Resolution 15-034 Requesting the North Pacific Fishery Management Council Reduce the Halibut Bycatch

CITY OF HOMER

HOMER, ALASKA

Reynolds

RESOLUTION 15-034

A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF HOMER, ALASKA, REQUESTING THAT THE NORTH PACIFIC FISHERY MANAGEMENT COUNCIL TAKE ACTION TO REDUCE THE QUANTITY OF HALIBUT BYCATCH IN THE BERING SEA ALEUTIAN ISLAND FISHERIES BY SETTING NEW BYCATCH LIMITS WHICH LOWER HALIBUT PROHIBITED SPECIES CATCH CAPS BY 50% OF THE CURRENT LIMITS.

WHEREAS, Coastal communities in Alaska depend on Alaska’s halibut resource for sustenance, recreation, cultural traditions, and livelihood; and

WHEREAS, The halibut fishery is of critical importance to the state, providing significant income to the state and its residents through commercial and charter fisheries; and
WHEREAS, The halibut stock and fishery are in a critical state after a continuous stock decline over the last decade; and 

WHEREAS, The commercial catch limits for halibut in the Bering Sea/Aleutian Islands (BSAI) region were reduced by 63% in the last decade in order to conserve halibut stocks; and

WHEREAS, Halibut bycatch limits for trawl fisheries operating In the Bering Sea, currently set at more than 7 million pounds, have not been significantly reduced for 30 years; and
WHEREAS, BSAI trawl fisheries caught and killed 7 times more fish than the directed fishery landed in the BSAI in 2014; and 

WHEREAS, The majority of halibut bycatch in the Bering Sea are juvenile halibut averaging under 5 pounds; and

WHEREAS, Historical tagging studies indicate that 70-90 percent of juvenile halibut spending the first few years of their lives in the Bering Sea can and do migrate to all other areas of the North Pacific including the Gulf of Alaska; and

WHEREAS, Homer is a Gulf community and home to many commercial, sport and subsistence halibut fishermen that fish in the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea, as well as a halibut fishing destination for visitors; and

WHEREAS, Halibut play a key role in the economies throughout Alaska including Homer, therefore overall stock health, biodiversity and catch limit cuts have and will continue to have dramatic effects on our fisheries, businesses, economies and communities that depend on the halibut resource; and

WHEREAS, Every pound of halibut caught as bycatch in any region results in a direct loss of yield and spawning biomass of the highly migratory North Pacific halibut resource; and

WHEREAS, The Magnuson-Stevens Act requires under National Standard 9 that bycatch be reduced; and

WHEREAS, National Standard 8 requires councils provide for the sustained participation of fishery dependent communities.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the Homer City Council requests immediate action by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council to reduce halibut bycatch in the Bering Sea Aleutian Island fisheries by not less than 50%.

               PASSED AND ADOPTED by the Homer City Council on this 11th day of May, 2015.

                                                                                                         CITY OF HOMER

                                                                                                         _______________________                                                                                                                                          MARY E. WYTHE, MAYOR

ATTEST:

___________________________

JO JOHNSON, MMC, CITY CLERK

Fiscal Note: N/A