Public Meeting Sept. 4

[OceanBlue]

From ODFW:

August 21, 2002

Dear Interested Party:

I would like to extend an invitation to you to meet with Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife staff on Wednesday, September 4, 2002 to discuss agenda items coming up before the Pacific Fishery Management Council (Council) September 9 - September 13, 2002. Our meeting will be held in the upstairs conference room at Englund Marine Supply, 880 SE Bay Blvd., Newport, from 10:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m.

Successfully implementing 2003 groundfish management measures will be even more challenging than last year. The Council has identified that the allowed harvest for several overfished species may be so low that some extensive closed fishing areas may be required for part or all of 2003. The level of harvest allowed for some species has fallen so low that virtually every Oregon fishery (commercial and recreational) may be disrupted to some degree. During their June meeting, the Council identified a range of potential options for management during 2003. Since that time, we have convened community and industry workshops – jointly with Oregon Sea Grant – in Astoria, Newport, Coos Bay, and Brookings. We heard and learned a great deal during these meetings about your concerns and some alternative options. We still need to generate our most likely course of action to meet next year’s challenges in a creative and responsible way. Your participation is critical to the process for developing an Oregon position on harvest options for next year.

The complete Council agenda can be downloaded at www.pcouncil.org/index.html. Our proposed meeting agenda is shown below with corresponding Council agenda items identified.

Proposed Agenda

I. . Introduction
II. C4 Consider in-season adjustments to some groundfish fisheries
(Emergency Rule to fish outside of 250 fm)
III. C2 Final Harvest Levels and Other Specifications for 2003
IV. C3 Management Measures for 2003
¨ Restricted Fishing Areas
¨ Commercial
¨ Recreational
¨ Shrimp Incidental Catch/Excluders
¨ Salmon (commercial and recreational incidental catch)

V. F2 Pacific Halibut Management (including groundfish bycatch)
VI. C5 Exempted Fishing Permits (Selective Flatfish Trawl, etc.)
VII. C9 Multi-Year Management
VIII. C10 Delegation of Nearshore Management Authority
IX. . Other Agenda Items - as time allows
¨ G2 Pacific Sardine Re-allocation of Harvest
¨ Other

If you have any questions, please feel free to call me at 541-867-0300 ext. 251, or e-mail me at mark.saelens@hmsc.orst.edu.

We look forward to seeing you on September 4.

Sincerely,

Mark Saelens
Oregon Groundfish Management Team Representative