Maine Aquaculture Reform update
Contact Penobscot Bay Watch 594-5717
Maine aquaculture reform bill attacked by DMR, aquaculture industry.
AUGUSTA. The Maine legislature's aquaculture reform bill is entering a new uncertain phase that may result in an entirely new aquaculture bill coming out of Tuesday afternoon's worksession of the Legislature's Marine Resources Committee. The committee is asking the public
to send them additional written testimony to consider.
NOTE The aquaculture reform bill worksession will be held at a
different location on Tuesday February 26th, 1 pm : Room 216, Cross Office Building
(State and Local Government Committee Room)
The bill is now being strongly opposed by aquaculture industry leaders and by the Department of Marine Resources. They are opposed to giving coastal towns a say in the leasing process in their waters, and to requiring consideration
of the impact of a proposed fishpen or shellfish lease on existing local economies
and scenic and natural heritage values. In addition,
deputy Marine Resources Commissioner Penn Estabrook has threatened to attach a fiscal note on the bill, which some committee members fear would effectively kill passage of the bill.
Committee members say they have heard from
numerous members of the public that the Maine DMR is effectively keeping them and their concerns out of the aquaculture leasing process. The committee is determined to boost local participation in the leasing process, but opposition from the DMR and the aquaculture industry has so far prevented the committee from reaching consensus on the final aquaculture reform bill.
The impasse has led some legislators to consider proposing a dramatic re-write of the bill at the upcoming hearing. One veteran downeast legislator has complained that the bill is an "omnibuss bill" that is trying to accomplish too many things at once. This has resulted in a bill that has opponents of nearly every section of it.
The committee has put out a request to the public, calling on them to send
them additional written testimony to consider. According to Tiffany Leonard, the
Marine Resources Committee secretary:
Below read a discussion of these issues at the February 21st work session on the bill between the Marine Resources Committee and Maine DMR Deputy Commissioner Penn Estabrook
Testimony of Penn Estabrook, Deputy Commissioner, Maine Department of Marine Resources, and questions by
the Joint Standing Committee on Marine Resources on February 21, 2002
(Note: Estabrook is in charge of Maine DMR's Division of
Community Resource Development
. According to DMR literature, that division " is responsible for understanding economic and market issues that affect the fishing and aquaculture industries
for purposes of applying agency resources on them."
Penn Estabrook This is a significant policy change listed in the proposed statute I thought it might be helpful and useful for the committee if I tried to capture that.
For the past 25 or more years economic development policies with regards to coastal development encompassing aquaculture have been developed and enacted by the legislature with implementing regulations by the department. That has very rigorous siting and performance standards. The essence of it is to provide an opportunity for the development of aquaculture under very strong constraints Its to the degrees it does not displace very specific activities. We have rejected leases where they did
We find that significant portions of this bill in essence negate that development policy
The provisions that provide for aesthetics, for consideration of enjoyment of the surrounding areas
are very subjective as opposed to objective. The standards that in the current law provide for very objective standards to be developed, where when testimony is given on the record we can measure the efficacy of the testimony and sustain or reject.
For characterizations of lack of enjoyment or not liking the beauty or the lack thereof, there are no standards . It would be a subjective opinion in return which in our view we would be placed in a position where in any case where there was testimony on those points, questioning the effect on the beauty or effect on my enjoyment, we would have no way to consider it. Thus we'd be placed in a position of rejecting that application.
We're concerned then that for some number of applications that are received, we would not have an opportunity to be part of our growth mix. In fact, there would be several existing leases which could be
questioned under the same standards and thus, very risky with regard to being renewed.
So we find in this section here pertaining to municipal law, we actively get municipal involvement.
There's no criteria here for what municipalities may provide in the law so we would be placed in the same position in regard of accepting or rejecting municipal commentary, where we would so , no we don't agree with you, that its not beautiful. Again we're not in a position for doing that.
So that whole body of thought places this at very substantial risk. In terms of just business climate or basic jobs, it places the bulk of those permits at risk.
Thank you and I'll be glad to answer any questions.
Representative Lemoine:
The existing law has the words "other uses" in the siting criteria. Is that vague "other use" language a problem at this point?
A Where the use is an activity that can be promulgated. The type of boat going through, we have engaged in that kind of discussion. I can't tell you as we speak this moment that someone has talked, well we had talked about inspection...sorry that's not about criteria... as another use. So we have not engaged in that kind of discussion.
Representative Bull - Following up on that, Penn. I guess I have a little bit of a problem with you saying that everything in current statute is very objective, because I find much of the current statute, and some of the criteria laid out, offer a great deal of subjectivity.
The "other use" language. It talks about the lease not unreasonably interfering with public use or enjoyment of beaches, parks, etc. You have language in here about not unreasonably interfering with navigation. Pretty much everything in here is requiring the department to make a decision on the reasonable or unreasonableness of ...
A: The unreasonable and reasonable approaches subjectivity, I agree but .... The issue that its talking about is a clear activity: can people have access to the park? Can their boats have access to the park, can navigation in fact occur?
Bull: Talking about enjoyment. That's not access.
A: Well if you don't have access you can't enjoy. So consider that in the context of can you get to the place?
Q: So you are objecting to all our expansion or just that piece?
A: The last four items. The last four on the sheet? We prefer to back the original statutory language.
Q: So the economics, we can't quantify that?
A: Some would say economics is more an art form than a science....I'd probably put a fiscal note on the bill if we went into economic analysis.
Q: I don't understand that. What the intent here of the committee is to allow municipalities and other affected parties to come to you with arguments that this project is not a good idea because it would unduly interfere with the economics of the area or...
A: So you would have to assess the economics of the area. Do an economic input output analysis or some such and say this is going to have some sort of quantifiable effect on that economy. That's a large question.
Q: This seems very open to discussion and debate. We've received a lt of loud testimony that some of these other issues are not being fairly discussed by the department so we're trying to hear those criticisms and trying to make sure that when people come to testify in front of the department on one of these leases, that those issues are being addressed.
Q:Representative Volenik. My concern is if the deputy commissioner is correct that its been our policy to foster economic growth, then there is no correlation that the development of economic growth is exactly correlated to the development of aquaculture The growth of the economy is based on any number of industries and factors including the tourism industry, which to my area is far more economically important than the aquaculture industry in any of its forms. I have a question whether economic development must follow a certain model that model being the development of aquaculture.
I also question if... it seems some sort of breach of logic that if the economic development of the coastal region is the prime concern of the department, and yet the department says it cannot analyze the economic impact of an industry moving in and possibly displacing an existing industry such as tourism or traditional fishing I just see a logical disconnect there. Which ultimately brings me back to the point that, if the dept has trouble deciding what is economically beneficial to the coastal region, finfish aquaculture or tourism, then perhaps its ultimately up to the people of a community or a group of communities to decide their own fate, and to decide what is most important to them, and what sort of development is important to them to them. So I question the department's statement.
Representative Lemoine: Does the department have a response or wish to respond?
A: (Estabrook shrugs no).
Q (Rob Bauer, in audience) I have a response..I wish to respond.
Rep Lemoine We're not going to open this up to public hearing, but are you answering the representative question>
Bauer A:I wanted to make a comment about the development policy on aquaculture, but I'll hold off.
Q: Representative Mcneil: I would be interested in eliminating at least 6,7 and 8. I'm a little unclear about what number 5 is. But you've taken the word public out of the bill. Would you explain that to me.
A: The change is not only the word public but in the current language it doesn't unreasonably interfere with the public use or enjoyment within 100 feet fo municipally owned state or federally owned beaches parks or docking facilities
What this language does it can't unreasonably interfere with the use or enjoyment of the "surrounding area", including...
Representative Lemoine We will return to section 2B. We're now working on criteria issues and we can continue to work on criterial issue and return to
Mcneil. I live in a community where even a marina with million dollar boats couldn't get through
because somebody didn't like the aesthetics of it. So people voted on it and decided, if you don't like the looks of that, then we don't have to do that.
That would have been a strong economic resource for us, so I think when you talk about aesthetics and you talk about what tourists like to do or not do I think that 's very subjective. Different tourists like to do different things... I think that its very hard to have to prove that that would actually ruin a tourist's outlook, so I'm not comfortable leaving it in the bill.
I think one of the strongest things to me on this is: I want to make sure the waters around the vendor, those areas are safe; that they are not ruining the water and that people can b assured if we're raising salmon or whatever finfish culture might come next, we're putting healthy product into the market.
I'll continue to vote against the bill in any event.
Representative Lemoine Thank you. Representative Ash?
Representative Ash: On Number 7. After listening to the deputy commissioner,
I'm almost thinking that we're asking him for something that cannot be provided without a great expense. We'd be putting quite a fiscal note on this entire bill for that. If you want to kill the entire bill I guess that would be the way to do it. I'm sure that'd be a humongous undertaking.
End of excerpted testimony
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Marine Resources Committee puts out call for public to send them more testimony.
"The committee is still defining and refining language. Many
requests have been made of the Department for further information. The
committee will still be accepting written testimony from the public. Please
no faxes or e-mails. Typed or written in 20 copies to be presented to the
clerk either in person or sent by regular mail."
Mailing address:
Committee on Marine Resources, 115 State House Station, Augusta, ME 04333-0115