35

Herald & Lantern 2? December '83

outdoors

sports

with Lou Rodia

Salt Water License Threatened Again

The clarion call has been sounded by the embattled foes of the salt water fishing license in nearby Maryland and Virginia. A well organized movement has been started to get the legislature in. the sister states which surround the Chesapeake Bay to pass a salt water license which will go into effect fn 1984. How does this affect us here in New Jersey? For those who fish up and down the coast in several states, the immediate effect would be that to fish salt water in the states which pass a salt water license you would have to purchase the license to fish there. That’s the first step. Right now, no Atlantic Coastal state has a license in place. Florida tried one some years ago, with disastrous effect on the tourist business. The effect was so sudden and so drastic that the salt water license was short-lived. The Florida legislature, faced with the realization that the license did more harm than good, rescinded it. If a license is passed right now in any of Ihe Coastal Atlantic States^ it seems to be a good bet that the license will follow in one Atlantic Coast State after another until licenses are needed in all of them. THAT’S NOT my scenario. That’s what the license proponents predict will happen and they are going all out to get passage of the measure in Maryland. There is little time to get the opposition forces mobilized, although there is considerable pressure against a salt water license. If you fish in Maryland or Virginia or if you have fishing buddies in either state there are some things you can do to help. First, and foremost, you can contact those places with which you do business when you visit on your fishing trips. Write the motels where you stay, the restaurants where you eat, the stores where you shop and advise them that the license jeopardizes their business. You can also write to the marinas where you keep your boat or purchase fuel and ask them to help. . Every Maryland or Vigrinia contact you make will help drum up support for the anti-license battle. But you must act swiftly because the timetable calls for action in the Maryland legislature as early as January and the target date for the license to be put into effect in that state can be as early as July 1, 1984. Time is of the essence. Another way you can lend support is to contact Jerry Leichty, president of the powerful Assaleague Mobile Sportsmen’s Association at Box 149, Ocean City, Md., 21842. The AMSA is one of the antilicense forces in Maryland and you can give them some support in this fight. While the AMSA is not soliciting funds, a couple of dollars in contributions will also be of help. It may not seem like your fight at the moment, particularly if .you do not fish in Maryland and Virginia. But sooner or later, if the license passes there, the

fight will come closer to home and we'll wake up too late to the reality that we should have done something sooner. NEW JERSEY’S Marine Fishing Legislation was shaped by a Marine Advisory Council which labored for months to rewrite and write laws regulating the salt water fishery from the start of tidal waters inland to the three-mile mark off the beaches where the Federal Government jurisdiction starts. That 20-member committee insisted unanimously that the new Salt Water fishing code prohibit the implementation of a salt water license in this state, and at present, none is being proposed here. However, license efforts

have been made in New York, Delaware, Florida (even in face of the bad experience they had one time before),' Maryland and Virginia. Other coastal states have discussed a salt water license at vairous times. Why is the issue so hot at the moment? At a recent tri-state conference in which the Governors of Maryland, Virginia , and Pennsylvania met to discuss the problems of a polluted Chesapeake Bay, the crying need for funds for the massive cleanup was stressed. Targeted were such fund-raisers as a salt water license, proposed by none other than Governor Harry Hughes of Maryland. The fishermen are being manipulated, in this fight. They are being promised

ramps, additional access, piers and jetties, and even fish hatcheries as an inducement to get them to support the license effort. It is ironic that the fisherman is-being asked to help finance the clean-up while he had little, if anything to do with the pollution in the first place. But, he is being told that while industry and agricultural excesses with pollutants caused the problem which in turn destroyed the fishing, the salt water angler must dig into his pockets to pay for the cleanup if he is to have any fishing in Ihe foreseeable future in the Chesapeake. ONE OF THE effects of the license is that it will keep lots of fishermen from fishing. While those favor-

ing the license point out that a ‘‘mere $5” is not enough to make fishermen quit, statistical evidence is available that this is not true. An Eagleton poll taRen in thejast salt water license go-round in New Jersey indicated that while 83 per cent of those now fishing id New Jersey • (that’s the resident fishing population which fishes in salt water) a whopping 17 per cent would quit. And the estimate of the numbers of tourist fishermen who would foregff a chance to fish while on vacation is not statistically documented it is certain that a higher percentage of them would quit. While fishermen seem to spend most of their money for boats, tackle and bait,

they also stay in motels, hotels ,and apartments; they in restaurants, shop in local stores and buy gasoline for their cars and at times they are even known to pick up a brew or two. at the local liquor store. l Fishermen pay now in substantial amounts for their sport through excisetaxes on most of the fishing tackle they buy. They paysales taxes, gasoline taxes, marine motor fuel 'taxes, and tolls. All of this revenue goes into state coffers at present. PTTLE IF ANY of this money filters down for fishing-related projects which will directly benefit the fisherman. In asking the angler to pay again to correct a problem he did (Page 36 Please)

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