Assembly kills bill extending bass season
A New York Senate bill to extend the striped bass season by two weeks went belly-up after it failed to make it through an Assembly committee.
The Senate bill, which was approved in May, would have allowed fishermen to harvest striped bass until Dec. 31 of each year, adding another 16 days to the season.
Senator Ken LaValle (R-Port Jefferson) sponsored the bill, and initially proposed to have the season extended to Jan. 15 of each year.
The bill states that extending the season “will help create jobs, boost the Long Island economy, and ensure that quotas can be reached even if affected by natural causes.”
But the bill did not make it out of the state Assembly’s environmental conservation committee, government officials said.
William Young, president of the New York Coalition for Recreational Fishing, a preservation lobby, said the striped bass stock is in decline and that extending the season would threaten the fish.
His group sent letters to assemblymen and senators, urging them to let the bill die.
“The signs are that [the bass population] is not going in the right direction,” he said. “That’s up and down the coast, not just one area.”
A status update of the striped bass stock hasn’t been completed since 2011, said Mike Waine, a coordinator with the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, which helps to set fishing quotas for commercial operations to protect fish populations.
The commission will complete its latest assessment later this year and release the results in the fall, Mr. Waine said.
Mr. Young said it would be unwise to change fishing regulations without knowing the latest information on the striped bass stock.
“Right now is not the time to do it, there’s a question mark,” he said. “Right now is the time to wait and see what’s coming down the road.”
But Bonnie Brady, executive director of the Long Island Commercial Fishing Association, said the bill would have helped fishermen meet their quotas, even if stormy weather or other conditions prevented them from getting out to fish.
“[Unfilled quotas are] money that’s gone, basically out to sea,” she said.
The regulations were put in place to protect the bass when their population plummeted in the 1980s. Now the stock has been rebuilt, Ms. Brady said.
“It’d be nice if the regulations would come into the 21st century like the fishermen have,” she said.
