Cameron Parish oyster fishermen are outraged over the passage of Senate Bill 73 in the just finished legislative session. The bill would effectively put most of Cameron Parish's oyster fishermen out of business until 2014. A large group gathered at the Cameron Courthouse on Tuesday to meet with state officials, but the meeting was canceled. They were invited to present their case to the Police Jury during the cheduled agenda meeting at 4 p.m. Leo Dyson, a Calcasieu Lake oyster fisherman for 35 years, spoke for most of those present when he said that SB 73 should be vetoed by Gov. Jindal. The bill was originally introduced by Sen. Blade Morrish to limit the number of outside fishermen taking Calcasieu Lake oysters. The fishery was severely depleted last season, and local fishermen had asked for a reduction in the number of
sacks allowed from 15 sacks to 10 sacks per boat per day. The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries left the limit at 15, however. Morrish's bill was defeated, but was resurrected in a changed form and passed at the last minute. The changed bill raises the limit to 25 sacks per day, but limits permits for Calcasieu Lake to 126, with 63 issued to persons who have harvested within the past 10 years and the other 63 to anyone else.
They will be issued on a first come first served basis determined by the date the application is received by the LDWF. The permit system would remain in place until July 1, 2014. Dyson said, "I don't think it's legal to sell us a license for a whole year, and we may not be able to use it for the last half of the year."
Oysters are harvested from October through April, but the license runs from January to December. Dyson said about 240 Calcasieu lake oyster permits were issued this last year, with about 200 belonging to Calcasieu and Cameron Parish residents. "If 240 fishermen took only 10 sacks a day, they would take at most 2400 sacks," Dyson said. "If 126 fisherman can take 25 sacks each, that is 3150, way more than we proposed."
Doyle Taylor, who attended a meeting in Baton Rouge a few months ago on the subject, said sports fishermen in Calcasieu Parish were concerned about the health of oyster reefs in north Calcasieu Lake. "They said the (oyster) dredges wiped out the reef," he said, "but that area has been closed for years." Dyson claims the mortality seen in some areas is due, not to fishermen, but to dispersant sprayed in the Gulf on incoming tides during last year's BP oil spill. He also said the bill, in its current form, was written by people from Houma.
The Police Jury agreed to send a letter to the Governor asking for a veto of the bill.
|