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Because I have a Charterboat license and a Federal Fisheries Permit for Northeast multispecies, I have had to send send in a catch report every time I took people out. Been doing that for years. I have never sold a fish, but when the Permits first came out, you had to have one if you fished in Federal waters and were boarded. They had to be sent in on a monthly basis, 12 months a year, even if you did not fish, you had to send in a report saying so. A multi-copied pad was given, with codes for species and areas fished.
About a year ago, the NY State DEC chimed in and although the state permit we must have in order to be able to keep 2 Striped Bass ($250 per year) required we send a copy of the Federal report to them whenever we caught Bass, THIS year (2010 and on), we must send in a copy no matter what we catch. As much of a pain in the ass this is, I have done it faithfully.
This morning I received a "Notice of Non-Compliance" from NOAA. The letter contained a list of dates from May 2010 that they said reports were missing. When I checked my copies, I did not fish on the dates they listed.
I called NOAA in Gloucester to try and clear this up, and was told that reporting requirements were changed in May 2010. Instead of reporting monthly, you now have to report weekly, whether you fished or not, whether your boat was on the hard for the winter or not. If you did not fish, you had to send a report telling them that...weekly. Not doing that would have your Permit Renewal rejected.
More beaurocracy that even the person I spoke to apologized for but the orders came "from upstairs". More proof that "upstairs" at NOAA hasn't the slightest idea of what the commercial and recreational fishing captains have to do to make a living. What a joke. Think it's time to pack it in.

I haven't sent a report since last August.
I guess I'll be getting that non-compliance letter shortly.

Walter, Sounds like NOAA is trying to smother Licensed Captains to death, even if you report as needed, that pile of s**t Lubchenco will use those reports to make every fish off limits..or buy a share to catch striper or tuna..where will that money go???Time to just fish..catch what you need..eat it...let the paperwork mountain bring our country to its knees...my 2 cents BH

If you lose your permit, you can't get it back. The more permits they lose, the smaller the group they have to deal with. That's probably their intent. A long time ago a mate who used to work for me told me I was crazy filling out all these reports and wanted me to lie and give false locations and amount of catches because "they'll eventually use all this all against us". I thought he was wrong..., I now see he wasn't.

I fill them out on the way in. I send 52 a year. They came after me because the buyer showed two pounds differance from my FVTR. 1600# of fish and 2# differance. They treat me like a crook. The fine was going to be 10,0000.$

Report to much and the species is overfished.

Report to little they say we don't catch enough and sell our quotas to different countries.

All this and 9 days to ship something 65 miles. Yep we are doomed.

Brewster-You HAVE to be kidding!