Industrial overfishing is hurting the Bay, and Va.’s economy

Yet, they aren’t always viewed that way. After a summer of industrial ships relentlessly netting menhaden fish from the Chesapeake Bay, noisy spotter planes, repeated net spills on the Eastern Shore, contaminated beaches and deadly bycatch of prized Red Drum, it’s time to ask: When will Virginia wake up? Why is the state allowing a foreign-owned company to pillage menhaden, the most important fish in the sea, and wreak havoc on our pristine Bay shores?

Omega Protein, owned by Cooke Seafood of New Brunswick, Canada, acknowledged to the Virginia Marine Resources Commission (VMRC) in August they are now prioritizing fishing in the Bay in an effort to catch their annual Bay quota of 112 million pounds so that the quota doesn’t get cut in future years. Then there are the wasteful net spills, which occur about every summer, fouling the pristine beaches of the Eastern Shore. Does all of this sound like good stewardship of our Chesapeake Bay?

In June, we launched a campaign to bring awareness to this problem and the damage it is causing to the Bay’s fragile ecosystem. We collected 11,000 signatures on a petition calling on Gov. Glenn Youngkin to move this industrial fishery out of the Bay until science can show it is not causing harm. Many citizens attended meetings of the VMRC to ask the commission members to conduct a public hearing on moving the fishery out, emphasizing that menhaden are a public resource and this massive fishery is inconsistent with the public trust doctrine. We also emphasized that these purse seine nets are too large to be fished safely in the shallow waters of the Bay where they often drag across the bottom and do untold damage.

After months of petitions, letters and calls for action, the administration finally proposed a 1-mile no-netting buffer along the Bay and Virginia Beach shores to reduce the likelihood of damaging net spills, which usually occur in shallow water. They also proposed additional fishing restrictions around holiday weekends during the summer tourist season.

This was a reasonable proposal with minimal impact to the industry, yet it was met with heavy resistance. But after a long meeting attended by a few hundred people, the VMRC voted this down 5-to-4 on Dec. 6, opting instead for a memorandum of understanding to have “further discussions.” Needless to say, Virginia’s saltwater anglers are not happy. Omega Protein again manages to escape with no new regulations and no accountability. This is a stunning display of poor governance.

Menhaden are inedible fish, reduced to fish meal and other byproducts and often exported for animal feed. This industrial “reduction fishery” has sparked controversy for decades and is outlawed by every other state on the East Coast. This one company gets to harvest 75% of the entire East Coast menhaden quota in Virginia waters, leaving less and less fish for predators that rely on them, most notably striped bass, but also other fish, mammals and sea birds. Menhaden are not considered “overfished,” but that is a coast-wide designation and has nothing to do with conditions in the Chesapeake Bay.

By allowing Omega Protein to catch a third of its total quota from the Bay versus the ocean (where operating costs are higher), Virginia in effect is subsidizing this fishery to the detriment of the Bay and local fishing economies. Is it a coincidence that the Eastern Shore, which was the epicenter of intense netting this summer, just experienced its worst recreational fishing season in recent memory? Local hotels, charter captains and bait shops are feeling the pain.

We applauded the administration for proposing to address net spills and other user conflicts, but the regulation proposal was defeated by some of the administration’s appointments to the VMRC board. Why would Virginia squander an opportunity to improve the Bay and coastal economy? Why should the Eastern Shore bear the burden of repeated net spills? Is the administration controlled by a lobbying firm or do they simply not care about our Bay?

For now, the assault on the Chesapeake Bay will continue until enough citizens stand up and government officials lead.