House Bill Aims to Help Young People Enter Commercial Fishing Industry
A bipartisan bill has been introduced by the House of Representatives to establish the first national program to help young men and women enter the commercial fishing industry. The legislation, introduced by Congressmen Seth Moulton (D-MA) and Don Young (R-AK), would provide up to $2 million a year in grant funding through NOAA’s Sea Grant Program. “This bill is designed to allow the next generation of fishermen, or people who want to get into the fishing industry, to receive training to become successful businessmen or women,” said John Pappalardo, the CEO of the Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen’s Alliance. Representatives from the Alliance will head to Washington D.C. later this month to join other groups from the Fishing Communities Coalition to lobby lawmakers. “We will be walking Capitol Hill for a couple of days talking about this bill,” Pappalardo said. click here to read the story 16:26
First off no amount of money can’t teach a successful trade when the success is based off of years and years of generational knowledge much like the fishing industry! The commercial fishing trade can not be taught through your everyday classroom or NOAA official….It takes years to establish a successful fishing vessel…Purchasing the vessel, the fishing gear and the permits is the easy part! The hard part is finding the fish and even harder continuing to find the fish, even harder than that the strick regulations that have been implemented, making it nearly impossible to run a year round successful fishing vessel!! Which leads me to wonder why in God name would they go for a bill such as this one when a majority of fisherman have been put out of business due to government regulations!!! Your going to take away the livelihood of so many generational fisherman yet try and pass a bill that would use a 2 million dollar a year budget to teach young men and woman how to fish and start a successful commercial fishing business?? This seems to me to be more on the lines of getting rid of the career fisherman who continue to put up a fight and replace them with government trained puppets who are taught how to fish by government standards!!! Here’s an idea how about giving back to the fishing communities who have been hit the hardest by regulations by using those funds to in fact teach and train but under retired or bought out fisherman who can no longer make a living but will always possess the skill set and knowledge of what it takes to be a successful fisherman!!! If that can’t be considered then the 2 million a year should be split up between coastal fishing communities and put towards the teaching and training of different skilled trades for fisherman who can no longer fish but lack the skills required to obtain a job position because the only skill they possess is the skill of fishing!!!
Thank you, Amanda for making your comment here. I find it ironic, following the national showing of “Sacred Cod”, where grown men shed tears over the fact that their sons have been removed from generations of their for forefathers ability to continue their heritage by politicians that control the purse strings of the agency, and environmental groups that want to remove fishermen from the industry.
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