WESTERN & CENTRAL PACIFIC NETWORK
Monitoring Transparency and Efficiency In Ocean Resource Management
Honolulu, Hawai`i
wcpnetwork@hawaii.rr.com
MEDIA RELEASE
CONTACT: SCOTT FOSTER
Director of Communications
808-988-1708 ~ wcpnetwork@hawaii.rr.com
IMPROPER PUBLIC NOTICE INVALIDATES ACTIONS OF HONOLULU-BASED FEDERAL FISHING COUNCIL -- AGAIN
Will Taxpayers Again Pick Up Another $50-$60,000 Tab For Botched Meetings?
HONOLULU: JUNE 20, 2008 -- Decisions made during the Tuesday, June 17 and Wednesday, June 18 meetings of the June 16-19,2008, meeting of the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council (Wespac) are null and void because, for the second consecutive regularly scheduled meeting, the public were not given proper notice as required by federal law. SEE COPY OF FEDERAL REGISTER AT: http://belammc.com/... (no notice for Tuesday, two Wednesday agendas, and March instead of June). The affected actions include: the MHI Bottom fish season opening and a hearing for the National Environmental Protection Act changes. The decision-making portions of the meetings will need to be held again at an estimated cost of $50-$60,000. Official participants are flown in from as far away as the Commonwealth of the Norther Mariana Islands (CNMI) and Guam and in addition to their annual salaries and benefits, officials attending the Wespac meetings are paid approximately $650-day per diem in addition to their airfare, lodging and ground transportation costs.
The failure to provide proper public notice also occurred during Wespac's March 17-18, 2008, meeting in the CNMI and the decisions made there had to be reheard and voted upon during a subsequent makeup meeting in Honolulu on April 15, 2008. In an April 15, 2008, media release, Wespac blamed "a bureaucratic error" by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). Scott Foster, the Communications Director for the Western & Central Pacific Network said, "We have no doubt that Wespac's ED, Kitty Simonds will again lay this mistake off on others -- but the fact remains, as ED, Simonds job is to provide steady management which she has not done. Simonds must have known about this before the four-day series of meetings even began. Why wasn't anything said or the important bottomfish closure vote moved to later when it would have been legal?"
Foster also noted, "It gives us no pleasure to again call this error to Wespac's attention because this will require all interested parties to once-again attend or monitor yet-another meeting on yet-another day during yet-another month while our fish stocks move ever-closer to total collapse. Continued mismanagement by the WesternPacific Fisheries Management Council is driving the Main Hawaiian Islands bottom-fish stocks closer to collapse with the self-inflicted nullification of the few good rules they actually pass." "Fishermen should be upset if Wespac doesn't hold another meeting to re-do that vote simply because the Bottom Fish Season may reach the catch limit and close before Christmas" Foster said. "Wespac will have to do what they did after they botched the public notice of the last Wespac meeting and schedule a re-do that will end up adding to the already ridiculous costs paid by taxpayers."
It is anticipated that at the make up meeting, likely to be called the 143rd if Wespac follows form, the Council will find itself in the unenviable position of having to approve minutes for the 140th, 141st and 142nd meetings due to Wespac's dereliction. "Kitty Simonds derelict management of the Council would have resulted in her dismissal if she was employed in the private sector." Foster continued, "this will probably not quiet the calls, by many groups, for her removal."
WESPAC ALREADY UNDER TWO CONFIRMED FEDERAL INVESTIGATIONS
Two active federal investigations have been confirmed for a thorough investigation into the "...expenditures of the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council." This action is in response to numerous complaints concerning Wespac and their Executive Director Kitty Simonds questionable use of federal funds -- including the illegal lobbying of the Hawai`i State Legislature. An April 10, 2008, Associated Press story is at: http://honoluluadvertiser.com/...
Wespac is the little-known agency operating under the purview of the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and responsible for the implementation of the just-announced federal registration and permit requirement beginning on January 1, 2009, for all of Hawaii's recreational fishers. Wespac manages the largest area of the eight U.S. Regional Fishery Management Councils which comprises "about half" of the total Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) waters under the entire U.S. jurisdiction; an enormous territory of 1.5 million nm2. This tremendous area with its myriad valuable fish stocks and other fragile marine resources spreads across the Pacific dateline and the equator and includes Hawai`i, Guam, and the Commonwealth of theNorthern Marianas Islands (Saipan).
ALSO SEE:
April 11, 2008
U.S. GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE CONFIRMS 2ND INVESTIGATION OF DYSFUNCTIONAL FEDERAL FISH COUNCIL
www.scottfoster.org/Wespac2nd_Federal_Investigation.pdf
BACKGROUND
http://belammc.com/...