I just received this from RISAA Please help!


We have come to the end of the General Assembly session and our bill on restricting the purse seining of Menhaden is effectively been bottled up and blocked by one legislator.

It seems that Jan P. Malik (Democrat- District 67, Barrington, Warren has told the recreational fishing community of Rhode Island to go to hell. He has refused, as a member of the House committee which has the responsibility for the bill to entertain any of the compromises offered by his own colleagues, RISAA or the house staff.

We need to send Mr Malik a loud message that we, the recreational fishing community of Rhode Island are tired and fed up with this representation of special interests despite the fact that we have 11,500 signatures in support of this bill and that recreational fishing contributes 160 Million dollars a year to the State of Rhode Island



Mr Malik can be contacted via the following means

E-Mail: rep-malik@rilin.sate.ri.us
Phone: His liquor store which is the phone number listed for him on the General Assembly web site is 247-1733
Home Phone: 247-1271

If you live in his district make sure to let him know what you think about his politics.

Thank you, with all of our voices, we will yet win this battle.

Doug MacPherson
Chairman, Legislative Committee - RISAA

UMMMM, Have you looked? This bill while well intentioned doesnt have legs to stand on now, every bunker in the universe is in narragansett bay...not good for the notion that there arent any around...bad timing or bad luck..whatever that bill isnt going anyplace.

Yeah I know there are lots of bunker this year, but I still think the bill is a very good idea. BTW Aren't you the one with the monster bass caught recently? If so, Congrats, I'm still looking for my first of the season.

Amen Billy.
good intention but the bill was the wrong time/place/method to do this.
I sent Malik a letter a few weeks ago CONGRATULATING him on being a voice of reason!

Voice of reason? The bunker are in the bay so the population must be fine? Why don't we say its fine when there are enormous schools up and down the east coast like there were historically. We have very low standards these days...

This has been rehashed and I'm not rearguing.

The RISAA bill is a fish grab; we want them, they cant have them kind of deal. NONE of the science supports their claims re: water quality etc.. do the searches this has been argued.

ASMFC indicates that Menhaden is not over fished, and wont back these types of measures so RISAA is trying to circumvent the fisheries management process, which is a very very very dangerous precedent to try and set.

This is a key bill I really hope it passes.

there maybe alot around this year but if we don't protect it the stocks will crash again.it happend before and will happen again.Bunker made a come back because some states banned purse seining.But not Rhode Island.:mad:

I guess you could look at it either way. We have bunker now and the fishing could be viewed as proof a WHY a bill would be a good thing. No one is really going to argue that the fishing has been epic in Bay. It's obvious why Jersey was so good last year as well.

To some degree the fishing will be good where ever the bunker end up in a given year. RI in particular is reaping the benefits this time. Some states, not so much. I don't think there could ever be too much bunker. I'm even hearing reports now of very good weakfishing taking place in the Bay. Been a while since that happened.

Of course there's lots of bunker in the bay - Ark has limited their activity this year and no other purse seiners have showed up. Also, Ark got a late start, I'm told because lobstermen did not need much bunker for bait. I guess their contention that lobstermen's livelihood depends on the bait supply of bunker is simply another untruth. Perhaps they are lying low so that people like Bill will look around and say "we don't need this legislation, there are plenty of bunker."

Contrary to this bill being a fish grab, this bill seeks to undo the fish grab currently in place. Currently a few have the ability to take the resource to the exclusion of the many. They've laid low this year so far, but it won't take many sets to clear out the massive schools from the bay.

The opponents have purposely mislead folks with half truths and innuendo. They make is sound like ASFMC is opposed to this legislation as contrary to a coast wide management plan. They are not opposed to RI controlling methods of fishing for pogies - they simply will not support it since it is not their purview, it's a local issue that deals with local populations of fish. [I recall that there was some opposition to some of the wording of the bill, which is easily resolved - but not the substance of the bill]

Opponents say that menhaden are not over fished That's only true for worldwide populations. History shows us that our resident populations can be decimated. It's been done for years, then the boats leave the area to find other areas that hold bunker.

Even the opponents don't buy their own spin. Otherwise, why would they be opposed to RI limiting fishing in their estuaries (like the other NE states) if there are sooo many pogies everywhere?

But the real problem - in typical RI corrupt fashion - is that Malik won't allow this bill to be considered - period.:fishslap: No compromises, no hearings, no technical changes, nothing! So much for the political process.

:confused: :gorez:

The opponents have purposely mislead folks with half truths and innuendo.

Oh and that is different than the non-truths being spouted regarding water-quality and the such.

The bill is built on warm fuzzy memories. The "historical' population from the 70's was probably a result of our practices: i.e. less control on treatment of seage and the such, so waterquality was significantly worse than it is today.

I did a lot of research before forming my opinions, and straight from one of the top ecologists in the world who happens to be at URI/GSO "One important thing that folks should be aware of is that the chlorophyll concentrations in the mid bay at least have declined by about 75% since the early 1970s. As a result the bottom of the bay appears very food limited to us - supporting large schools of pelagic menhaden may not be such a great thing for demersal species."