These numbers are fictional - for demonstration only
Meaux, this is where the argument comes in with a lot of folks. Purely on the surface it does not give the rec crowd fewer days. For example, lets say the recreational sector would be given 50K pounds and there is no SS. The season is figured with the 140 Louisiana permitted charter boats and the thousands of recreational anglers we take fishing, predicted to harvest X amount of fish because we are counted separately as part of the total. So lets say they figure on a 10 day season. But in that 10 day season is figured a lot of "uncertainty" and currently they apply a 20% error rate.
For argument sake, lets say SS splits the quota 50/50 so now the charter boats get 25K pounds. Because they agree to stricter management they loose the 20% rate of uncertainty. So yes they would get more than 10 days and it would theoretically prevent future overages . The purely rec would get the same number of days that they would have previously gotten 10 days in this example, the total poundage would be less but you are no longer counting the fish harvested on a charter boat, it is subtracted from a different total. The error rate from bad data is still there so there could be emergency closures, you could go over the allowed amount which would mean you would have to pay those fish back the following year, etc.
From a business aspect I am coming to believe it is a good system. However I believe that it is also a pandora's box and we should proceed very carefully. I would much rather be managed by my State who seems to have a handle on what is going on but they have failed miserably in getting that done, thus forcing many into SS since it is the only game in town right now.
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