Contact: Gordon Helm FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(301) 713-2370 8/8/95
The National Marine Fisheries Service will include 1994 weakfish stock assessment data in its review of the proposed prohibition on the harvest and possession of weakfish in federal waters, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced today.
Even though there is a tremendous amount of support for the proposed rule on weakfish, during nine public hearings from Massachusetts to Florida many people commented on their concerns that the most current data was not being considered.
The weakfish data utilized by the fisheries service was collected by individual states and submitted to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission's stock assessment committee for analysis. Once the stock assessment was completed, the weakfish management board reviewed the results and adopted them as the status of the stocks.
The determination of the status of stocks is an annual process, and is constantly reviewed. In the case of the weakfish proposed rule, only the 1993 year status review was complete, and was the best available data when the Draft Environmental Impact Statement and the proposed rule were prepared. However, the 1994 data is now available and will be carefully reviewed and incorporated into the final rule.
The fisheries service will carefully review all comments and any new data presented - including the 1994 stock assessment data on the weakfish fishery. The review process is expected to be completed by mid-September.