Directs the attorney general to bring legal actions against the National Marine Fisheries Services or any other federal or state agency challenging existing inequitable fishing quotas that discriminate against New York state commercial fishermen.
STATE OF NEW YORK
________________________________________________________________________
S. 3197 A. 2514
2017-2018 Regular Sessions
SENATE - ASSEMBLY
January 20, 2017
___________
IN SENATE -- Introduced by Sen. LAVALLE -- read twice and ordered print-
ed, and when printed to be committed to the Committee on Environmental
Conservation
IN ASSEMBLY -- Introduced by M. of A. THIELE, MURRAY, PALUMBO -- read
once and referred to the Committee on Environmental Conservation
AN ACT in relation to directing the state attorney general to bring any
and all legal actions against the National Marine Fisheries Services
or any other federal or interstate agency challenging existing inequi-
table fishing quotas that discriminate against New York state commer-
cial fishermen
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. Legislative findings. The Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA) was
2 enacted by the United States Congress in 1976 to restrict foreign fish-
3 ing vessels in the United States offshore waters from 3 miles to 200
4 miles off the shoreline. The MSA also sought to regulate fishing in
5 federal waters by establishing various management tools such as a state
6 by state quota allocation system for commercial fishermen. These state
7 by state quotas created by the Mid-Atlantic Fisheries Management Council
8 and the U.S. Department of Commerce's National Marine Fisheries Service,
9 pursuant to the MSA, are based upon faulty and incomplete collection
10 data, which discriminate against commercial fishermen in the state of
11 New York. As a result of these discriminatory practices, New York's
12 quota for black sea bass, bluefish, scup, and summer flounder are much
13 lower than would be allocated under a fair non-discriminatory system.
14 For example, New York's summer flounder quota was less than half of that
15 allocated to Rhode Island, New Jersey, Virginia, and North Carolina.
16 This discriminatory quota system has resulted in unwarranted economic
17 and job losses. It is the purpose of this act to direct the state attor-
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD04089-01-7
S. 3197 2 A. 2514
1 ney general to commence legal proceedings challenging this discriminato-
2 ry fishing quota system.
3 § 2. The state attorney general is hereby directed to commence any and
4 all legal actions against the National Marine Fisheries Services and any
5 other federal or interstate agency necessary to overturn said fishing
6 quotas as arbitrary, capricious and discriminatory against residents of
7 the state of New York.
8 § 3. This act shall take effect immediately.
