Sandwich fish farm closure faces resistance

[macojoe]

By DOUG FRASER
STAFF WRITER
For the past 10 years, at least twice a year, David Daniels, two of his fishing buddies and their wives have visited the Cape for what he says is the best trout fishing in New England.

"It's the size and the number of the trout," said Daniels, a fish and wildlife officer in Enfield, Conn. "The (fish) stocking program is much better in Massachusetts. It's got Connecticut beat by 100 percent."

The Massachusetts Fisheries and Wildlife Board decided last week to close the Sandwich fish hatchery and another in the western part of the state because of budget cuts.

Daniels and his friends are getting ready to launch a letter-writing campaign to state officials to keep the Sandwich facility open. The two hatcheries combined produce 25 percent of the fish stocked in the state's ponds, lakes and streams. Three other hatcheries will remain open.

"It's a stab in the back for Cape Cod. It's like taking the Red Sox out of Boston," said Richard Thrasher of closing the Sandwich hatchery. Thrasher lives in Monument Beach and fishes with Daniels and the Connecticut crew.

The Cape has only one native species of trout, the sea run brown or salter brook trout. That species has almost disappeared.

Thrasher said he believes that more remote places such as Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket and the Outer Cape might be too far away to keep the trout alive in transit, now that the nearest hatchery is in central Massachusetts.

Felix Browne, spokesman for the state Office of Environmental Affairs, said that most stocking is done in the spring, and that the 52,000 trout stocked this fall would go to all the usual places, including the Vineyard. Spring stocking, he said, could be affected by the hatchery closures.

Russ Lawrence is a trout fisherman who fishes from his canoe in the warmer months and ice fishes on Martha's Vineyard ponds in winter. He said that any reduction of the stocking program is criminal.

"My understanding was that freshwater fishing and hunting licenses was an untapped resource and when we ran into a budget crisis and this happened," Lawrence said.

State lawmakers are getting an earful about the hatchery closings, said staff at Sen. Robert O'Leary's office and Sen. Therese Murray's office.

As Senate Ways and Means Committee chairman, Murray oversees state department budgets. Murray spokesman Kevin O'Reilly said cuts were made to just about every department budget, but that Murray and many other legislators believed the $12.7 million approved for the wildlife department was enough to keep the hatcheries open.

O'Reilly said the state received notification yesterday from the U.S. Department of the Interior that $4.7 million in federal funding was in jeopardy because the state ended the practice of putting money collected from hunting and fishing licenses and fees into a fund dedicated solely to fish and wildlife programs.

When he took office last January, Gov. Mitt Romney decided to end such practices because they lacked accountability since the funds are outside the budget process. Many of those funds were also spending more than they were taking in, with a combined deficit as high as $20 million annually, said Matthew Gorzkowicz, Murray's budget director.

"To say we're taking in money (from hunting and fishing licenses) and diverting it to other uses is not true," Gorzkowicz said. The state gets between $6 million and $7 million from licenses and fees, and $4.7 million from the federal government. The state budget makes up the difference. That was the portion that was cut.

(Published: October 1, 2003)