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Atlantic Striped Bass Conservation Act; Atlantic Striped Bass Fishery
Note: EPA no longer updates this information, but it may be useful as a reference or resource.
[Federal Register: September 14, 2006 (Volume 71, Number 178)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Page 54261-54262]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr14se06-13]
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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
50 CFR Part 697
[I.D. 063003A]
RIN 0648-AR33
Atlantic Striped Bass Conservation Act; Atlantic Striped Bass Fishery
AGENCY: National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Commerce.
ACTION: Withdrawal of a notice of intent to prepare an Environmental
Impact Statement (EIS).
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SUMMARY: On October 20, 2003, NMFS announced its intent to prepare an
Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) and hold scoping meetings in
accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). On
September 7, 2006, the Assistant Administrator for Fisheries decided to
withdraw NMFS' intent to prepare an EIS due the increase in the fishing
mortality rate since the time of the original notice. The overwhelming
public response to the rulemaking - the great majority of whom were in
support of maintaining the closure - together with the clear public
perception that large trophy sized fish congregate in the Exclusive
Economic Zone (EEZ), suggests that fishing effort in an opened EEZ
might markedly increase striped bass mortality above the already
elevated current rates. Therefore, further processing of an EIS is no
longer warranted. The notice of intent to prepare an EIS is withdrawn
and the NEPA process is hereby terminated.
DATES: Effective September 14, 2006.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For any further information, contact
Chris Moore, Chief, Partnerships and Communications Division, Office of
Sustainable Fisheries, NMFS, 1315 East-West Highway, Room 13317, Silver
Spring, MD 20910.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Background
On April 24, 2003, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission
(Commission) recommended that the Secretary of Commerce (Secretary)
remove the moratorium on the harvest of striped bass in the EEZ and
implement Federal regulations to compliment Commission measures in
Amendment 6 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Striped Bass
(Amendment 6). In addition, the letter included rationale for the
action and requested that the Secretary implement a 28-inch minimum
size limit for the recreational and commercial striped bass fisheries
in the EEZ and allow states the ability to adopt more restrictive rules
for fishermen and vessels licensed in their jurisdiction.
In February 2003, the 2002 fishing mortality rate of F=0.28 was
below the target level (F=0.30), whereas the female spawning stock
biomass of 60.6 million pounds was 1.6 times the target level an all-
time high. Under these ideal conditions, the Commission recommended to
the Secretary to open the EEZ to striped bass fishing.
In response to the Commission recommendation, an advance notice of
proposed rulemaking (ANPR) was published in the Federal Register on
July 21, 2003 (68 FR 43074). The comment period closed on August 20,
2003. The comment period was subsequently reopened on August 26, 2003
(68 FR 51232), for an additional 30-days. NMFS announced that it was
considering proposed rulemaking to revise Federal Atlantic striped bass
regulations to be compatible with the Commission's Amendment 6, and was
seeking comments on the implementation of the Commission's recommendations
to the Secretary to open the EEZ to the harvest of Atlantic striped bass.
NMFS also solicited comments on possible alternative management measures
and issues relative to these recommendations.
After review of comments received from the public during the ANPR
comment period, NMFS determined there were sufficient issues raised,
both in support of, and in opposition to, the Commission's
recommendation, to warrant further evaluation of the potential impacts
of opening the EEZ to striped bass fishing. That determination resulted
in the initiation of a decision-making process required under the NEPA.
A Notice of intent to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS)
and notice of scoping process was published in the Federal Register on
October 20, 2003 (68 FR 59906). The notice presented a summary of the
ANPR comments, and requested further public input on a list of
potential alternatives and other management measures. Public meetings
were held in nine Atlantic coast states between November 5 and December
10, 2003, and public comment period closed on December 22, 2003.
Delay in the Development of an EIS
In September 2004, the Commission's Striped Bass Technical
Committee (Technical Committee) prepared its 2004 Stock Assessment
Report for use by the Striped Bass Management Board (Board), which
included data through 2003. That assessment contradicted previous
assessments which had indicated that the striped bass population was
not overfished and continued to grow in abundance. Instead, the results
indicated that the stock was overfished and that spawning stock biomass
had been reduced to below target levels. However, given that results of
tagging study analyses did not show a similar increase in fishing
mortality, the members of the Technical Committee did not feel the
assessment provided an accurate representation of stock status. As
such, the Technical Committee recommended the 2004 assessment results
not be used for management decisions until both the modeling software
and the input data sets were reevaluated during the 2005 assessment
process. As a result, the 2004 stock assessment has not been used by
the Commission for management decisions. In addition, NMFS decided to
delay the completion of the EIS to be able to incorporate the 2005
stock assessment in the EIS.
During 2005, the Technical Committee and Stock Assessment
Subcommittee reviewed model inputs and the model itself to determine if
the results from the 2004 assessment truly reflected status of the
population or were an artifact of data or model errors. They concluded
that a number of the indices used in the 2004 effort were not
consistent with what was observed in the population as a whole, or were
contradictory to the majority of other reliable time series. Those
indices were removed from subsequent model runs. The Technical
Committee believes the current assessment reflects the true status of
the population, i.e., the stock is not overfished and overfishing is
not occurring.
Further Public Participation
As a result of the new assessment results, NMFS decided to consider
options for opening the EEZ again in 2006. Because significant time had
passed since the nine initial scoping hearings were held in November-
December 2003, and given that further stock assessments were now
available, NMFS needed additional scoping before finalizing the
alternatives to be analyzed in a draft EIS. NMFS developed a
preliminary draft analyses of Federal management options to open the
EEZ to the harvest of Atlantic Striped Bass (Options Paper), which
included the 2005 stock assessment. This document was published in the
Federal Register on April 24, 2006 (71 FR 20984) with a
[[Page 54262]]
30-day comment period. The comment period was extended an additional 30
days and ended June 26, 2006. Options considered in the document were:
(1) Open the entire EEZ, implement a 28-inch (71.1-cm) minimum size
limit, and allow states to adopt more restrictive regulations for
fishermen and vessels licensed in their state (Commission
recommendation); (2) open the entire EEZ, implement a 28-inch (71.1-cm)
minimum size limit, allow states to adopt more restrictive regulations
for fishermen and vessels licensed in their state, implement a
recreational bag limit of 2 fish per day, require circle hooks for all
commercial and recreational hook and line fishing using bait, and
commercial trip limits (option a) bycatch trip limit options (option
b); (3) open the entire EEZ, implement a 28-inch (71.1-cm) minimum size
limit, allow states to adopt more restrictive regulations for fishermen
and vessels licensed in their state, allow hook and line gear only,
implement a recreational bag limit of 2 fish per day, require circle
hooks for all commercial and recreational hook and line fishing using
bait, and implement a commercial trip limit of 30 fish per trip or day
whichever is greater; and (4) status quo. No preferred option was
identified.
Most public comments were based on review of the Options Paper,
which analyzed impacts under each of the four options. The Option Paper
stated that options 1-3 could result in an increased fishing pressure
in the EEZ (i.e., increased mortality), however, any increase in EEZ
effort will likely be minimal and offset by an equally small decrease
in nearshore effort.
The vast majority (97 percent) of the 8,000-plus comments were for
option 4 status quo. Public comments overwhelmingly indicated that the
public disagreed with the Option Paper's conclusion that there would be
no increase mortality if the EEZ were opened. The public believes that
if the EEZ were opened that mortality would increase substantially. In
addition, the public believes that ``It has been determined that the
majority of striped bass in the EEZ are larger fish, which also tend to
be females,'' although, there is no scientific study to substantiate
this. Regardless, there exists a strong perception by the public that
larger fish are offshore and that perception alone might cause an
increase in fishing pressure in the EEZ and, as a result, an overall
increase in mortality on the stock.
Discussion
The striped bass stock has shown significant changes since 2003
when the Commission recommended that the Secretary open the EEZ to
striped bass fishing in Amendment 6. Although approved in February
2003, Amendment 6 was based largely on data from the 2001 Stock
Assessment. Notably, at the time of adoption, the best available
science suggested the mortality rate to be stable and below the
threshold, and that spawning stock abundance was increasing. Amendment
6 incorporated new management standards to ensure stock conservation
including targets and thresholds for both mortality and spawning stock
biomass, and five triggers that would allow the Commission to respond
quickly to increased mortality. One of the triggers is ``If the
Management Board determines that the fishing mortality threshold is
exceeded in any year, the Board must adjust the striped bass management
program to reduce the fishing mortality rate to a level that is at or
below the target within one year.''
The best available science suggests that the stock's status and
fishing mortality rate have changed significantly since the time the
Commission approved Amendment 6 in February 2003. Not only has the
overall trend shifted towards increased mortality, but the specific
fishing mortality rate itself has increased from F=0.28 (below the
target of 0.30) to F=0.40 a rate that exceeds the target and is almost
equal to the overfishing threshold of 0.41. This shift represents a
mortality increase of 43% since 2002. In fact, fishing mortality
estimates for older striped bass (age 9 F=0.50) and (age 10 F=0.44)
both exceed the threshold level. Further, the trend toward increasing
female spawning stock biomass (SSB) has reversed itself with the
overall biomass decreasing from 60.6 million pounds (according to the
science available in February 2003), to 55.0 million pounds in November
2005. The SSB remains well above the target of 38.6 million pounds and
threshold of 30.9 million pounds, but has shown a downward trend of 9
percent since 2002.
The analysis in the Options Paper stated that any increase in EEZ
effort (increase mortality) under options 1-3 would likely be minimal.
But, with the fishing mortality rate at F=0.40, NMFS cannot be certain,
especially after taking into account the overwhelming public perception
that large trophy sized fish congregate in the EEZ, that opening the
EEZ would not increase effort and lead to an increase in mortality that
would exceed the threshold. Since the current mortality rate is just
below the threshold, any increase will require the Commission to reduce
fishing effort on striped bass. Both the Commission's and NMFS' ability
to immediately respond to an overfishing and/or overfished situation is
a potential issue, particularly given the timeframe within which
Amendment 6 was created, and given the lag time in which a given year's
data is available to management.
Therefore, NMFS has concluded that it would be imprudent to open
the EEZ at this time and has chosen to not proceed with further
processing of an EIS under the NEPA process.
Authority: 16 U.S.C. 1851 note.
Dated: September 8, 2006.
Alan D. Risenhoover,
Director, Office of Sustainable Fisheries, National Marine Fisheries
Service.
[FR Doc. E6-15262 Filed 9-13-06; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-22-S