Fish Managers, Industry Eloquently Testify Against Creating National Marine Monuments by Exec Order
SEAFOODNEWS.COM By Peggy Parker - September 29, 2015
Industry leaders from both coasts and fishery managers from Alaska and New England testified today before the House Subcommittee on Water, Power and Oceans about naming new marine national monuments off the Atlantic Coast and Alaska.
At issue is the process by which vast ocean areas can be designated off limits to some or all human activity, including commercial fishing. One is a deliberative, from the ground up process managed under authority of the Magnuson-Stevenson Act (MSA) and other legislation through regional fishery management councils, NOAA, and other resource-management agencies.
The other process is by presidential declaration under the authority of the Antiquities Act of 1906. This process results in a Marine National Monument, similar to land-based monuments that prohibit mining, drilling, commercial take of living resources, and other extraction activities.
“The most troublesome thing about the use of the Antiquities Act,” said Jon Williams, president...
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