$300 fine awaits anglers who don't sign up for free registry

App.com: $300 fine awaits anglers who don't sign up for free registry
Recreational fishing advocates who won a fight to keep saltwater fishing free in New Jersey got a surprise this week, with new state rules that decree a $300 fine for those who don’t sign up for the new registry of ocean anglers.

“It’s outrageous to put in a fine system. It’s totally vindictive. They’re going to be chasing people down and writing tickets,” complained Jim Donofrio of the Recreational Fishing Alliance, an activist group that fought off moves to impose a paid saltwater fishing license.

But officials at the state Department of Environmental Protection say the fines – $300 to $1,000 for a first offense and $500 to $5,000 for a second – are necessary to meet federal requirements for the national fishing database that will get New Jersey’s angler information.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration “requires the registry be enforceable,” said Larry Hajna, a DEP spokesman. The fine amounts are “consistent with our general marine fishing violations under the law,” he said.

But as NOAA has done, the state could take a soft touch toward enforcing registration. Gordon Colvin, who led efforts to publicize the federal registry in the fishing community, always emphasized the agency’s national goal was to build a more cooperative relationship with anglers.

News of the fines surprised many, including those who were involved in the past year’s debate over the registry. Anthony Mauro Sr. of the New Jersey Outdoor Alliance said he hopes the DEP will tread carefully before fining anglers, adding: “I don’t think they have the C.O.s (conservation officers) to do it.”

NOAA developed the national saltwater fishing registry as a virtual telephone book of recreational fishermen with their addresses and telephone numbers, to better target surveys that measure how many fish and what species are being caught.

That registry will overhaul the Marine Recreational Fishing Statistical Survey, which had relied on telephone polling and dockside surveys to develop estimates of what was being caught. MRFSS’ methodology and findings came under intense fire in recent years, when fishing advocates accused the survey of vastly overstating recreational catches.

Most of the national registry database is coming from states that have saltwater fishing licenses. New Jersey and Hawaii are the last two holdouts where the fishing communities have managed to preserve their ocean access as a free right.

Some outdoors groups and DEP officials saw New Jersey saltwater fishing license fees as way to fund the state’s perennially underfunded fisheries conservation programs. But a drive led by the Recreational Fishing Alliance convinced the state Legislature to mandate a free registry instead as New Jersey’s way of joining the national database.

Critics still complain the registry is not truly free in that the DEP has to use other taxpayer money to fund it. The program is costing an estimated $600,000 and “charging a few dollars per fisherman can go a long way to ensure we have adequate resources to manage our important coastal resources and fisheries,” the Sierra Club said in a statement.

Anglers who already signed up individually for the NOAA registry – many paying a $15 fee to the agency – now still must sign onto the New Jersey registry. They will not get a refund, DEP officials say.

“They are running this as their own show. They don’t care if you have the federal registry or an HMS,” the highly migratory species permit for tuna and swordfish, said Jim Hutchinson of the RFA.