[Federal Register Volume 62, Number 105 (Monday, June 2, 1997)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 29694-29695]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 97-14217]
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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
50 CFR Part 648
[I.D. 052097C]
Fisheries of the Northeastern United States; Petition for
Rulemaking for Redistribution of the Summer Flounder Quota
AGENCY: National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Commerce.
ACTION: Notice of receipt of petition for rulemaking; request for
comments.
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SUMMARY: NMFS announces receipt of, and requests public comment on, a
petition for rulemaking on the distribution to the states of the annual
commercial quota for summer flounder. The State of Connecticut,
Commissioner of Environmental Protection, has petitioned the Secretary
of Commerce (Secretary) to adopt a commercial allocation of either 2
winter coastwide periods and a state-by-state summer period or a
coastwide allocation system for all three periods (two winter periods
and a summer period).
DATES: Comments on the petition are requested on or before August 1,
1997.
ADDRESSES: Copies of the petition for rulemaking are available upon
request from Gary C. Matlock, Ph.D., Director, Office of Sustainable
Fisheries, NMFS, 1315 East-West Highway, Silver Spring, MD 20910.
Comments on the petition should be directed to Dr. Gary C. Matlock at
the above address. Please mark the outside of the envelope ``State of
Connecticut Petition for Rulemaking.''
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mark R. Millikin, 301-713-2341.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The fishery affected by this petition for
rulemaking is the summer flounder fishery, which is managed under the
Fishery Management Plan for the Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea
Bass Fisheries. The Secretary has management authority for this species
group under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management
Act. The management unit for this fishery is summer flounder
(Paralichthys dentatus) in U.S. waters of the Atlantic Ocean from the
southern border of North Carolina northward to the U.S.-Canada border.
Implementing regulations for the fishery are found at 50 CFR part 648,
subparts A and G.
The current method of allocating the annual commercial quota for
summer flounder is on a state-by-state basis. The quota is apportioned
among the states based on historical commercial landings averaged over
the period 1980-89. The quota applies throughout the management unit;
that is, all commercial landings in a state are attributed to that
state's quota for a given year, regardless of where the summer flounder
are harvested. The proportion of the coastwide quota that an individual
state receives is the same each year, but the total amount varies from
year to year, as the coastwide quota varies. Overages in a state's
quota allocation in the prior year are deducted from that state's
allocation in the following year.
The Connecticut petition proposes that the current state-specific
allocation of the commercial quota for summer flounder be eliminated
and that a
[[Page 29695]]
``Coastal Commercial Quota System'' be adopted. One proposed system
would establish a system similar to that approved recently for the scup
fishery under a regulatory amendment for that fishery (62 FR 27978, May
22, 1997). That system would allocate the commercial quota into three
unequal periods--two winter coastwide periods (January-April and
November-December) and a state-by-state summer period (May-October).
The second proposed system would allocate the annual quota into the
same three unequal periods (January-April, May-October, and November-
December); however, a coastwide system would be implemented for all
three periods in conjunction with a system of coastwide landing limits.
Connecticut's petition states that either of these two coastwide
systems would be acceptable. However, Connecticut's petition prefers
the commercial quota system that combines two coastwide winter periods
with a state-by-state summer period. Connecticut further petitions that
any regulation adopting a state-by-state allocation system have the
percent shares for each state based upon landings data for the period
1990 through 1992.
NMFS requests interested persons to submit comments on the petition
for rulemaking submitted by Connecticut. NMFS will consider this
information in determining whether to proceed with the development of
regulations suggested by the petition.
Authority: 16 U.S.C. 1801 et seq.
Dated: May 27, 1997.
Gary C. Matlock,
Director, Office of Sustainable Fisheries, National Marine Fisheries
Service.
[FR Doc. 97-14217 Filed 5-30-97; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-22-F
