FISHING NEWS: Bad Company: Omega Protein and the RFA

[capt.frankdanner]

It is my opinion that Donofroi is a loud mouthed moron, who has taken over the RFA for his own agenda. RFA members, it seems, are leaving the RFA like fleas jumping off a dead dog.

[CaptTB]

Interesting you point out some Omega employees showing up at a public rally (and in another op ed you claim they "teamed up" with Omega, a stance you are now backtracking from since it was obviously an inaccurate statement) but you ignore that both MFCN and PETA members were at the rally as well. PETA was photographed and published in a number of publications both online and in print, far more than Omega members were, yet you do not claim that, as in your earlier piece, RFA "Teamed up" with MFCN and PETA. Why? Additionally, you now claim that a "few hundred" people attended the rally. That too is an inaccurate statement. Since I know for a fact that several hundred people from NJ alone attended (I personally booked over 190 tickets on buses myself) plus at least two buses from NC, one or two from Florida, one from South Carolina and one from Georgia plus two from NY (these are only the ones I know for a fact came) not to mention the numerous people who drove (myself included) and took the train (I know of at least a dozen just from NJ) the number was well over 1000 people.

Weren't you there? You know as well as I that a "few hundred" is a gross underestimation that may fit well with your tirades but is not factually correct.

Omega was not involved in the organizing or coordination of this event. I know this because I was. They did not participate in either the e-mail exchanges between organizers (hundreds of e-mails) nor did they participate in any of the nearly dozen conference calls that took place prior to the rally. It was discovered about 2 weeks or so before the rally that they wished to attend. While many people, including the RFA, were not pleased with this revelation it would be something along the lines of what one might expect MFCN to do if we the organizers tried to prevent someone or a group of someones from attending a public rally. Omega does not even target a species of fish that is even managed by the MSA, so their presence made little sense from the RFA and other organizers perspectives (I speak for myself and give my opinion on others based on their comments, but they must speak for themselves) but it is every American Citizen's right to assemble and be heard. That is why both MFCN and PETA members who attended the rally were also treated with the same respect that everyone else was, despite the fact that neither I nor the RFA nor anyone else "teamed up" with them.

The rally turnout was most certainly light. Though understandable, as you say yourself these are difficult economic times, while the participant turnout was light the congressional turnout most certainly was not, which is likely the reason for the sudden flurry of post rally activity by you.

Capt. Tony Bogan
United Boatmen

[HutchJr]

In response to recent criticisms leveled against the Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA) by the Marine Fish Conservation Network’s executive director Matt Tinning on behalf of his members, RFA will offer no apologies for its participation in the Keep Fishermen Fishing rally in Washington DC on March 21, 2012.

Mr. Tinning’s outlandish public claims that the Recreational Fishing Alliance “teamed up” with Omega Protein to convene the Keep Fishermen Fishing simply because representatives of Omega Protein attended the rally is completely absurd. Given that the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and Marine Fish Conservation Network’s own executive director - and even their own individual members - also attended the rally, by Mr. Tinning’s logic it must therefore be determined that both PETA and the Marine Fish Conservation Network also officially "teamed up" with RFA and the Keep Fishermen Fishing rally.

The rally was a public event held on U.S. Capitol grounds, meaning that neither RFA nor official rally organizers were able to physically remove from the grounds any of those who would peaceably assemble to provide a counter-point to our reform Magnuson message. RFA supports efforts to reform the federal fisheries law, we do not however support any efforts to trample upon any American’s First Amendment rights, specifically “the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble.”

RFA will never apologize for defending our members’ right to fish on healthy fish stocks, nor will we ever apologize for upholding the values of the First Amendment. Asking us to do either is un-American and a clear violation of our mission.

It should be noted that five different conservation groups initially united to form the Marine Fish Conservation Network in 1992 in an effort to streamroll significant restrictions into the 1996 Magnuson Stevens reauthorization by claiming ‘support’ from mainstream recreational fishermen. The groups involved in that formation were Ocean Conservancy, Greenpeace, National Audubon Society, National Coalition for Marine Conservation, and World Wildlife Fund.

In the time since, a vast majority of the sportfishing interests have departed the coalition after recognizing it for being a simple ‘environmental astroturfing’ arm of the Pew Environment Group. In fact, most of the participants today who have stayed within the Pew-funded Network have direct financial ties to Pew in one way or another of their own.

Following the 2010 fishermen's rally which helped bring the plight of the recreational and commercial fishing industry to the forefront of the fisheries debate in DC, Pew's Lee Crocket told the Washington based Roll Call newspaper that his organization had "funded advocacy groups, including the Marine Fish Conservation Network and the Ocean Conservancy," to lobby for a policy which privatizes our nation's fisheries in the name of reducing overall fishing participation.

As for Mr. Tinning, prior to joining the Pew-funded Marine Fish Conservation Network last year, he was was Legislative Director and Vice President of External affairs at Ocean Conservancy and a lobbyist and political analyst for the Australian Government inside their Washington Embassy. Mr. Tinning was also a legislative aide to New Mexico Senator Jeff Bingaman.

Regrettably, during the heavy political lift required in the late 90’s by the Recreational Fishing Alliance to ban the Omega Protein reduction fleet from many inshore coastal waters along the Atlantic, Mr. Tinning was still attending college back in home in Australia where he was earning his degree in U.S. politics and law. Based on his absurd rants, he's not much of a student of history, American nor American fisheries for that matter!

RFA has a proven track record of going toe-to-toe with the reduction industry, as RFA executive director Jim Donofrio noted in the Asbury Park Press earlier this week.

You can also see more of RFA's official bunker positions in the links below:
http://www.joinrfa.org/Press/ASMFCBunker_080411.pdf and http://www.joinrfa.org/Press/RFA_Men...ents102411.pdf

As for Mr. Danner’s comments, you know what they say about “opinions.” The only agenda that Donofrio has is to meeting the mission of the Recreational Fishing Alliance, which is to “safeguard the rights of saltwater anglers, protect boat, marine and tackle industry jobs, and ensure the long-term sustainability of our Nation's saltwater fisheries.”

Perhaps Mr. Tinning and Mr. Danner feel that the only way to long-term sustainability of our saltwater fisheries is by joining with the likes of PEW & EDF to create wide-reaching marine reserves and through the privatization of our fisheries (read: catch shares & sector separation) in the name of preservation, not conservation. RFA believes passionately that we can protect the fish while also protecting the fishermen and the fishing industry.

Jim Hutchinson
Recreational Fishing Alliance

[ultangler]

I wasn't there this year but I was at the 2010 rally and I need to add a few things:
1. I didn't even hear about this year's rally. No press release came to my email, there was no phone call, nothing. Nor did I see it publicized in any way, shape or form. Considering that I'm a member of the national outdoors press, much less the fact that I'm a dedicated recreational angler, what does this say about the effectiveness of its promotion?
2. At the 2010 rally, the commercial/recreational mix certainly made for strange bedfellows. There was little everyone agreed upon, except for the fact that we were all pissed off at the regulations we faced - whether we fished for fun or profit. This seems to be the common theme RFA has capitolized upon.
3. Just because Omega was there, you can't state they "teamed up" with RFA. You can say they might have some surprisingly similar goals, that maybe they have some political ideas in common, but not that they "teamed up".
4. RFA does seem to have tunnel vision, when it comes to the issues. They have their own, and that's that. I know and like Hutch and I'm sure his motives are pure, but when I've reached out to the organization in the past - specifically, when the MD legislature considered allowing the open-water dumping of dredge material in the upper Chesapeake Bay and we needed help fighting it - they completely blew me off. As I recall Jim Donofrio's exact words to me were "that's not an issue we're worried about."
5. My money's going to the CCA.

[CaptTB]

ultangler, perhaps you will want to check how you receive news releases. I know of at least 2 ap newswire releases that went out prior to the rally. The first was picked up by some 150+ news agencies across the country within the first few hours (I linked to a number of them on the website at the time)

Don't deal with those things much so I am not knowledgeable about how the system works with newswire releases and reporters but hope that info helps for any future events.

Capt. Tony Bogan
United Boatmen

[ultangler]

Hey Capt. Tony - Thank you for reinforcing my point! The saltwater recreational boating & fishing industry is covered in special-interest magazines by a few hundred writers, almost all of whom are members of BWI (such as myself) and a few of whom are members of OWAA. We're easy to find and we don't normally cull through the reams of info coming in through the AP wire looking for tidbits related to saltwater fishing & boating. Again I ask: what does the outreach on this event tell you? The fact that press releases went out to AP, but people like me weren't contacted despite (because of?) my 2010 attendance and the resulting coverage (an article in Sport Fishing Mag and a blog on BoaterMouth), tells me that maybe the interest was in grabbing exposure in newspapers as opposed to reaching saltwater recs? That maybe the organizers were less interested in reaching out to the recs than they were in reaching out to other groups? Maybe that they learned something about including certain groups/people in '10? Or, perhaps it was merely an oversight... but for folks as PR savvy as RFA, I doubt it.

[HutchJr]

Speaking of “outreach” Lenny, I called you yesterday – by phone – but no return phone call. That and the following fact lends me to believe that you’re being a bit disingenuous with your criticism.

Respectuflly, I checked our Constant Contact email management system over the weekend, and it appears that in 2009, on the day after a press release was sent out by the RFA announcing that legislation had been introduced by Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) to amend the Magnuson Stevens Act to provide limited flexibility in dealing with rigid, unscientifically supported, arbitrary deadlines, ‘Ultangler’ officially opted out of Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA) email alerts and is now listed in our database under the “do not mail” category.

Lenny, you officially requested on March 19, 2009 that the RFA no longer contact you via email – seems a pretty tough criticism for you to level against RFA, that three years after BLOCKING our emails from reaching your account, you’re complaining about how we never contact you?

Since we do use Constant Contact to manage our mailings, I am not allowed to email you anything – ever! The only way it’s possible is if you opt back in yourself. By our records, you haven’t received an email bulletin, action alert or press release from the RFA in over 3 years.

So, you don’t accept RFA email alerts, yet the rally information was all over the web, it was featured in the Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, CQ Roll Call, PR Newswire, Associated Press, Angler Magazine, Big Game Fishing Journal & The Fisherman magazine. Now, if you’re only getting your news from the Bonnier publications for which you write (Salt Water Sportsman, Sport Fishing, Marlin, etc.) then certainly you’re not going to get any information about the rally given that they have chosen to ignore the event.

As for the “common theme RFA has capitalized on,” it’s not simply that we’re “all pissed off at the regulations we faced,” the ‘ask’ here is to reform the Magnuson Stevens Act to right the wrongs which were included in the law in 1996 & 2006 when groups like Marine Fish Conservation Network and Teddy Roosevelt Conservation Partnership (both groups having received significant funding from the Pew Environment Group over the years) helped memorialize the rigid language included by the environmental business community by signing off on the approvals, erroneously I might add, on behalf of the recreational fishing community.

What it appears that you don’t understand (and what the Bonnier publications refuse to publish) is that the commercial and recreational organizers in the rally (which includes recreational groups like RFA, MSSA, NACO, Viking Yachts, Big Game Fishing Journal, United Boatmen to name a few) are asking Congress to reform Magnuson through passage of the Flexibility and Access in Rebuilding American Fisheries Act, HR3061.

While they’re have been some bold claims made by Mr. Tinning’s group about how this particular legislation HR3061 presents a “blunt and blanket anti-regulatory message across all sectors,” what the legislation actually aims to do is clearly spelled out in the legislation itself should folks take the time to read it.

In a nutshell Lenny, HR3061 would (A) extend rebuilding timelines in certain situations (for which Congress and Dr. Jane Lubchenco herself and admitted that 10-year timeframes for reaching rebuild targets are arbitrary and not related to science); (B) suspend ACLs and 'accountability measures' for fish stocks where science and data is lacking (if the science and statistical analysis is insufficient per National Standard guidelines, why would you support payback of recreational quota on a year-to-year basis?); (C) calls for socioeconomic impact studies to be presented by councils when certain management decisions are made; and (D) requires the science and statistical committees to provide a more transparent analysis of their findings so that regional fisheries councils have more understanding of how findings were established.

Finally, HR3061 would (E) require that the National Research Council (which is the highest peer-reviewed scientific group in the US, performing duties under the National Academy of Sciences) to perform a comprehensive review of the NOAA recreational data collection programs and the improvements made since the 2006 reauthorization. Keeping in mind that MRFSS was supposed to have been replaced, by law, in 2009, this legislation would have the National Research Council further evaluate how well NOAA Fisheries has performed this project.

My question to you Lenny, please, is what part of HR3061 are you opposed to specifically?

There’s some pretty twisted logic in our sportfishing community, perhaps stemming from 30 years of hatred between the commercial and recreational sector. It’s at the point now that if a commercial fisherman supports an idea, the recreational angler is supposed to oppose it without question. “If a commercial fisherman hates catch shares, by all means, catch shares must be good, so let’s support it,” becomes the call from the sportfishing community, which is pretty much the response I've gotten from the national glossy mag editors.

Does it seem more sensible somehow to oppose efforts to correct the terrible flaws in Magnuson, simply because the commercial fishermen are supporting it? Seems like a load of illogical hogwash!

At a time when most Americans have grown bitterly frustrated at the partisan gridlock in Congress between Democrats and Republicans, that tired mindset within the sportfishing elite that comms and recs should never meet on common ground is precisely how Mr. Tinning’s friends were so damn effective in creating a network of no take, no access marine reserves off the California coast.

Lenny and the rest of the elite Bonnier media seem to have spent more time focusing on the fact that the recreational and commercial interests were united under a common goal, while Mr. Tinning has focused all of his criticism on the ‘red herring’ in this debate, which is the menhaden industry. Lost in all the discussion is the ‘ask’ of Congress, supporting pragmatic Magnuson reform.

Again Lenny, what is it specifically about HR3061 that you oppose?

And how in the heck do you expect the RFA to get releases to this particular member of the national outdoor media if you’ve blocked messages from reaching your email box?

And if you're quicker to post an online criticism than you are with a response to a personal phone call, what's that say about the state of the outdoor media today?

****Respectfully as a follow-up to Lenny Rudow, an outdoor writer for whom I have a great deal of professional respect, he just called and we had a great half-hour conversation regarding these issues. I hope this 'communication gap' will be narrowed in the future once both of us make a concerted effort to keep in touch on issues related to the fish, the fishermen and the fishing industry. Thanks Len ****

[ultangler]

For the record - Jim and I spoke; I reminded him I'd asked to be put on the press/email list again in 2010, and he reminded me I hadn't reached out to him or RFA since then. We agreed on some issues, and more or less agreed to disagree on others. I suggest that for a future article of the week, the summeries for HR 3061 (supported by RFA) and HR 2304 (supported by some other recreational fishing entities) be printed, so rec anglers here on Tidalfish can read them and decide for themselves which makes more sense.

[Matt Tinning]

Thanks to those who read my Tidal Fish piece. It reflects a grave concern about the direction RFA has taken, and about whether their leadership is actually advancing the interests of recreational fishermen.

The main point of the op-ed doesn't hinge on how much behind-the-scenes coordination occurred between Omega Protein and RFA in advance of the rally. I have no way of knowing that, and it’s not of particular interest. My point is about the pivot in direction RFA has made in recent years; and the alignment of their message with others who engage in fishing practices that harm our prospects for future access to healthy recreational fisheries.

RFA had a very clear message for their 'Keep Fishermen Fishing' rally: get out of the way and let all of us—commercial and recreational fishermen alike—catch more fish, regardless of what the science tells us about the consequences. That was a message that united a strange mix of protesters on March 21, including a sizable contingent from Omega Protein: our rough estimate was 15 out of a crowd 300, which would be 5% of attendees.

The truth is that the cross-sectoral anti-regulatory fervor being stirred up by the national leadership of RFA—which permeated many RFA communications in the lead-up to the rally—is directly in line with Omega Protein's case against ASMFC's emerging new management approach. Omega Protein employee Keith Mason told National Journal: "we're here for the jobs", echoing the entire rally theme. Captain Bogan tells us that rally organizers knew about Omega’s plans to attend in support of the rally two weeks prior to the main event. There’s been no indication that they asked them to stay away.

To liken the Omega rally contingent to a couple of PETA counter-protesters is beyond disingenuous. PETA was there with a (bizarre) counter-message: they were there in direct opposition to the rally, and as usual to fishing interests more broadly. Omega, by contrast, were there in vocal support of the rally's central message.

It’s true that in a past life RFA did important work to support legislation limiting the reduction fishery off the New Jersey coast. The RFA of old is to be commended for that. The new RFA, despite maintaining public opposition to the reduction fishery, is a different beast. There are countless more recent examples of their leadership working directly counter to the best interests of anglers—whether they come from last month’s rally, their consistent rejection of sustainable management, or their split from the rest of the recreational community in New Jersey over Pots off the Reef. It’s long past time they reversed course.

[HutchJr]

Perhaps the political operatives inside the Pew-funded ‘preservation’ groups should think of reversing their own course, away from the defamatory and egregious attacks upon reasonable, pragmatic fisheries management measures which would conscientiously protect our resources, as well as America’s right to responsible access.

March 25, 2011 - http://www.joinrfa.org/Press/NJReefBill_032511.pdf

March 8, 2012 - http://www.joinrfa.org/Press/PotsOffReef_030812.pdf

[CaptTB]

Captain Bogan tells us that rally organizers knew about Omega’s plans to attend in support of the rally two weeks prior to the main event. There’s been no indication that they asked them to stay away.

That is because I also told you that no one told them to "stay away" as we have no right to try to deny someone their right as an American Citizen to attend a public demonstration. Same as we did not tell your organization to "stay away" or PETA to stay away.

As I said earlier, telling someone they are not welcome at a constitutionally protected activity is something I would expect you and MFCN to do, and your above quoted comment backs that up.