UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

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NATIONAL OCEANIC AND ATMOSPHERIC

ADMINISTRATION

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MARINE FISHERIES ADVISORY COMMITTEE

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Wednesday,

November 12, 2008

The Marine Fisheries Advisory Committee met in the Bienville Room in the
Hotel Chateau LeMoyne, 301 Rue Dauphine, New Orleans, Louisiana, at 9:00
a.m., James Balsiger, Vice Chair, presiding.

[MEMBERS PRESENT]{.underline}:

JAMES BALSIGER, Vice Chair

MARK HOLLIDAY, Director, Office of Policy

TOM BILLY

RANDY CATES

BILL DEWEY

ANTHONY DILERNIA

PATTY DOERR

CHRIS DORSETT

ERIKA FELLER

MARTIN FISHER

RANDY FISHER, PSMFC

ROB FLETCHER

CATHERINE FOY

JIM GILMORE

STEVE JONER

[MEMBERS PRESENT (CONTINUED)]{.underline}:

DOROTHY LOWMAN

HEATHER MCCARTY

VINCE O\'SHEA, ASMFC

TOM RAFTICAN

ERIC SCHWAAB

LARRY SIMPSON, GSMFC

DAVE WALLACE

[ALSO PRESENT]{.underline}:

TIM HANSEN

VIRGINIA HERRING

TOPHER HOLMES

WILLIAM JACOBI (VIA TELEPHONE)

PETER JONES

GARY REISNER

PHIL STEELE

[T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S]{.underline}

[PAGE]{.underline}

Introductions and Opening Remarks

Dr. Jim Balsiger, Acting Assistant

Administrator for NOAA Fisheries\.... 6

Larry Simpson, Executive Director

Gulf States Marine Fisheries

Commission\...\...\...\...\...\...\..... 6

Agenda Review: Overview of Plenary,

Subcommittee, and Working Group

Agendas for the Meeting

Tom Billy, MAFAC Liaison\...\...\... 28

New Member Orientation

Mark Holliday, NMFS Policy Office 46

Ethics and Financial Disclosure

Briefing (by telephone)

William Jacobi, Senior Counsel,

Ethics Law and Programs Division,

Office of the General Counsel

U.S. Department of Commerce\...\... 97

Update Briefing - Seafood Quality

and Safety

Tim Hansen, Director, NMFS

Seafood Inspection Program\...\... 132

[Subcommittee and Working Groups Briefing]{.underline}

Strategic Planning, Budget and

Program Management Subcommittee

Jim Gilmore, Subcommittee Chair.. 165

Commerce Subcommittee

Tom Billy, Subcommittee Chair\.... 177

Recreational Fisheries Working Group

Bob Fletcher, Group Chair\...\..... 183

[T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S (CONTINUED)]{.underline}

[PAGE]{.underline}

Protected Resources Subcommittee

Bob Fletcher, Subcommittee Chair. 190

Ecosystem Approach Subcommittee

Chris Dorsett, Subcommittee Chair. 198

Adjourn\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\..... 298

P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S

(9:01 a.m.)

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: This is the MAFAC Meeting which, Mark would know
the exact rules but I think maybe I chair it. But it is sort of in the
spirit of the motion or the action discussed at the last meeting where
this committee was hoping to be more, I\'m not sure I know what the word
is, self-involved, I guess and wanting to elect their own chairman. I
think, and in the way that Tony DiLernia did for so long, I think that
my partner here to my left, Tom Billy, can run the meeting and, if
necessary, Mark and I will sort of be bailiffs here and make sure
everybody stays in control. But anyway, thanks for coming and Tom,
please take over.

MR. BILLY: Okay, thank you. I would like to welcome everyone,
particularly the several new members that we have to the committee. And
we will have an opportunity in a minute for all of us to sort of
introduce ourselves, our affiliation, and our interests, as appropriate.

There is a few initial things that Larry Simpson would like to share
with us about New Orleans, and I am sure, welcome all of you as well.
So, let\'s start there and then we will get back on the agenda.

MR. SIMPSON: Great. Thank you. Welcome to New Orleans. New Orleans, New
Orleans, anyway they say it down here.

Some of the things that I was able to put in front of you, this is a
little packet of note cards that one of my staff members who is a
professional photographer has taken. Don\'t worry, if I didn\'t bring
enough, the lady is coming over who did the reception tonight is
bringing some more of these. So, we will get some of those for
everybody. If you didn\'t bring your New Orleans restaurant guide, I
have got a few extra copies here.

But just quickly, tonight, on the back of the thing, you see the little
map, if you will go out to, Mark, what is the name of it, Bienville,
walk out Bienville and go straight down to the river, down Bienville and
go behind Canal Place, you will see Aquarium of the Americas on the
river, right down here at the bottom. It is five, six blocks easy
walking if it\'s not raining. And that is where the little do is
tonight. And there will be hors d\'oeuvres and drinks and so forth. And
it should be a nice venue. It is a shark tank, and you know, the big
aquarium and everything. So hopefully, that will be a fun thing for you
all.

And I couldn\'t think of anything really to do. There is a lot of things
come into my mind and so, my grandson being born yesterday.

(Applause.)

MR. SIMPSON: This is the third grandchild, second grandson. Eight
pounds, 14 ounces. Evan Price Pruitt. My youngest daughter, her first.
So, I just figured this would be best.

There will be a lady that comes in this afternoon named Ginny Herring
who put all this stuff on. I said, Ginny, this is what I would like to
do. And so she has handled it all. I have nothing to do with it, other
than the idea. And the lady in the office, I had the idea and she did
all of this.

So, welcome to New Orleans. It is a great place to eat. It is a lot of
fun. This central area right here is the Vieux Carre, old city. And this
was the original old city, the highest piece of ground and then it grew
from there.

So, New Orleans is a fun place. Enjoy yourself. If I can help you in any
way, just let me know. And I will remind you again this evening about
how to get down there. And 6:00 to 8:00, you will have time, if you are
not full, to go out and enjoy some of the restaurants around. They need
the business.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Thanks a lot.

MR. SIMPSON: You\'re welcome.

MR. BILLY: All right. Now, let\'s get on with the introductions. I\'m
Tom Billy. Currently, I am consulting on a limited basis. The name of my
consulting company is International Food Safety Consulting. I had a
39-year career in federal service, starting with the old Bureau of
Commercial Fisheries back in the \'60s and always had this interest in
fisheries and have now the opportunity to serve on the MAFAC Committee
that I remember the first meeting of and participated in as one of the
staffers.

So, I was elected at the last meeting the Committee Liaison. And as Jim
indicated, share the responsibilities for sort of managing the meeting
and being the liaison between the Committee and NOAA Fisheries.

So, having said that, why don\'t we go this way.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Sure. I\'m Jim Balsiger. I think I know most of
you. I am the acting head of the National Marine FisheriesService right
now. I was just talking to a few of you. I will be in that position at
least until January 20th and maybe until February and maybe March and
maybe April and maybe a couple of years. So, it is a great job,
particularly meeting people like this. So, I do feel a little bit on the
bubble, but I am scrambling and working as hard as I can.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Hi. I\'m Mark Holliday. I am officially called the
Executive Director or Designated Federal Official from MAFAC. I have
been with FisheriesService since 1981 in various capacities in fishery
statistics, economics. And I currently direct the Office of Policy and
work directly for Jim and the directors of the Agency.

Any questions on logistics, your likes or dislikes about the meeting,
bring them to Topher.

(Laughter.)

DR. HOLLIDAY: Topher Holmes who is our now SEAGRANT Fellow, working with
us for the current year. He was with us at the July meeting. Topher, you
can finish introducing yourself.

MR. HOLMES: That\'s pretty much it. Topher Holmes, SEAGRANT Fellow
working for Mark this year. I\'m from Oregon State University.

MS. LOWMAN: And I am Dorothy Lowman. I am a consultant based out of
Portland, Oregon and I have clients in the North Pacific that include
both the Best Use Cooperative as a Catcher/Processor Cooperative up in
the Bering, who work on the Bering Sea, in the Gulf of Alaska, as well
as I am just starting a project for TNC, The Nature Conservancy up
there.

I have been doing a lot of work down here on the west coast for the
Environmental Defense Fund, working on the Pacific Council\'s IFQ
initiative, which just took a major vote last week. And my background is
I spent a number of years doing the sort of Pacific rim circuit as
council staff on a variety of different councils. And this is my second
term on MAFAC.

MR. GILMORE: And I am Jim Gilmore. I am with the At-Sea Processor
Association, which is a Seattle-based trade association of large
catcher/processor vessels involved in the Alaska Pollock Fishery, the
Pacific Whiting Fishery, and some other North Pacific Groundfish
Fisheries.

MS. FOY: I am Catherine Foy. My current links are with the Aleutians
East Borough. Those are small communities that rely specifically on
commercial fisheries. I am their marine mammal biologist.

I am also working with the Elliot Marine Mammal Group and Fish and
Wildlife, looking at sea otters now. So, Steller sea lions, sea otters,
and I have added beluga whales to the list as of yesterday.

MR. CATES: Randy Cates. I have an open ocean fish farm in Hawaii. I
represent commercial fishing. As a former commercial fisherman, I am
still involved with many of their issues. And I have a marine salvage
company. So, if you go off the shoreline in Hawaii, you will,
unfortunately meet me in that capacity. And some R&D work for the Navy
and the military, still.

MR. DiLERNIA: My name is Tony DiLernia. I am currently a professor with
the City University of New York. I am at Kingsborough Community College.
I am the director of the maritime technology program there. For a number
of years, I ran a research vessel for City University also. I was a
captain.

I currently also own a charter boat, operating out of New York. I
represented the for-hire fleet in New York for a number of years as
president of their association. I am a former member of the Mid-Atlantic
FisheriesManagement Council. And I am a member of MAFAC. This is my
seventh year. They decided to tick me up one more year rather than leave
me around for six and retire me, I got an extra year out of the deal.
Thank you, Jim. I get to sit with all of my friends for an extra year.

MR. SCHWAAB: My name is Eric Schwaab. I am the Deputy Secretary of the
Maryland Department of Natural Resources, where I have been for almost
two years now. Before that, I was the resource director for the
Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, representing state fish and
wildlife agencies all across the country.

In an earlier stint at Maryland DNR, I was the fisheries director as
well and sort of doing Atlantic State\'s Commission and Mid-Atlantic
Council, among other things.

MR. RAFTICAN: Tom Raftican. I have got a bit of a change since the last
time I was here. I have ran for 11 years, ran United Anglers of Southern
California but will no longer be there in that capacity, but run United
Anglers for the past six years and will continue in that capacity. We
work with recreational fisheries. We do a lot of habitat enhancement and
fisheries enhancement and will continue to work in that direction. And
also have formed a new association called the Sport Fishing Conservancy
and will continue to work in that capacity with fishing clubs and
recreational anglers.

MR. WALLACE: Yes, my name is Dave Wallace. I am a new member of MAFAC. I
essentially grew up in fisheries and fisheries policy. And in my career,
which has been solely devoted to fisheries, I have been involved in
mostly commercial fishing, even though I am an avid recreational
fisherman. When the council system, when the Fisheries Conservation
Management Act was enacted, I was involved in the Surf Plan, Ocean
Quahog Industry and we had already come to the conclusion that we were
the enemy. If we were going to race for fish, we would catch all of the
fish and we would give them away. And that was a recipe for disaster.
And so we had already started working through the old commercial, the
former National FisheriesService Commercial Fisheries, I have forgotten
the name of it, through the regional administrator at that time was
Fozzie Norris, to develop a program and go to Congress for legislation
to protect the industry from ourselves.

At that point then, we recognized that the Fisheries Conservation
Management Act was going to be enacted and it was going to have the
authority to manage it. And so the Mid-Atlantic Council then, within a
few months of being formed, started the Surf Clam Fisheries Management
Plan, which was limited-entry and a whole series of things, which was
revolutionary.

Ultimately, we were the first in the country to do ITQs, it is an ITQ
fishery. I represent individual companies and I represent an association
who represents the ITQ holders.

So, we have, I think we have demonstrated that there is a way to manage
fisheries where you reduce capacity to the point where it is balanced
with what the resource can stand. I am very, very interested in the
marine environment. I happen to also be a member of the MPA advisory FAC
over in NOS. And I hope to be able to use this position and that
position to have a better-coordinated function between Jim and Jack
Dunnigan in being able to have two over-arching programs that do two
different things with the same result, without having one overpower the
other.

And so I look forward to working with all of you. And I see the next
couple of years as being very, very interesting. Thank you.

MR. FISHER: Hi. I\'m Martin Fisher. I am from Florida, St. Pete,
Florida. I am vertically integrated in the grouper snapper industry. We
own three commercial boats in my family. I have a wholesale business,
retail business. I sit on the ad hoc advisory panel for IFQ for grouper
for the Gulf of Mexico Fisheries Management Council and I have been very
active in advocating and creating fishery advocacy groups, Gulf Fishing
Association and Fishermen\'s Advocacy Organization. I am no longer part
of them as Executive Director but I still support them.

And we have got a lot going on in the Gulf of Mexico, as you may know,
LAPs are already in place in red snapper. We are coming up for
referendum on Grouper IFQ and we have got a lot of issues, including
aquaculture that is happening for us there.

MS. DOERR: I am Patty Doerr, with the American Sportfishing Association.
I am the Director of Ocean Resource Policy. ASA represents about 700 or
so fishing tackle manufacturers, wholesale distributors, producers. So,
everything from Shimano International down to the local bait and tackle
shop in North Carolina.

We focus a lot on marine protected areas and fishery issues, obviously.
We see them as a growing issue in the next several years.

And this is my first MAFAC meeting. I am happy to be here. I am looking
forward to it.

MR. DEWEY: Good morning. I am Bill Dewey. I am with Taylor Shellfish
Company in Washington state. We produce about 16 million pounds of
clams, oysters, and mussels, and geoduck every year. I manage public
affairs for the company I started back in 1981 with a bachelor\'s degree
in shellfish biology and have been working in the industry ever since.

I also have a small clam firm of my own that I do on the weekends and in
my spare time as well.

MS. FELLER: Hi. I\'m Erika Feller. I work for The Nature Conservancy,
particularly in our California program. I am sure you guys know The
Nature Conservancy. We are a conservation organization focused on
biodiversity. We are in every state in the U.S. and in about 30
countries.

I guess I am in kind of the peculiar position of a conservation rep
because we are also trawl permit owners in California and I have been
doing a lot of work on working with the groundfish industry in central
California, principally.

My background in fisheries is varied and it is this issue that keeps
coming back to me, over, and over, and over, again, even though I don\'t
necessarily look for it. I have been with the Conservancy for about nine
years. And in that time, I have been our agency liaison with NOAA, Fish
and Wildlife Service and the Forest Service. So, I kind of have a bit of
a varied background.

And I used to work for Congressman Gilchrist for a couple of years. So,
I know Eric and Dave.

MR. O\'SHEA: Good morning. I\'m Vince O\'Shea with the Atlantic States
Marine Fisheries Commission. So, I have 15 coastal states from Florida
to Maine. And their vision is working together to restore Atlantic
stocks. Thank you.

MR. FLETCHER: Good morning. I\'m Bob Fletcher, President of Sports
Fishing Association in California and I have been a long-time involved
in running and representing sport fishing boats but I also was on the
Pacific FisheriesManagement Council for 15 years. And I am a member of
Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission Advisory Committee and I am
currently on the regional stakeholders group for the Marine Life
Protection Act in California, which is kicking off as we speak. And it
should be pretty interesting. It is going to be probably rather intense,
as we work to develop a network of marine protected areas in southern
California.

I am going to be retiring in April from my job with the Sport Fishing
Association but will continue on as a consultant working for them and
perhaps others. So, nice to be here.

MR. SIMPSON: I am Larry Simpson, the Executive Director of the Gulf
States Marine Fisheries Commission. It is a five-state compact from
Florida to Texas. We share Florida with Atlantic. I have the west coast.

And I have been with the Commission, June 15th it was 30 years. I
started in \'78 and as a member, a non-voting member of the Gulf of
Mexico FisheriesManagement Council all that time. Our commission deals
with, has a varied program from data to the habitat, recreational
fishing, sport fishing, all kinds of activities.

So, I\'m glad to have you all in the southeast.

MR. FISHER: Good morning. I\'m Randy Fisher. I am the Executive Director
of the Pacific States Marine FisheriesCommission, which includes
Washington, Oregon, California, Idaho, and Alaska.

We do a lot more than either Larry or Vince and we do it a lot better.

MR. SIMPSON: I knew he was going to do something.

(Laughter.)

MR. FISHER: We do very similar things as the other two commissions. We
are actively involved in disaster relief, handing out 170 million
dollars to the fishermen on the West Coast that were involved. And we
shut down the whole West Coast Recreational and Commercial Fisheriesthis
year.

So, Congress gave us a bunch of money and we are handing it out like
crazy people. So, that is what we are doing now.

MR. CATES: You must have a lot of friends.

MR. FISHER: Yes, greed is a lovely thing. I can tell you that.

MR. JONER: Good morning. I am Steve Joner. I am with the Makah tribe,
which is a small tribe on the northwest tip of Washington state. A small
tribe with a big fishery. And we do everything from whales to whiting up
there. I have been at this a long time, too. In fact, I knew Jim when he
was a commoner working at Alaska FisheriesScience Center long, long ago.

I deal with a lot of people at this table, mainly through the Pacific
Council process and also with that gentleman Jack Dunnigan who was
mentioned earlier. We have a sanctuary that is located within the usual
custom fishing grounds of the four coastal tribes of Washington. So, I
will just say that is a challenge doing that.

MS. McCARTY: I am Heather McCarty. I guess I have been here for three
years on MAFAC. I am from Juneau, Alaska. I am a fisheries consultant. I
used to be a salmon fisherman. I worked for the largest salmon hatchery
system in North America, Prince William Sound Aquaculture Corporation,
for many years. I have also done public relations and journalism.

Currently, I do governmental affairs, regulatory stuff. I spend a lot of
time in the North Pacific Council meetings. I served for three years on
the Essential Fish Habitat Committee of the North Pacific Council. My
current clients, my major clients include the University of Alaska
School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, where I ran a small research
program that is funded by industry, At-Sea Processors Association. And I
also work for a small processor in Kodiak, Alaska, Island Seafoods. And
I guess probably the most work I do is for the CDQ Group, Community
Development Quota Group in western Alaska. And that is the Pribilof
Islands, St. Paul Island, which I just came from yesterday. And I work
for them in the Council Process and at the state and federal levels.

MR. BILLY: Okay, thanks. I would also like to ask the staff members to
introduce themselves.

MR. STEELE: Good morning. I\'m Phil Steele. I am the assistant regional
administrator of the NMFS Southeast Regional Office, where I head up the
Sustainable Fisheries Division. My primary responsibilities are for
working with the Fisheries Management Council.

I am here, primarily, this week to give you a couple of reports. One, on
the ongoing and proposed ITQ programs in the Gulf of Mexico. It is
probably more appropriate also to give you a report on impact and other
issues in the Gulf of Mexico.

MR. REISNER: I am Gary Reisner. I am the CFO and Director of Management
and Budget for National Marine FisheriesService. I will be talking about
various programs to assist fishermen and fishing industries from
disasters of the Capital Construction Fund.

MR. HANSEN: Hi. I\'m Tim Hansen, Director of the Seafood Inspection
Program NOAA Fisheries, a program that has a voluntary aspect to it that
inspects about one-third of the seafood consumed in the United States.

My background is in fishery science. Steve Joner and I are old school
chums from back when. Also, I have an almost 24 year career now with the
federal government NOAA Fisheries, FDA, and back to NOAA Fisheries. And
I also serve as alternate delegate for the Codex Committee on Fish and
FisheriesProducts.

MR. BILLY: Okay, thank you very much. Well, it certainly is obvious to
me and I hope to all of you, the rich backgrounds and diversity of
experience and interests that are represented by the committee. And
that, in my mind is where our strength comes from in taking on issues
and new ideas and reviewing existing programs, the variety of things
this committee does to, hopefully, help the NOAA Fisheries people carry
out the most effective programs that are possible.

I will quickly go through the agenda. This morning is going to be
devoted largely to providing information to the new members, as well as
providing an overview of the committee and how it functions, some of our
responsibilities with regard to financial disclosure, the ethics rules
that apply to us in this capacity.

And then finally, wrapping it up with a brief update of a project NOAA
Fisheries has taken on with regard to developing a strategic plan for
seafood quality and safety. And you will hear more about that.

This afternoon, we are going to stay in general session and have asked
the subcommittee chairs of the existing standing subcommittees to talk
briefly about what the subcommittees are focusing on, sort of their
areas of responsibility, to give, particularly again, the new members a
chance to understand and, at the end, you will be asked to pick one or
more of the subcommittees that you would like to be associated with.

This operates in a pretty loose manner. And by that, I mean, there is a
lot of flexibility. So we try to, sometimes subcommittees are working on
a subject that is of broad interest and we will schedule it so that any
of the members can choose to participate. So, it is not a very strict
type of subcommittee arrangement. There is some flexibility that we will
take advantage of when it is appropriate.

Then tomorrow, Thursday, we are going to get some updates, looking at
implementation of the new provisions of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, some
of the new requirements. We continue to pay close attention to this
important area and are interested in keeping up-to-date with where the
agency stands in implementing these various responsibilities.

We will learn a little bit about the budget and where things stand
there. We will get an update on a subject that we started looking at a
couple of meetings ago, which is eco-labeling. And we asked NOAA
Fisheries to look at this and consider some options in terms of a
potential role for the Agency in this area as we continue to explore
this as an idea, to look at it and think about what might be possible.

Then we are going to look at the work we did on Vision 2020. Tony will
talk about that. And perhaps more importantly, how we plan to keep the
2020 document up-to-date and how we plan to share the document and what
it represents with all of the interested parties, not only in Washington
but around the country.

Then Jim Gilmore is going to talk a little bit about the transition
paper we prepared to hopefully be helpful to the new administration. We
will talk about that and what we intend to do with it beyond sharing it
with the senior management of NOAA.

The rest of the meeting, largely, is designed to take advantage of being
here in New Orleans and looking at, as examples, how the fisheries
management is pursuing the new requirements in the Stevens-Magnuson Act,
as well as how they are planning to move forward and address a subject
that the committee has given a lot of attention to the last few
meetings, and that is aquaculture.

I want to encourage the committee, as we get into this phase of the
meeting, to think about what is shared with us and to think more broadly
on a national basis because there are similar activities going on
throughout the country. Many problems that have occurred and the idea is
to have this committee think, sort of evaluate, whether the current
programs and strategies for dealing with disasters, dealing with
significant changes in fisheries and so forth are appropriate, whether
there are any gaps or other things that ought to be considered as we
bring to the table from the different geographical areas our expertise
and experiences.

I think that pretty well covers the rest of the agenda. At the end, we
will talk about scheduling our next meeting. We will talk about
potential agenda items based on ideas that may come up at this meeting,
as well as any other thoughts or recommendations that any of you have.

So, that is the agenda. It looks like a good one, in terms of getting us
involved in another new area of fisheries assistance and disaster
assistance and the transitions that are occurring in the fisheries
management area.

Are there any questions or comments anyone has? Yes.

MR. SCHWAAB: I just wondered, when we talk about the transition document
and the 2020 document, whether it would be appropriate to ask Dr.
Balsiger to make a few comments about the federal transition underway
and how he might see things unfolding and whether there are additional
opportunities that we might take advantage of in that process.

MR. BILLY: Okay, we will. Good idea.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: On that front, if you would, I have just a few \--

MR. BILLY: Sure.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: \-- statements I was going to make \--

MR. BILLY: Okay.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: \-- which will touch briefly on that. I know going
around the table, letting everyone introduce themselves was a great way
to kick this off, including especially the local people who have said
most of what I wanted to say, welcoming people to this town.

This is a great city. I had an opportunity to be here in August when we
had our fifth annual Seafood Cook-Off. And of course, that is focused on
the seafood in the area but I think it is a big part of what Southern
Louisiana is about, and New Orleans in particular, all the seafood and
seafood products. It is a key part. Seafood and other natural living
marine resources in the ocean are a key part of what this part of the
country is about. So, it was a good place. So, there is more than a
billion pounds of fish. There are about seven hundred million dollars of
product landed commercially in the Gulf. Recreational fishermen catch
almost one hundred million pounds of fish. It involves a huge
recreational effort.

I\'m not an economist but the recreational impact is on the order of
eight hundred million dollars per year, just in Louisiana from
recreational fishing.

So, it is a big part of the economy down here. There are four hundred
seafood processing plants, ten thousand people work on seafood here in
the Gulf. So, meeting here is quite appropriate and I look forward to
the comments that come out of this.

We are kind of in a period of transition, as Eric Schwaab mentioned, in
the federal government, and also a little bit of a transition here in
MAFAC. We have two members that aren\'t here. Chris Dorsett, who is a
continuing member, who is an NGO representative. Which group does he
work for? Ocean Conservancy. And then Ed Ebisui, who is from Hawaii, who
has been a council member on the Western Pacific Fishing Management
Council for a while, who is an attorney but, and also a commercial
fisherman a little bit. But he clearly has an eye towards sustainable
resources, as everyone does here. So, it is a great committee.

I think that is all the committee or is there someone else?

DR. HOLLIDAY: John Graves is on his way to the ICCAT meeting, \--

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Yes.

DR. HOLLIDAY: \-- the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. George
Nardi, an Aquaculturist from the northeast called on Monday. He had an
emergency with his business and regretfully, couldn\'t attend at the
last minute. Of course, John Connelly from NFI met with us back in July.
He said he had a conflict with the date and wouldn\'t be able to make
this meeting.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: I don\'t know how I overlooked them. John Graves,
Dr. Graves from VIMS has been instrumental in the U.S. tuna positions at
ICCAT for a long time now. He spends a great deal of time on that and
Nardi with Aquaculture and, of course, John Connelly who we all know
quite well.

Anyway, this group is in a little bit of a transition. We will clearly
have new people in the government. Right now, Admiral Lautenbacher has
retired and so there is a man named Bill Brennan, who is currently the
head of NOAA. He will, necessarily, submit his resignation on January
20th and, most likely, it will be accepted. So, on January 21, Mary
Glackin will be the head of NOAA until some appointment process is gone
through. It could be weeks or it could be months.

But Mary came to see us when we met in New York City. We were pleased
that she was able to make that. And she is from the, a little bit more
focused \-- is the recording on? She is more focused on the dry side of
NOAA, satellites, weather, atmosphere. So, I think we can use some help
to try to convince her that the wet side of NOAA is also not to be
overlooked.

But she is a very good person. She is my direct supervisor and we get
along very well. But she will be there for some period of time. She is a
senior career person in NOAA right now. So, it is heartening to have
someone who has got a basis in the business. She has been in NOAA for a
long time.

So, we will be waiting for the transition teams from the Obama
administration to come through. We all know that campaign was well
organized. Lots of people. Lots of energy. And so we don\'t think it
will be very long before they are talking to NOAA and NMFS. And we had
talked briefly ahead of this time, I think it would be great if working
through Glackin and Brennan and me, to the extent that the transition
people come to see me, that we try to set up an interface between those
transition people and this body.

And depending on their desires, it may be everybody who can happen to be
where the transition team is or maybe just Tom Billy or somehow, but I
think it would be important to have this group feed into that process.

This particular group, through the years, has been used differently but
Dr. Hogarth, at the end of his tenure, and me find this the principle
place to get policy advice on broader issues.

The Fish Management Councils, of course, make recommendations on the
fish regulations for regions and that is not going to change. And we
meet with them as a group from time to time but most of that time was
spent on how to smooth out the logistics on how the government, how NOAA
works with the Fish Councils, how to get regulations through. And they
don\'t look at the overall policy issues for the country.

So, that is this group\'s job and the last few years, that has been big
in the way the Agency has gone forward. So, we appreciate the time and
the effort that you put in here. I recognize it is not compensated. So,
it is a burden on you but it is very useful to us and to the country.

So, Tom has gone through the agenda so I am not going to talk anymore
about that. Maybe I will just quit there. That is about all I think I
can tell you because I think we do need to find an opportunity to feed
the ideas from this group into a transition team. And did I already say
we should try to take the opportunity to emphasize the wet side from
Heather \--

(Laughter.)

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: So, thanks, Tom.

MR. BILLY: Yes. It was, that point was clear to me in the review of the
transition documents that Mary arranged for this committee to review. It
was very clear of where the emphasis was, beyond the flying over the top
at about 30,000 feet, as someone said, with very little detail.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: I\'m not one for making lots of comments like this.
I won\'t bother you anymore but when you look at the glossy material
they had for us to look at, from the NOAA transition, it is very
professionally done, but the only picture of a fish on there was a
cod-end full of pollock being pulled up a stern ramp in the Bering Sea.
And unless you knew what it was, you had no idea it was fish, even, you
know, unless you had seen a picture of one. So, we needed a fish on a
plate or something on that thing.

NOAA typically tends to use that cod-end picture or else some really
pretty fish with big bubbly lips in a coral reef somewhere. And we are
bigger. We are more than that. Those are important. Those are hugely
important. We are more than that. So sorry.

MR. BILLY: No problem. Any comments or questions, at this stage? No?

MR. CATES: I have a question.

MR. BILLY: Sure.

MR. CATES: How will we make ourselves more relevant with the new
administration?

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Well, I think we need to work through this. We
don\'t know who they are, who is going to be dealing with us. But I
think as these transition people come through and we try, through
Brennan, Glackin and myself to set up some interface between this group
and them, we will discover what they are amenable to, the way they like
to work, whether they want to do everything on the internet, or whether
they want face-to-face meetings or whether telephone calls can be set up
or how they would be best served. But I think we need to be flexible to
the way that they want to gain information from this committee about
NOAA.

MR. SCHWAAB: Well, just one more comment on this topic. It seems to me
that, in these transition processes, one of the things we need to think
about is not what is important to us as much as why it is or should be
important to them.

So, to some degree, Jim, the way that you and your team can sense, and I
think we can help you in that, you know, sort of read the feelings a
little bit, with respect to, you know, some of the priority with the
incoming administration, you know, what and how can we help you sort of
align some of the opportunities in our world with some of what those
emerging priorities are. I think that is maybe the way we ought to be
thinking about it.

MR. BILLY: Fair enough. I mean, they may decide that they are going to
have a traveling team that goes around the country and wants to meet
with people. And then we can maybe suggest some of the names. You know,
and that is one way that they might choose to approach their work. They
may just sit in Washington and expect people to come to them. They may
only consider written documents or electronic communication. All of that
is unknown. So, it is right at that stage where that will become, start
to become clear and then we can choose a strategy as appropriate. We
will see.

I think it is clear from this discussion, Jim, that there is interest in
the committee in having that kind of an opportunity to interface and
share our thinking. So, you can help us with that, you know, as you have
the opportunity.

Yes, Tony.

MR. DiLERNIA: Yes, When our leadership briefs the transition folks and
the new political appointees, I would just ask or remind you to
emphasize that this is a non-partisan committee. It is very
non-partisan. Because I know my feeling has been in the past that when,
especially with change of administration, folks tend to look at things,
and especially the political appointees try to read the tea leaves. And
let\'s face it, you know, myself, just having served as chairman for
three years is a perfect example of how non-partisan this committee was.
You know, a liberal democrat from Brooklyn.

So, I would emphasize how non-partisan the committee has always been and
will continue to be.

MR. BILLY: Good point. Okay, then I would like to move on. And we will
start the new member orientation portion of the agenda. And let me turn
it over to Mark.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Thanks, Tom. This is not going to be very painful, I hope.
But I wanted to provide a set of materials and some access to some tools
and information about how the committee is organized, why the committee
exists, a little bit of the process of how we conduct our work. And I
think it will be helpful both for new members and current members to
review this because we are going to be helping each other to try to
become an even more effective body for the next go-round.

So, I have a number of different topics I am going to try to cover. And
one of the things that we have been working on is a handbook. We have a
draft of a handbook that we posted onto the MAFAC website.

So, I am going to start there and say there is a website. If you
haven\'t seen it before, you should know that it is off of the NMFS home
page. And on the website we have all of our meeting information from the
current meeting and prior meetings. So there is an archive of decisions,
records. There are draft summary notes of each meeting and the action
items. There are transcripts of the prior meetings.

So, this is a very valuable resource and tool that more and more we are
relying on using an electronic form to convey information back and forth
to members. You will notice you don\'t have a three-ring binder in front
of you. I have been trying to wean people away from these large heavy
briefing books that very few people actually get to read. So, we have
been posting a lot of the material online. What I have done in the blue
folders that you have is provided a copy of what I am calling an
annotated agenda for each of the major topics. It is just a one-pager
that describes why we are talking about this topic, what do we hope to
achieve. And so I would like to use that as a tool to help communicate
during the meeting and remind you that we have a purpose for each of
these agenda topics and these are the salient points we are trying to
cover.

But all of our reference materials for this meeting is online. And I
also have, as you can see, a lot of people nowadays bringing computers
to meetings. I have a couple of thumb drives if you want to copy all of
that material if you haven\'t had a chance to get to the website, we
have them for you to borrow and load it onto your laptop.

If you have any feedback about this, if you don\'t like it or if you are
not really into the computer side of things, we can still accommodate
and make it work for you. So, we are not trying to drag everybody
forward but we would like to encourage folks to take more advantage of
some of these tools.

Just to quickly look at the website and you click at the advanced
materials, this handbook that we have put together, this draft of a
handbook is listed. It says it is fairly large size. It is in a PDF
format. [And we would like you to take a look at it, not during this
meeting but over the course of the next month or two to take a look and
see if this information in there is useful to you or if there is
information or questions that you have about the committee and how we
work and the materials that we need, what should be in it that is not
there.]{.mark}

So, take a look at it over the course of time and give us your feedback.

Because we would like it to be sort of a living document. We can add to
it because it is electronic very easily. We can modify it, keep it
current, and have it as a resource for folks to use throughout their
tenure as members of the committee.

So if I go to the handbook itself right now, when you bring up the PDF
file, this is what you would see. And again, if you just roll your
cursor over a topic, and you just click on any of the items, it will
take you directly to that part of the PDF file.

So, I am going to go to Summary of MAFAC Responsibilities. I am going to
speak to this for a few minutes as the beginning of my 101 on MAFAC. And
of course, you can follow along if you have it. I am not going to read
it but I just wanted to cover some of the main issues here.

MAFAC has been around for a long time. It is one of the longer-standing
federal advisory committees. It is now in it its 35th, 36th year, since
1970. And it is a secretarial FACA committee. The Department of Commerce
Secretary appoints the members. It is listed on the Federal Advisory
Committee website as a Department of Commerce Committee.

It is comprised of no fewer than 15 and no more than 21 voting members.
We also have the three Interstate FisheriesCommissioners, Executive
Directors as the non-voting consultants to the committee. The current
charter, which is also included in the handbook, lists the Chair of the
Committee, which is currently the NOAA Administrator. And the vice chair
officially is the Deputy Assistant Administrator for Fisheries, Jim
Balsiger. And as existing members know, we have had a charter working
group that convened over the last year and made recommendations and
reported out at our July meeting to change and modify the charter to
effect the arrangement of the chairmanship and the reporting
relationships that we are in the process of submitting to the Department
of Commerce for approval of those changes.

So, our current charter is actually valid through February of 2010. So
we are working on updating that before then to reflect these
recommendations and gain approval from NOAA and the Department for the
recommendations at the July meeting.

Obviously, you know, if you have made it this far, you know what the
mission is of the organization. The structure, we have gone through
that.

The roles and responsibilities, I think the one thing I would want to
reflect on, and we will talk a little bit about this later this morning
when we hear from the General Counsel for Ethics from the Department who
is going to be speaking to us on speaker phone, that there are certain
responsibilities that are coincident with serving on the committee, the
financial disclosure forms, for example. And some of these seem perhaps
to be a nuisance or a burden to continue to maintain these. But it
really is part of the benefit of having an advisory committee that is
transparent, that is open.

And again, the reason behind the Federal Advisory Committee Act in the
first place was to avoid providing, having advice provided to
decision-makers and government that was partisan or that was made up of
only a select few people that was not representative, that was not open.

So, all of our meetings are open to the public. We publish a notice
three weeks in advance of the meeting, notifying the public that we are
meeting. We don\'t meet in secret. We don\'t meet in private. All of our
\-- we have Chad Dawson here, he is our court reporter. We didn\'t
introduce him but he is \--

COURT REPORTER: Jackson, not Dawson.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Chad Dawson is a football player; right? Sorry. Chad
Jackson who will be transcribing all of our spoken words here into a
transcript and from that we take our notes from it.

And so this is all in the interest of making the public aware that a
federal advisory committee is in business and is providing this broad
spectrum of opinion, broad spectrum of advice, both to NOAA and to the
Department of Commerce in the most open and democratic way possible.

So, the responsibilities of a member are not terribly burdensome but
they may be a nuisance in terms of some of the bureaucracy associated
with it. But I think there is a well-made trade-off in being able to say
that this committee is representative of a diverse group and that we
operate in a very open fashion.

For those new members who came on. We have seven new members in total.
And we actually had 11 vacancies as of this summer. And so we made a
decision based on we, the Department and NOAA, made a decision based on
recommendations from MAFAC not to recruit 11 new members all at one time
because that is more than half of the committee.

So we wanted to allow for some continuity and some continuation of the
function and that institutional memory. So, we asked four of the
existing members to stay on for an additional 12 months. So, Bob
Fletcher, Tony DiLernia, Chris Dorsett and Jim Gilmore were selected and
asked if they would be willing to stay on for 12 months to provide this
continuity such that come June of next year, we will open that public
process again to go and ask for nominations for four, new members. But
we now have a third of the committee, no more than a third of committee
being replaced at any given time.

So, it is a little bit of a unique circumstance so I wanted to make sure
everyone understood how and why we were doing this and what we plan to
do. Along about June of next year, we will publish a notice in the
Federal Register soliciting nominations and go through the process to
bring on four additional members.

Right now we have, I think, I believe it is six of our existing members
whose terms expire this December and we have requested the Secretary of
Commerce to reappoint those members for another term and that process
has begun \-- so, those who were on their first term \-- and again, all
of this information is public. It is posted on the website, who you are,
your contact, and your terms are all public information. And we are
renewing the terms of existing members for their second term and that is
underway right now.

We generally meet twice a year. We can have additional meetings. The
biggest constraint is budget and so, on an annual basis I have been
given funds to sponsor two large-scale meetings. But if there is a need
for meetings between then of the entire committee, we can always go back
and seek some dispensation. But at the very least, we have used
successfully conference calls of the subcommittees and the full
committee to deal with business between meetings.

The only caution that we need to be aware of is if we are making
decisions as opposed to developing an idea or discussion of things, if
we are actually going to have a vote or a decision on something, we have
to have prior public notice that we are going to be meeting by
teleconference and we\'ll provide a dial a number for the public, if
they want to participate.

So again, no secrets. All above-board, prior public notice. So those are
some of the constraints or some of the bureaucracy that I am responsible
for keeping the committee on track and not in violation of these
guidelines and regulations. And hence, our conference call with our
General Counsel at 10:45 this morning.

The subcommittees are a very important part of the MAFAC. We have five
standing subcommittees and an ad hoc working group. We are going to go
more into more depth into each of those areas this afternoon. But the
principal subcommittees are the executive subcommittee which is the
chairs of each of the other subcommittees, the Council Liaison, the head
of the other subcommittees, Budget and Program Management, Commerce,
Protected Species, Ecosystem Approach. The chairs of those subcommittees
along with the Council Liaison, that forms the executive subcommittee.

The process of serving on the committee: if you are choosing to serve,
you can serve on more than one. It is a volunteer position. You can have
your choice of what areas that you want to work on. So, part of the
discussion this afternoon will be going through what the committees have
been working on recently and what the committees want to work on in the
future.

I would like to leave this meeting with a work plan for 2009 for each of
these subcommittees and say these are the topics that we think will be
hot or are of interest to MAFAC. And the role of the subcommittee is to
serve up this information. It is to sort of do work between meetings, to
deliberate and to prepare materials that we could bring back to the full
committee for decision, discussion or hopefully discussion, then
decision. Ready, fire, aim. And really use it as a tool because we only
do meet face to face twice a year. I think the role of the subcommittee
has been a very effective one. At least in my opinion, over the last
years they have worked very well.

So the Executive Committee, Strategic Planning, and this is material we
will be using again this afternoon, that briefly describes what the
function of these different groups were. And this ad hoc working group
in the last couple of years is a result of reinvention of the way we
collect marine recreational fishery statistics in NOAA, we have formed a
working group on recreational fisheries. And Bob Fletcher has been
spearheading that effort and serving as the liaison between MAFAC and
those efforts within the Agency and the Commission\'s constituency.

So, that is the overview of the purpose and structure of MAFAC. Any
questions on this so far? Does it make sense, where we are going? Larry?

MR. SIMPSON: Mark, did you, I had an email, did you tell them about or
would you describe the unique nature of a FACA committee? I don\'t know
if you expanded on that or not or is that relevant right now?

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well, I can jump into it now. I think the point about
FACA, I mean the Federal Advisory Committee Act is a federal statute
that governs the setup and operation of these advisory groups to the
Administration. And so because it comes with the territory of having
these special conditions of how we appoint members and how we conduct
business.

And I guess the bottom line is one of you are representing MAFAC when
you are on the committee. You are representing the interests of the
organized group, bringing your expertise, you know representing the sum
total of who you represent, your experience, your training to the table.

And so I think the notion of FACA, it is just providing a context for
the conduct and the process of the meetings but you are still, again,
working as a unit. You know, all of the decisions that we are making are
consensus decisions. If there are dissenting opinions and we can\'t
reach a consensus, those would be reported as a minority view in the
record for purposes of the transcript and the meeting reports.

So, I think FACA provides us framework of this context of how we operate
but it still comes back down to MAFAC as a unit having gotten a mission
chartered by the Department. And again, there aren\'t many other places
\-- the Secretary, the NOAA Administrator and the NMFS Administrator get
this kind of advice and get this perspective. It is a policy-oriented
group. We try not to be too much in the weeds. There are lots of other
people who are doing the day-to-day operational advising. But the
long-term, the strategic view, the higher level, whatever cliche you
would like to use, I think that is really the bread and butter and the
strength of what this committee can do because there is nobody else out
there who is charged with looking at that.

Regional organizations, regional bodies, states, interstate commissions,
they all have their own local perspective, but the national perspective
on policy of living marine resources, and fisheries in particular, that
is the purview of this group. It is an increasingly listened-to group,
as evidenced by Mary Glackin\'s participation and asking MAFAC to
comment on the strategic views of NOAA for the transition.

I will note that the comments that we submitted last week, they were
spread out on Paul Doremus\' desk and he was busily trying to
incorporate all of these MAFAC comments into those two pages before they
go public. So they weren\'t just being passed aside saying check the box
we asked MAFAC. He was struggling but he was trying his best because we
had some pretty broad ranging comments to incorporate them in those
two-pagers and the documents that will be NOAA\'s message to the public
on transition.

Does that kind of get at what you \-- or was there more?

MR. SIMPSON: No, that\'s fine. It is a fairly unique thing to be the
fact a chartered committee does not meet a one Sea Grant, Councils and
MAFAC as I appreciate. There may be a few more.

DR. HOLLIDAY: The MPA Advisory Committee, right. And there is NOAA\'s
Science Advisory Board. In total, there are nine principal FACA
committees in all of NOAA.

All right. So, I wanted to shift gears a bit. Let me check on time. That
must mean 10:04 our time.

If we could go back to the handbook for a second, a lot of people \--

So, just to give you, you know, you can\'t tell the players without a
score card, this is currently out of date. The Vice Admiral is still
shown as the head of NOAA. But you should know this is a NOAA advisory
committee. It is not a NMFS advisory committee, and so we deal with more
than just National Marine Fisheries Service.

This is the organizational chart for NOAA. It shows the different line
offices across the bottom, the different program offices. And sort of
having a wiring diagram, we are going to maintain this and keep it
current as the new political appointees come in. So, I think this would
be a handy reference to keep in mind. It is going to be available in
that MAFAC handbook online. So, as changes occur, this is someplace we
can go to help keep straight of who is who.

At the same time, the NOAA Fisheries Service org chart is something that
you should all be familiar with as well. This shows the current
organization of the Fisheries Service. And if I have time, I might do a
little bit of Fisheries 101 PowerPoint here in a moment. But this shows
you the structure and \--

MS. FELLER: Could you full screen it? I can\'t see it.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Yes. I\'m sorry.

This shows you the overall leadership organization of National Marine
Fisheries Service, Jim Balsiger. And just for this purpose, I will wait
for this 101 to go into a little bit more detail. Jim and his principal
deputies for regulatory programs, administration and operations and
science programs, those are the three major branches of the tree. And
then we have our field structure, headquarters and field structure that
falls beneath that.

So, this will be kept up-to-date on that handbook as well. I will
provide the context and explanation of our organization in a minute in
the PowerPoint. In fact, that is what is up next.

Now, some of this may be old hat to people and some of this may be brand
new. But at least by going through it quickly, we will make sure that
everybody is on the same page. Now, all of this material is up on the
website. So, if you need copies or haven\'t seen it yet, share it with
friends, be my guest.

I have stolen this from previous briefings that have been done by
various folks so, it is current information. But the whole purpose of
this presentation is to give you a little bit more background about NOAA
Fisheries Service and Organization, because our subcommittees are sort
of organized along these various lines of statutory authority for
protected resources, fisheries and marine mammals and so was our line
office structure. So, I wanted to give you some perspective on NOAA
Fisheries Service itself.

A long history of involvement both in the science, management and
regulation of fisheries dating back into the 1870s. And this is a
picture of our organization and how we are currently structured. It is a
very heavily regionalized structure. Across the country we have six
regions: northeast, southeast, Pacific Island, southwest, northwest and
Alaska. And in each of these regions, we have both a regional office
that is focused principally on management and regulation and a science
operation through a fishery science center, which has subordinate
laboratories where specific areas and types of research and analysis
take place.

So, the large part of 2700, 2600 people in the agency are located in our
field structure. And then we have our headquarters located in Silver
Spring. So, many of you may have current interactions with one
particular regional office. And all of these functions are mirrored
around the country in these six different regions.

Here is another view of the same org chart. Three branches. Sam Rauch,
who will be here tomorrow, is the Deputy Assistant Administrator for
Regulatory Programs on the management and regulations of protected
resources and the regional administrators who report to him. And the
office directors for sustainable fisheries, protected resources, and
habitat report to Sam.

On the science side, Steve Murawski is the director of our science
programs and the Chief Science Advisor. He will be here later today
through tomorrow. He is in charge of the Fisheries Science Centers
around the country. The Science Centers include what\'s called Southeast
Fisheries Science in Miami, for example, as well as the headquarters
Office of Science and Technology where John Boreman is the Office
Director, leading that operation.

And in the middle, the Deputy Assistant Administrator for Operations is
John Oliver. And he is in charge of different operations and
administrative functions, Management and Budget, the Law Enforcement
Office, the Chief Information Officer. I report to John as does the
Seafood Inspection Program. So those are the three major trees of how we
are organized and where we draw our expertise from.

I am not the budget expert, although I did stay at a Holiday Inn last
night, but it wasn\'t an express.

Historical budget trends, Gary Reisner is our expert and he is going to
talk a little bit more about the current scene on budget tomorrow. But
the takeaway from this slide is we have had a pretty active budget cycle
over the last few years. And the big difference that you will note here
is the delta between the President\'s budget and what is enacted. So we
have a very interested and very assertive appropriations interest on
Capital Hill that, in most years, that blue bar is something that we are
operating from on an active level, and consistently is higher than the
President\'s budget. This reflects a number of different theories and
hypotheses about Congressional interest and specific projects or just
general interest in the investments in natural resources science and
management relative to other budgets, priorities that are in the
president\'s budget. So, we could go into detail on this but we won\'t.

The value of marine fisheries is big business. It is important to the
economy. This helps explain why we are in the Department of Commerce.
Commercial sector, Alaska, you know, the leading ports, principally,
from the pollock fishery, for industrial fisheries, Menhaden in
Reedville, Virginia, and Louisiana, with a large part of the tonnage of
domestic fisheries; per capita, 16 and a half pounds per person and it
has been hovering around that level for the last several years. Shrimp
continues to be a very important component of the commercial sector.

We have a document called [Fisheries of the United States]{.underline}
that contains all of the statistical information. All MAFAC members
should be getting a copy of that every year when it comes out.

Randy?

MR. CATES: How often is that information updated?

DR. HOLLIDAY: This is all conducted on an annual basis. So, when we
publish [Fisheries in the U.S.]{.underline}, we will do leading ports
for the calendar year 2007. The state of our statistics programs\--
because it is a mosaic of state and federal programs, some of the
regions iterate and get data updated frequently on a monthly basis. In
other cases, depending on the state or area, they only get updated once
a year. So, the common denominator is on an annual cycle that we update
all of the statistics from around the country to produce a snapshot of
what is going on.

Recreational fisheries are popular around the United States. The three
major statutes, you know, it should be pop quiz. Everybody knows what
they are. Magnuson-Stevens Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act, the
Endangered Species Act\-- those are the principal statutory drivers but
there are about 90 to 100 other ones that impact and give us authority
to do things or require us to do things. These are some of the drivers
that we are responding to when we make policy.

The Magnuson Act, you know, most recently, was reauthorized a couple of
years ago a whole new litany of requirements on the agency and the
states and the councils to do things, some of them not funded but all of
them are good things for the future sustainability of fisheries that we
are required to do. We will be talking a little bit about those
specifically tomorrow with Alan Risenhoover\'s update on the Magnuson
Act update in the morning.

We have some goals set out for limited access privilege programs, you
know, doubling the number of LAPs. Magnuson-Steven reauthorization
required a specific final date for ending over-fishing by 2011, mandated
the creation of a national saltwater angler registry to approve
recreational data. And had some very strong words to say about IUU\--
illegal, unregulated, unreported\-- fishing in our role of NOAA and the
Department in international fisheries management.

Regional Councils, there are eight Regional Management Councils. Many of
you, based on our introductions are familiar or participants or members
of them past or prior. But it is a big job. Fisheries are different.
There are 46 Fisheries Management Plans, over 500 different stocks of
fish that we are trying to manage. Scientific research is in our science
centers. Again, I am breezing through this. So, go through this at your
leisure and if you have questions or want to know more about it, you can
ask us or explore our websites.

But we perform life science, physical science, social science, research,
stock assessments, economic valuations, habitat characterizations, we
have a very large science enterprise. That is the bottom line from this
component and it is applied science. It is applied to the sustainability
of both fisheries and non-harvested species. Marine mammals, protected
threatened major species, providing habitat and sound ecological
functions for the ecosystems in which they live.

We have a joint role with the fish and wildlife service of protecting
these particular endangered and threatened protected species.

I\'ll just kind of move through. Marine Mammal and the ESA, talking
about some of our major activities and take reduction plans. Aquaculture
program, we have had briefings at every one of our last, at least the
last half dozen MAFAC meetings on the status of aquaculture. You have
been a large part of developing the ten year plan for aquaculture. The
aquaculture legislation that did not get passed this past session of
Congress, but it\'s a key component of the equation of our
responsibilities.

And of course, extending beyond just the IUU fishing. These regional
fishery management organizations, a number of you are involved in ICCAT
or IATTC or some of these other transboundary management
responsibilities, again, these are all topics that are looking for input
on policy advice and MAFAC as a role to play in helping answer questions
and shape the future issues.

This is just a listing sort of geographically of some different kinds of
topics that were, at the time, this was March of this year, issues that
were either on our plate or on the council\'s plate that were causing us
to make some choices, make some decisions, make some allocations, and
this is an ever-changing map. But again, you can use it as a reference
point of what are some of the territory that MAFAC could get into and
advise on.

MR. CATES: Mark, are any of these slides available online?

DR. HOLLIDAY: They are all on the website. They should all be on the
website.

MR. CATES: Okay.

MR. JONER: What was this entitled? I\'m just trying to find it and I
couldn\'t.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Topher, do you know what it is called on the website?

MR. HOLMES: I have no idea.

DR. HOLLIDAY: All right. On a break, we will check it out for you. Other
questions on that?

MR. JONER: Mark, I just want to point on your slides of the fishing
ports, I think I saw Kodiak listed as hake and I wanted to know what Jim
was up to. Is there hake up there? Gas prices being what they are, we
are just out of bounds, five, six, seven miles. Just catch them in
Kodiak.

MR. SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman, I would just like to compliment Mark on the
very brief general update, new and old. That was just a very good, you
know, go and do that every time. You did a wonderful job.

DR. HOLLIDAY: The shorter the better. Right?

MR. SIMPSON: No, seriously. I mean, that was good.

DR. HOLLIDAY: So the last part of my act before we are going to take a
break at 10:30.

I have\-- it is important to me because it is probably one of the things
that takes a lot of my time, and that is travel. Travel for MAFAC is not
a terribly complicated issue, but I feel duty bound to go through a
brief travel PowerPoint to remind everybody old and new about what the
rules are so we all stay out of trouble and have a carefree life.

So, I am not pointing fingers. I am just \--

So, in fact, this is someplace in this handbook. If I remember.

MR. DiLERNIA: The travel guidelines \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: Yes.

MR. DiLERNIA: \-- 20.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Traveling for the government. All right. So this was
presented to MAFAC a couple of meetings with regard\-- I should let you
know that I have only been doing this since, what, October of last year?
So, I am kind of newbie, but I have presented at MAFAC a lot of times in
my career, but I have never had the privilege of working as the
executive director until last fall. But this briefing was given at a
couple of meetings before I showed up but I have modified it and changed
the names and provide a little more bit of emphasis.

But when you travel for the government, you are considered special
government employees and, therefore, when we pay to reimburse your
travel, you have to follow the federal travel regulations. And so they
are cumbersome and they are designed to provide good value to the
government by our contracts with different carriers. And we have some
very specific rules. And so if you are ever interested in knowing what
they are, there is a link here to the federal travel regulations that
govern things like how much money do you get reimbursed for a particular
visit to a city, your per diem. What governs the kinds of reimbursable
expenses. There is an answer in the form of frequently asked questions
at this link. And there is additional travel information out on NOAA
travel website. So, those two links you can keep an eye on.

But I liked this travel powerpoint because it was pretty straight
forward. That is travel basics. You are invited. So, we have a meeting.
You are invited to come and participate in our meeting. And you are
really considered an invitational traveler. So, you are at our
invitation. We have a government travel agency that is called ADTRAV.
And that is their phone number and that is their fax number and that is
their email.

So when you make plans to travel for MAFAC, your first step is to call
ADTRAV and say, \"Hey, I want to go to this city on this date and I need
a train ticket, plane ticket, some common carrier ticket.\" You have to
make that reservation through ADTRAV and they will book that ticket for
you.

MS. FOY: Mark, it does have to be through the ADTRAV in Silver Spring.
They can\'t call ADTRAV \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: ADTRAV in Silver Spring knows MAFAC and knows who you are.
ADTRAV has a national 800 number in Atlanta. They \[Atlanta ADTRAV
staff\] won\'t necessarily know to tell me that you are traveling. So,
your itinerary, in order for us to process it has to come back to us.
And so the Atlanta office doesn\'t know you. They have thousands, not
thousands, at least dozens of people taking calls. And Silver Spring is
only three people. And they have a list of the MAFAC members and they
know what to do when they get your request for travel. They send it back
to us.

MR. JONER: Mark, I had a call \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: So this is the number.

MR. JONER: Excuse me. I had a call from that 205 area. Where is that?

DR. HOLLIDAY: The fax is actually located in Atlanta.

MR. JONER: Oh, okay. Well, somebody called me from there about my
travel.

DR. HOLLIDAY: It could be. If there is an overflow and they need to get,
they will then contact people in Atlanta to do some of that work.

MR. JONER: Oh, okay.

DR. HOLLIDAY: But that is them initiating it. So our contacts should be
directly with the folks in Silver Spring. Because they know MAFAC.

So do not use any other travel or airline agency. Don\'t go and book a
flight. Don\'t use your own credit card. Don\'t do any of that stuff.
Let ADTRAV book your flight and they will issue the ticket for you.

What they do, once you have made your reservation, as I said, they give
you the itinerary. These are the dates you are going to travel. These
are the flights that you have agreed upon. They send that to me, the
inviting office, and we have prepared for you a travel order, travel
authorization. It is a piece of paper that says you are on official
government business as an invited traveler and these are the funds that
have been set aside to cover that travel and dates, et cetera, et
cetera.

We process that and that is the authorization that we then fax back to
ADTRAV that gives them the green light to issue the electronic ticket.
So, they won\'t release your ticket until they get this travel
authorization. But we can\'t prepare the travel authorization until we
get your itinerary. We can\'t get your itinerary unless you call ADTRAV
in Silver Spring.

MR. CATES: I have a word of caution on that, because this has happened
to me twice now. I booked through ADTRAV and it has a contact
information from you on who to contact. ADTRAV will send an email with
itinerary and everything and it looks like it is a done deal. But when I
go to try and upgrade or whatever I want to do, the ticket is not
issued, but on the email it looks like you are already done. You had
better double check.

DR. HOLLIDAY: That is a good point. There are two emails that ADTRAV
generates. The first one is when you make your reservation and it says
your itinerary has been done. The second email is when your ticket has
been issued. So, way at the end of the subject line on the email, it
says your electronic issue has been issued.

MR. CATES: So, newcomers, don\'t think \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: Don\'t be fooled by the first one. That just means if you
have a reservation, that your ticket is not ready to be issued
electronically because they haven\'t yet received your travel
authorization. And we can turn the travel authorizations around pretty
quick. Some people have to book early or there are very few flights.

In one case\-- was it Southwest? One of the airlines wouldn\'t hold a
reservation for more than 24 hours. So we had to do it a second time
because we weren\'t aware that they needed the travel order right away.
But if we know about it, we can do it.

MR. CATES: My tickets on this weren\'t issued until two days before I
flew. And I was calling two or three times a week saying, \"When are you
going to issue the ticket?\"

DR. HOLLIDAY: Right. But they didn\'t know who "John Cates" was. You're
listed on their MAFAC roster as Randy Cates.

MR. SIMPSON: Well, it\'s only really an issue when my wife travels and
you want to try and pair yourself up.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Right. If you want to get your travel \-- you want to be
able to get your e-ticket issued so that you can either upgrade using\--
you can upgrade using your own miles, but your ticket has to be in hand.
So you have to get that ticket early.

MR. SIMPSON: That is my only issue is when you bring your spouse. It is
kind of difficult, unless they do it really in advance. She\'s fussing
because she has to sit two or three rows away.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Dorothy?

MS. LOWMAN: So, yes, I mean, you really do have to do these things. I
mean, like you can\'t upgrade until the thing is bought, for example.

But I also wanted just to give kudos to Mark, because he really does try
to work with you if you have these things and get it through this
cumbersome process in a short time. So, I want to thank you for it.

MR. CATES: How far in advance can you typically give authorization?

DR. HOLLIDAY: As soon as we know what the venue is and the destination
will be. You can book the flight. We just want to make sure that you are
going to be going there. Every time they issue a ticket, they charge us
money, a non-refundable service charge. So even if you turn a ticket
back, we are still out-of-pocket some money. And in some cases, the
tickets themselves are non-refundable. Because if you do a lot of these
advance purchases, if it is not a government contract carrier, which is
why we encourage people to use their government contract for a
city-pair, which is an official carrier between two points. And most of
the time, that is a Y-class fare and that fare is refundable. You can
turn it back in. You can exchange it. There is no fee involved. But if
you get a non-refundable ticket, say a 45-day advance purchase and you
decide you are not going to go, well, we are stuck paying the bill for
it. So, we try to avoid that.

And in answer directly to your question, a month or two before the
meeting, I will usually say start making your reservations with ADTRAV.
And we can get your ticket issued as soon as we get the itinerary and
turn that around in a couple of days back to ADTRAV, and they can
release the ticket a month or two in advance.

So that is, on the invitation side, so I was going to spend the next
minute or two just talking about, your trip is over, you come back, you
are all happy but you\'re out-of-pocket some cash because you don\'t
have a government credit card so you had to put some money up front, you
want to get reimbursed.

So, within five days, the federal travel regulations, if you read them,
five business days later, we are supposed to be submitting a voucher for
you to get reimbursed. In some cases, it has been weeks or months. I
don\'t know why people delay. If it was my money, I would be getting
there on day two to get my money back, but a lot of people I have had to
hound to get their vouchers in so they could get their money back.

Forward a copy of your travel costs and your receipts to headquarters.
Send the original receipts but keep a copy for yourself, in case
something happens.

You don\'t need to send in receipts for food. You have a set amount of
money that you are going to get paid for food whether you eat it all
today, or you can pocket that money or you can load up on donuts. It
looks like there are brownies.

MR. DiLERNIA: The brownies are good.

DR. HOLLIDAY: On the first day\-- so, I think the per diem, it just
changed for New Orleans. I think it is \$59 a day. And so you can spend
it all for dinner, or lunch, but you don\'t need to give me your
receipt. You get that money. That is called your per diem. And it is not
just for your meals, it is for your meals and incidental expenses. And
so, if you tip the person at the front desk, the doorman or something,
all those, M-I and E, it is referred to: Meals and incidental expenses.

But on the first day of travel and the last day, guess what? The
government says you only need three quarters of that. So, when you get
your reimbursement, you only get

reimbursed three-quarters of that \$59.

MS. DOERR: What about transfers to the airport?

DR. HOLLIDAY: Transfers, they are covered 100%. From your home to an
airport. From your airport to your hotel. Any transfers are covered at
full expense, separately from the per diem amount that I have been
talking about. Save the receipt.

Technically, unless it is over \$75, we don\'t need the receipt, but you
would be better off just to send a receipt. Keep your receipts and keep
track of things just because you never know when things might come back
and someone ask for something we didn\'t have.

MR. CATES: The New Orleans tax is a lot cheaper than New York.

DR. HOLLIDAY: New York, yes. But it isn\'t as much fun.

MR. DiLERNIA: What do they charge you in New York?

MR. CATES: Well, to go the airport, we paid \$75.

MR. DiLERNIA: Really?

MR. SIMPSON: Well, but what is neat about New York is you can use your
credit card. I don\'t know if the taxis here do that.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Okay, so, I am almost done with this, and we are coming up
on our break, and we have a 10:45 appointment with the attorney.

MR. O\'SHEA: You guys are paying for luggage now, right?

DR. HOLLIDAY: Good question. I presume. You know, we will find out but I
presume. I never travel with checked luggage.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Yes, but they usually give you a receipt.

DR. HOLLIDAY: That\'s another \--

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: That is a business expense.

DR. HOLLIDAY: You can explore the travel regulations.

If you stay in a spot for more than four days, you can have your
dry-cleaning done. Is that right?

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Except in Alaska or Hawaii. In Alaska or Hawaii,
you don\'t get your clothes cleaned, but any place else after four days
you can. That is true. It\'s in there.

DR. HOLLIDAY: That is a legitimate business expense that will be
reimbursed. Get a receipt.

MR. BILLY: How about a taxi to a restaurant?

DR. HOLLIDAY: No. You are on your own. There are plenty of places to eat
within walking distance. That is the government\'s view. If you are out
in a desolate area, in a hotel that doesn\'t have food service and you
need to go offsite to get a meal, they will consider it. But if you are
in a location that has food facilities, there is no reason to even ask
for reimbursement simply because you want to go to your favorite
restaurant.

All right. So, you have sent your summary of your travel costs, your
receipts are in. We prepare a travel voucher and we submit that
electronically to NOAA finance. NOAA finance is going to then direct
deposit your reimbursement into your account. And that is why we have
asked you to all maintain this direct deposit form that has a bank
account number that you want these funds put into. And if you change
that bank or your bank is no longer in business \--

MR. DiLERNIA: Lehman Brothers.

DR. HOLLIDAY: \-- fill out another form. Randy?

MR. CATES: Are you notified when the direct deposit goes through?

MR. DiLERNIA: Yes. You get an email.

DR. HOLLIDAY: You should be getting an email. If you are not, let me
know and I will see why not. But you should get a little notice saying
\"such and such a date a deposit was made in an account with this
amount.\"

MR. CATES: And so we can go back and check. On the last travel, I don\'t
remember recalling ever getting \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: Getting reimbursed or getting an email?

MR. CATES: Both.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well \--

MR. DiLERNIA: Did you use that number I gave you, the deposit number?

(Laughter.)

DR. HOLLIDAY: Okay.

MR. CATES: I just wanted to check on it.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Your responsibilities are to know the regulations.
Ignorance of the law is no excuse. Make your travel arrangements only
through ADTRAV. Do not use your credit card to purchase tickets. I will
repeat. Do not use your credit card to purchase tickets.

For train travel, obtain your authorization prior to traveling. It is
very difficult to do it after the fact. Debt forgiveness doesn\'t work.
Submit the signed vouchers and receipts on a timely basis.

And you know, try as you might, we won\'t reimburse you for things that
the federal travel regulations say are against the law. And I say that
because we are next to Bourbon Street.

(Laughter.)

DR. HOLLIDAY: The government is charged a service fee for each ticket
issued. If you drive to the airport, you will get mileage for your car.
If you park it in the parking lot, you will get the parking at the
airport reimbursed.

We generally do not allow rental cars. So when there is a common
conveyance to get to a hotel, there is no reason for you to pay for a
rental, for us to reimburse you for a rental car that is going to sit at
\$29 a day for parking when you have no place to go except back to the
airport.

If we are at a venue and there was no other way there we could authorize
it, but we generally do not authorize rental cars. Okay.

Okay, I\'m done. Any other questions, we can pick them up during the
break or throughout the meeting. Or at any time you are uncertain about
something, give me a call or an email. I would be happy to talk to you.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Thanks, Mark. That was very good.

Now, we are going to have a break. How hard is 10:45?

DR. HOLLIDAY: He is going to be on the phone at 10:46.

MR. BILLY: So, we have got ten minutes for a coffee break. So, be back
in your seats in 10 minutes. And you can have your coffee with you.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record at 10:36 a.m.
and resumed at 10:50 a.m.)

DR. HOLLIDAY: Will, can you hear us okay?

MR. JACOBI: Yes. Can you hear me?

DR. HOLLIDAY: So far, so good. So, Tom is going to do an introduction
and then we will turn it over to you.

MR. JACOBI: Okay.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Okay. We have on the line Will Jacobi. He is Senior
Counsel focusing on the Ethics Law and Programs Division, Office of
General Counsel in the Department of Commerce. And we thought it was
important, particularly for the new members but also a review for the
existing members of our obligations with respect to ethics and the law.

So, I\'ll turn it over to you Will. And I assume if we have questions,
we should just go ahead and ask them as you make your presentation?

MR. JACOBI: Yes, just feel free to interrupt.

MR. BILLY: Okay.

MS. DOERR: Can you turn it up?

MR. BILLY: Yes, I\'m going to try.

Okay. Go ahead, Will.

MR. JACOBI: Hey Mark, I guess I can\'t hear the people in the audience.
So, if a question does come up you will have to maybe chime in. Okay?
Because I can hear you but I didn\'t hear in the background.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Will. We will\--

MR. JACOBI: We\'ll see how it goes. Hello?

MR. BILLY: Sounds good.

MR. JACOBI: Okay. So, I am going to give you a brief summary of the
ethics that apply to members of the Marine Fisheries Advisory Committee.
And as members of this committee, you are considered what is called
SGEs, that is a special government employee. And as such, you are
subject to federal ethics laws and regulations just like full-time
government employees like me, but the restrictions that are placed on
you are not as great as they are on me, and I will point those out as we
go along here.

But I am the person who reviews your financial disclosure reports. And I
have spoken with a few of you and you file these every year. And the
purpose of the review is to determine whether you all have any potential
conflicts between the duties of your position as a committee member and
any stock holdings you have or any outside activities in which you are
engaged. And Congress recognizes that people like you are asked to serve
on these committees based on your expertise in the field, and therefore
it is expected that you are going to have conflicts or that you are
going to be engaged in outside activities that are related to the
subject are in which you are providing advice. And of course, you are
going to have conflicts.

And accordingly, there is a special statutory provision that allows for
the issuance of a conflict of interest waiver based on the government\'s
need for your services.

So, when I am reviewing your reports, if I see a potential conflict I
would request that a waiver be prepared. And that is why it is important
that you fully disclose all of your stock holdings and outside positions
so that we can get all the potential conflicts covered by a waiver.

Now I guess backing up a step, what is a conflict? What is a financial
conflict? And let me just explain what the financial conflict of
interest statute basically says, which is that you cannot participate in
a matter as part of your government duties in which you have a personal
financial interest.

And your financial interest includes not only your own but those of your
spouse and your outside employer. And when I speak of outside
employer\-- and you probably think that MAFAC is your outside
employer\-- but when we speak of outside employers, we mean your real
job. Your full-time jobs. So, you know, your outside employers, their
financial ethics is imputed to you as well as your spouse, your minor
children, and any organization on which you serve as a board member or
officer or trustee.

So for example, let\'s say that you are in the aquaculture business, and
as part of your MAFAC duties you are asked to make a recommendation on
NOAA implementing an aquaculture plan. Well, that is going to effect
your outside financial interest. You know, the financial interest of
your employer. So that would be a matter that can create a potential
conflict. Or if you are a commercial fisherman, and one of the issues
that comes up is you all are making recommendations on whether vessel
monitoring systems should be on all commercial fishing boats or as a
commercial fisherman, that is going to affect your financial \-- even
though it is going to affect all commercial fishermen, it is still going
to affect your financial interest as a commercial fishermen. So again,
that would be an area in which you would be working on matter that
affects your financial interest and you couldn\'t participate in that
matter unless an exemption applied and a waiver was issued.

By the way, when we talk about not participating in matters affecting
your financial interest, it is not just voting on a matter, it is
providing advice and making recommendations. It doesn\'t have to be
final decisions. It could be any input that you making into a decision
is participation, not just when you say, \"I didn\'t vote on it but I
did participate.\" That is not the way we analyze it.

MR. BILLY: You need to speak up a little bit.

MR. JACOBI: I need to speak up a little bit?

MR. BILLY: Just a little, yes.

MR. JACOBI: Okay. Any questions, at this point?

MR. BILLY: Is this the preferred approach, the waiver?

MR. JACOBI: I\'m sorry. What?

MR. BILLY: Is this the preferred approach for anyone that might have a
conflict of interest, just to do the waiver as appropriate?

MR. JACOBI: Yes. I mean, and I am making a determination based upon the
review of the report.

MR. BILLY: Okay.

MR. JACOBI: Keeping in mind, people may be sitting there and thinking
well, why didn\'t I get a waiver, I may have this conflict. There are
some regulatory exemptions that would allow you where we don\'t need to
have a waiver. For example, if your only outside interest is your
employer, and your employer is going to be affected by a decision you
make but they are just going to be affected as a member of an industry,
then there is a regulatory provision that allows several advisory
committee members to participate in matters, in general policy matters
that could affect their employer as a member of the industry. So in that
case, you don\'t need to get a\-- we determined that we don\'t need to
issue a waiver in that case. If it is just an employer.

That said, if the matter is going to have a special and distinct effect
on your employer, then that is not covered. And that\'s something that
we wouldn\'t even issue a waiver for. And even if we have issued waivers
for anyone, they are only waivers that allow you to participate in
general policy matters that could affect your financial interest or your
outside employers. The waivers don\'t allow you ever to participate in a
matter that is going to have a special and distinct affect or that
specifically involves your outside interest.

And for example, the waivers would cover commercial fishermen being
allowed to participate in the decision to put VMS systems on commercial
fishing boats and stuff, that is not going to have a special and
distinct effect on you as a commercial fisherman. It is going to affect
everybody. But if it was a decision affecting your particular employer,
that wouldn\'t be covered by a waiver.

And the special and distinct issues, my understanding that is never
going to come up. As a matter of fact, you guys are operating on a much
higher policy level. So, these specific, what we call matters involving
specific parties, we don\'t anticipate that is going to come up for
MAFAC. Waivers that we are issuing are going to be just fine.

MR. BILLY: Okay, thanks.

MR. JACOBI: Now, the other point is is that if you have an outside
employer, as I said, there is a regulatory provision that allows you to
participate in general policy matters that would affect an outside
employer as a member of this industry, but if you own stock in the
company, that is a different story. Then there needs to be a waiver
issued because that regulatory provision just covers the employment
interest. It doesn\'t cover stock ownership. And I know that was an
issue for at least one member who had an outside business and that would
have been covered by the regulatory provision. But he also owned stock
in the company, so we needed a waiver for that.

I\'m probably getting into too much detail. The people that needed
waivers got waivers. If you have a specific question, we can speak about
that later, but I am pretty comfortable that everyone that needed a
waiver got a waiver.

Okay. So that covers financial conflict of interest, I believe. And
another area is non-financial conflict of interest. And the rule here is
that you can\'t participate in a matter involving somebody with whom you
have close ties. And again, this is a non-financial conflict. And this
only comes up when you are dealing with matters involving specific
parties. And again you know, close ties are your employer, your
spouse\'s employer, your former employer who\-- for the last year, an
organization with whom you are active with who is not your employer. But
again, we don\'t anticipate that MAFAC is going to involved in any
specific matters. So [this, generally, is not going to be an
issue.]{.mark} But that is just another rule that still does apply to
all Federal Advisory Committee members.

That covers conflicts of interest. Another area I wanted to touch on was
gifts. There are rules for government employees in terms of accepting
gifts. And the basic rule is that you cannot accept a gift from anyone
who is a prohibited source. And a prohibited source means anyone that
has business or is seeking business with the department. And the
Department of Commerce just doesn\'t cover NOAA, it covers a whole range
of\-- it covers commerce, it covers everything.

You also cannot accept a give if it is offered to you because of your
government position, your MAFAC position. However, there are numerous
exceptions to the gift restrictions which will pretty much overcome
everything I just said.

(Laughter.)

MR. JACOBI: The basic exception is that if it is a gift that is valued
at under \$20, you can accept it. There is a limit. You can\'t accept
more than \$50 per year from the same source but if it under \$20, it is
never going to be a problem.

The other exception and the most relevant for you all, is the gift based
upon an outside business relationship. So, if somebody is offering you a
gift based upon what you do in your real job, then you don\'t have to
worry about gift restrictions. In other words, if it is not related to
what you are doing as a MAFAC member, you don\'t have any concern.

But, let\'s say you guys are down there for your meeting and some
interested outside party wants to have a party for you and MAFAC is down
there and they are having a party for you. You may know that person from
your outside business, but if you are being invited to an event because
of your MAFAC position, then the gift restrictions do apply. So that is
just something to be aware of.

Now that said, there is another restriction, there is another exception
that they allow you to attend the event, if it meets the criteria for a
widely-attended gathering. And that means that a certain number of
people have to be going, not including government people, and it has to
represent a diversity of views. But I am not going to go too far down
that road because I haven\'t heard anything like that is happening down
there yet.

So just be aware that as members of MAFAC the gift rules, the federal
ethics rules, including the gift rules do apply to you. It is just
something to be aware of. Any question there?

Okay. Government activities.

MR. BILLY: Hold on.

MR. CATES: I have a question.

MR. JACOBI: Yes.

MR. CATES: Is there any problem with one MAFAC member\-- for example, if
we are here on business and we go out to dinner, one MAFAC member buying
another MAFAC member his dinner? Do you understand that question?

MR. JACOBI: Yes, I understand the question. So that is a good point.
There is a rule on gifts between employees. And that is fine, as long as
everybody is at the same level. So there is no problem with what you
just said. But if a subordinate, there is a rule that subordinates
cannot give a gift to a supervisor, and a supervisor cannot accept a
gift from a subordinate.

We had a situation recently where I was asked a question about another
committee wanted to buy a retirement gift for the Admiral, the Vice
Admiral. And the gift restrictions are implemented in that case because
the committee members were government employees, and their appointing
authority was Lautenbacher. So, technically, they could not buy a gift
for him because you could not buy a gift for a supervisor.

However, as with that rule, as is the case with all of these rules,
there seems to be there are many exceptions to them which would allow
it. And there is an exception where you can buy a gift for a supervisor
for a significant life event. And a retirement would meet that criteria.

I am not asking \-- your appointing official is the Secretary. So, I am
not suggesting that anyone buy a gift for this secretary, but that would
be a similar scenario. So, that answers the question?

MR. CATES: Yes, a lot of people are buying me dinner.

MR. JACOBI: Okay. Those are the gift rules.

Non-government activities. Working for a foreign government is generally
okay. This used to be in issue but we got some clarification on that.
Under the constitution, government employees cannot accept compensation
from a foreign government. That really applies more to me. We got some
clarification. For members of federal advisory committees, if you\'re
working for a foreign government, that is generally okay. It is not
going to be an issue for MAFAC members. So, if you are working for a
foreign government, that is fine.

That said, there are some restrictions on representing foreign
governments and representing foreign entities. And that is why you sign
that certification of status statement. And this is a little bit outside
of my area. It is actually a lot outside of my area. But you can\'t be
engaging in representational activities for foreign governments or
foreign entities if it requires registration under the foreign agents
registration act or it requires your registration under the lobby and
disclosure act.

So, I can\'t really answer any follow-up questions on what that means,
other than if you are required to register under those acts with respect
to representation for foreign governments or foreign entities, that can
be a problem. I think everybody is filing certification status
statements saying they are not engaged in those activities.

But staying on the issue of lobbying in the government, some of you may
be engaged in lobbying activities before Congress or before federal
agencies and that is fine, but there is a restriction. Now for me, me as
a full-time government employee, I am not allowed to lobby a federal
agency on behalf of others on any matter. It is just prohibited. For you
all as members of a federal advisory committee, you also\-- there are
restrictions. The only restriction, though, is that you cannot lobby a
federal agency or a federal court\-- but that is not likely\-- but you
cannot lobby a federal agency concerning a specific party matter on
which you participated as a MAFAC members. And as I pointed out before,
it is unlikely that you guys are going to deal with specific party
matters because MAFAC is not dealing with individual parties. You guys
are at a much higher level. You know, you are not talking about specific
party matters, but to the extent that you ever do\-- and when we say
\"specific party matter,\" I mean like something that involves an
identifiable party like a contract, or a grant, or a license, or
litigation. But again, I don\'t believe that is what you all are doing.
But if you did, then you couldn\'t go back and communicate with
government officials about that same matter in your private capacity.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Will, we have a question for you.

MR. JACOBI: Yes.

MR. DiLERNIA: Hi, Will. Tony DiLernia here. I am member from New York.

Will, let me give you a for instance. MAFAC develops a policy supporting
the offshore aquaculture bill.

MR. JACOBI: Yes.

MR. DiLERNIA: And at a later date, I happen to be meeting with my
senators from the State of New York, and they ask me about what issues
are going on. And I tell them that I support the offshore aquaculture
bill.

MR. JACOBI: Yes.

MR. DiLERNIA: Is that permitted? Is that, we are good with that?

MR. JACOBI: Yes. The only thing I would caution on that is that when you
are meeting with members of congress, unless you have authority to do
so, you don\'t want to say you are speaking for MAFAC.

MR. DiLERNIA: No.

MR. JACOBI: But no, you can do that.

MR. DiLERNIA: As an individual I can.

MR. JACOBI: The restrictions \-- yes, what you just said was perfectly
fine. The restriction that I am referring to only applies to federal
agencies and federal courts. It doesn\'t apply to making representations
before Congress. You can go before Congress and talk the same thing to
Congress that you are talking about in MAFAC.

MR. DiLERNIA: So then we have, to carry it a step further, at this point
\--

MR. JACOBI: The MAFAC issue that we are talking about was not a specific
party matter. So the restriction wouldn\'t apply to that in any event.
So, it is okay anyway. You can talk to anybody about that because it is
not a \-- you can talk to a federal agency about it because it is not a
specific party matter.

MR. DiLERNIA: Okay. Let me give you another for instance.

MR. JACOBI: All right.

MR. DiLERNIA: We have a document here. It is called Fisheries 2020,
which is our vision of the future of fisheries. Later on in this meeting
we will be discussing how we should use this document. And it has been
suggested that we take the document and duplicate it and send it to all
of the members of Congress. That would be acceptable? Hello?

MR. JACOBI: I\'m thinking.

MR. DiLERNIA: It\'s a public document, at this point. It has been
published.

MR. JACOBI: Well the reason I am just hesitating in my response is that,
is this something that you would be doing outside your MAFAC duties?

MR. DiLERNIA: No. This is something the committee would do. I mean \--

MR. JACOBI: Yes. The only person \-- the reason I am just hesitating in
answering is because I know there are some lobbying restrictions but I
don\'t know \-- there are some grass roots lobbying restrictions, and I
think that what you are doing is permissible. But that is more of a
general law \-- well, it is another division that would answer that
question.

But, Mark, I am just a little bit hesitant to answer that question for
sure. I think it sounds okay, but I know there are some restrictions on
using appropriate funds for lobbying.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well I think for our purposes now, I think there is a
little bit of uncertainty. So we will say we will take that up outside
the meeting and follow up with Tony and the rest of the committee when
we get a more clear answer for ourselves.

MR. JACOBI: Okay.

DR. HOLLIDAY: All right?

MR. JACOBI: I would want to discuss that with our general law division.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Right. We can talk to Hector and others.

MR. JACOBI: Yes, okay.

MR. DiLERNIA: Thank you.

MR. BILLY: Another question.

MR. JACOBI: Okay.

MR. CATES: If we are asked to\-- Randy Cates here with Aquaculture\-- I
have been asked to meet in several congressional meetings. Do we have to
make a disclosure that we are a MAFAC member, even though we are there
representing our own company\'s interest?

MR. JACOBI: No, I don\'t think so.

MR. CATES: Okay.

MR. JACOBI: I mean, it is up to you. But if you are going to talk\-- say
you are a MAFAC member, you don\'t want to be doing so in a way that
would suggest that MAFAC is endorsing what you are saying.

MR. CATES: Right.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Go ahead.

MR. JACOBI: Okay. I\'m going ahead?

MR. BILLY: Yes.

MR. JACOBI: Okay. That pretty much covers it. The only other thing I
will touch on is\-- I know it is not timely\-- is political activities.
Political activities, for me, there are a lot of restrictions on me.
There is pretty much no restrictions on you guys except that you
shouldn\'t be engaging in political activities on government premises or
during your duty hours. Other than that, you guys don\'t really have any
restrictions on you.

Like for instance, I can\'t engage in fund raising activities, but you
can. But again, not too timely, but just to let you know.

That pretty much covers everything I have to say. Any other questions?

MR. BILLY: Okay, Heather.

MS. McCARTY: Yes, this is Heather McCarty. I was curious if you have
ever had any inquiries or any concerns expressed to you from anyone
regarding MAFAC as a group or MAFAC members.

MR. JACOBI: Any inquiries about MAFAC?

MS. McCARTY: Yes.

MR. JACOBI: They really wouldn\'t come to me. I mean, I wouldn\'t be
getting those inquiries. I mean, I am just kind of here to review your
reports and provide guidance to you guys and tell you about the rules.

If some of you had a problem with MAFAC it probably wouldn\'t get down
to, it could get down to me eventually. But if there was a problem it
wouldn\'t come to our office. If you are asking about whether there is
anything has been in the news about investigations, you know, somebody
would report that, I guess, to the Office of Inspector General.

And I guess conceivably somewhere down the road they would come to me
and ask me a question but I have never heard anything come up with
MAFAC. But I am somewhat down the food chain.

MS. McCARTY: Okay, thanks.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Another question here. Steve.

MR. JONER: Yes, this is Steve Joner. I have a non-MAFAC related
question. What do you know about the Pacific Whiting Treaty and the
holdup there because of the conflict of interest?

MR. JACOBI: Well, I know that it hasn\'t been resolved yet because, you
know, I guess Congress is still out and I know that they are still being
held up. You know, the statute says that the members are subject to the
conflict of interest rules. So, that needs to be resolved.

MR. JONER: And so specifically, what was the problem there?

MR. JACOBI: The problem was that, under the Pacific Whiting Treaty, the
statute says that members are to be appointed, basically it says the
members should be appointed from industry. And remember I said earlier
when we were talking about the rules, you know, Pacific Whiting is not a
federal advisory committee. Remember when I said there was a conflict of
interest waiver that there is a special statutory provision that
Congress expects that you guys as FACA members, they are looking for
people with expertise. So they expect that there is going to be
conflicts. So there is a special statutory provision that allows for the
issuance of a waiver, based upon the government\'s interest in having
you serve.

But Pacific Whiting Treaty, that is not a federal advisory committee. So
that waiver wasn\'t available for those members. And again, the statute
says, you know, they are looking for people, you know, some people that
are in the industry. So obviously, they are going to have conflicts,
too. And the statute says the conflict of interest rules are going to
apply to the members of the Pacific Whiting Commission or Pacific
Whiting Treaty. So, it kind of creates a log jam.

I mean, it is difficult for them to be able to provide guidance without
violating the conflict of interest statute. So, there has to be a fix to
the situation. I\'m not sure what it is going to be but it has to be
fixed.

So, that was the problem.

MR. JONER: Okay, thank you.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Randy?

MR. CATES: I have a quick question. On the website, you give examples of
a problem and if you work for a company and you are a MAFAC member, is
that company allowed to apply for grants within Commerce?

MR. JACOBI: Yes, I don\'t see what the problem is going to be there. Are
you asking whether you, as a member of the company, can apply for the
grant?

MR. CATES: Or as an employee of a company that you work for, is the
company allowed to apply for a grant?

MR. JACOBI: That is outside of my area but I don\'t know of any ethics
rules that would be, any such rules that would bar that would be under
some grant rules. But that would shock me if that was the case.

MR. CATES: Okay.

MR. JACOBI: But the more pertinent question would be, assuming you could
do it, whether you as the MAFAC member could apply for the grant, could
communicate with Commerce officials. And again, before I mentioned that
there was that rule that says that federal employees generally cannot
communicate with a federal agency on behalf of another.

So, I couldn\'t do it but for advisory committee members, that
restriction is more narrow. You all just, the only restriction on you
all is that you can\'t communicate with federal agencies concerning a
matter on which you are working on, a specific party matter on which you
are working as a member of MAFAC.

So, if you are not working on that grant as a member of MAFAC, which you
are not because that is not what you guys are doing, you would be able
to communicate with Commerce officials about that grant.

MR. CATES: Okay.

MR. JACOBI: So, assuming that there is no grant restrictions that would
bar your initial question, I would be really surprised if that was the
case.

You could ask the grant people when you are applying for the grant but
they will probably just, they won\'t \-- yes, I would be very surprised.
Okay?

MR. CATES: Thank you.

MR. BILLY: Other questions anyone?

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well, if other questions come up, are you okay with people
contacting you directly? I mean, you have given their contact
information out to the past members or should they come through me?

MR. JACOBI: Contacting me is fine. You know, if they want to go through
you or if they want to go through me that is fine. You know, if they
have a specific question they think it is easier to contact me, you
know, that is actually, that is the better way to do it. They like using
you for the distribution of what, you know, the 450s and all of that.
But contacting me is perfectly fine.

DR. HOLLIDAY: All right. So, I will re-circulate your contact
information to make sure they know how to contact you directly.

MR. JACOBI: Okay.

DR. HOLLIDAY: No other questions right now? Will, I really appreciate
your spending the time with us this morning. I think many people found
it very helpful and you provide some good food for thought for other
future questions that come up as well.

MR. JACOBI: Okay. My pleasure. Okay. Have a good rest of the meeting.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Thanks very much.

MR. BILLY: Okay, thank you.

MR. SIMPSON: Well we all, as United States citizens, own stock in all of
these companies.

MR. BILLY: All right.

DR. HOLLIDAY: So before we move off this topic, \--

MR. BILLY: Yes.

DR. HOLLIDAY: \-- liaisons. So this is an opportune time for us to look
at our requirements for financial disclosure and certification of
non-foreign agent. So, the new members have just gone through this
process so you can tune out for a minute.

For the existing members, you have to do this on an annual basis and
this is the last meeting before the turn of the calendar year. So, it is
my first attempt to try to get you to work with me to re-up, as they
say.

MR. JONER: How about if I just turn my travel in on time.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well here is the deal. I have, for each existing member, I
think almost every member, if we come out right. I have a folder here.
And inside it will be your last year\'s financial disclosure statement
with your signature whited out and then Xeroxed. Okay? So nothing has
changed from last year\'s report. You know, things may have but \--

MR. BILLY: Values have gone down.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Never ask for anything that has to do with the value of
your holdings, it is just the name of it.

So, if things have changed, you can take this home with you and just
write on an addendum sheet and staple it and sign it. And 90 percent of
the work is done. And there is also a blank certification of status
statement that you are not a foreign agent. That needs to get signed
again.

And so I am handing these out now. And you don\'t have to do them at the
meeting. But rather than send it to you in the mail and explain it to
you and I have saved on the postage and I get to give you all some
really neat folding things that look pretty cool.

So, I am going to hand these out and then we will go on to the next
agenda item. But I wanted to, so, I have discussed this with Will.
Everything is legit the way we are doing it but he would like to get
them back. And he said at the end of the year, I would like to get them
back in a month\'s time or something so that he can get through all of
these and make sure that everything is fine.

MR. DiLERNIA: Can\'t we just sign them and give them back to you right
now, Mark?

DR. HOLLIDAY: If you want to, you are absolutely welcome to do so. But I
don\'t want to pressure you if you want to go and review it in detail
and do that.

I will just wander around.

MR. BILLY: Okay, thanks for doing that. This is really a good way to do
it.

Okay, I am going to move on to the next item. At the last meeting in New
York City, we asked NOAA Fisheries to develop a new strategic plan. And
I thought I would read from the report what we said. This is a
resolution that was passed unanimously. It reads \"We recommend that
NOAA develop a strategic plan for seafood safety based on input from our
own seafood safety people and from FDA,\" the Food and Drug
Administration, \"with an emphasis on completing the memorandums of
understanding with FDA and emphasis on internal organizations, economic
fraud and increased research into public confidence in seafood and
especially increased research into food safety technologies and include
the positives and the job well done of the current seafood safety
program.\"

So, it is a lot of words, essentially to say we want NOAA Fisheries to
step back like they did with aquaculture earlier and develop a strategic
plan for this important area of seafood safety and quality and labeling
and all the related issues.

And we have with us today Tim Hansen. He is the director of the National
Marine Fisheries Services Seafood Inspection Program and he is going to
provide us a status report on the work that has been initiated to
develop this strategic plan that we have asked for. So, Tim, the floor
is yours.

MR. HANSEN: Okay, thank you, Mr. Chairman.

As Tom mentioned, we were charged with creating the plan, a strategic
plan for 2020 for seafood safety. However, we didn\'t complete it. And
we purposely didn\'t complete it. I will give you some reasons for that.
I will also go over, you know, what we have done. We have made
substantial progress. I think we can conclude it very soon. We have a
significant reason for wanting to wait. We think that although we want
to have a vision for the future, the near term vision is kind of clouded
and there are several reasons for that. And so, the ad hoc group and
myself asked the chairman if he wouldn\'t indulge us with a little time
delay. And he graciously granted that request. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

So, the reason for the delay is really, there is a lot of things going
on in the area of food regulation and seafood safety. And something that
really kind of obscured the picture kind of on the short term. So, I
will go over those very quickly.

First, we have got, as Jim mentioned, we have a new administration. That
means that we will have a new NOAA Administrator, perhaps a new
Assistant Administrator for Fisheries, maybe not. But this, since
political appointees do establish priorities, our new senior managers,
if you will, may or may not want to make priorities in this area. We
just don\'t know. We hope they do.

Secondly, and this is a real zinger, and many of you may not be aware of
this activity but in the 2008 Farm Bill, there is a provision in that
bill to amend the Federal Meat Inspection Act to include catfish, which
means that USDA Food Safety Inspection Service becomes a regulatory
authority for catfish. So they would be regulating catfish in the same
way they would be other food products such as meat, poultry, mostly meat
under the Inspection Act.

It also gives them the authority to define what is a catfish. And in
2002 Farm Bill, a catfish was a North American catfish. And now it seems
that the Secretary of Agriculture may want to include all catfish. And
the reason for that is there is a desire to regulate foreign produced
catfish, basically from Vietnam who out compete our catfish industry.
They want to control export and control the safety of those. I will go
into what that entails in just a second.

The Act also would give the opportunity to USDA to regulate all
farm-raised fish if they were so petitioned by the industry.

So, eventually this could evolve into anything that has to do with
aquaculture would have a different regulatory authority than wild caught
fish. We don\'t know if it is going to go there but I have got to tell
you that the food safety inspection service is absolutely enthusiastic
about the idea. So, they are gearing up for it.

Another thing, another provision is that it also authorizes the Ag
Marketing Service, which has the same authority as us but they do
everything on a fee-for-service voluntary basis, you know, all food
commodities except seafood. This would authorize them to create a
program for catfish, a voluntary program.

We have been talking to them and they seem less enthusiastic about this.
So, we are going to have a public meeting probably early next year, a
joint public meeting in catfish country to sort of cure the concerns of
folks down there. Yes, sir?

MR. DEWEY: Tim, on the Farm Bill where it spoke to the ability for FSIS
to do inspection of other fishery products in farm-raised fish if they
are petitioned, who does that petitioning?

MR. HANSEN: My understanding it would be the interested industry. So, if
the foul industry in Idaho decided they prefer USDA regulation versus
FDA regulation, \--

MR. DEWEY: Well, it is not necessarily some other third party that
somehow thinks that \--

MR. HANSEN: Well, I\'m not sure of that.

MR. DEWEY: \-- thinks that certain farm-raised fish should be inspected
by them.

MR. HANSEN: I\'m not sure who has standing in this case.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: The Agriculture Department, based on past
questions, would take that into consideration in making the decision
whether to accept a petition and make a species amenable under the meat
act.

MR. DEWEY: But the petition would have to come from the group wanting
the inspection versus, or to be inspected versus a third party that
would say, this product needs to be inspected by him.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: There is no hard and fast provision. So, I am sure
the Department would factor in a third party involvement in deciding
whether to accept the petition or not.

MR. HANSEN: Okay. Well, also the other little zinger here is that this
will facilitate USDA authority but didn\'t take any away from FDA who
still thinks they have authority over this commodity.

So, here we are not knowing who \-- part of our job is to enforce
regulatory rules in the voluntary firms that we inspect. And whose
regulatory rules would be enforced, who is charge? Would we have some
competition from Ag Marketing who may read a parallel program to ours
for farm-raised fish. So that kind of clouds the picture and we are not
sure where all of this is going but it should become clear in the next
few months. I believe that Food Safety Inspection Service has to come
out with some regulations early this year, in 2009. So, we will get a
clearer picture of all of that at that time, perhaps.

On the FDA front, they are implementing something called the Food
Protection Plan which, if you are interested, is on the website, which
is a whole bunch things to include food safety across the board, not
just seafood. So, they are going to be changing the way they do
business, it would appear. And we may have to sort of adjust our way of
doing things, whatever that is. They are talking about things such as
applying HACCP to all food groups, charging for re-inspections. There
are a whole bunch of things in there that were much different than they
were in the past.

Also, they have a pilot, they are starting a pilot of third party
inspections for aquacultured shrimp. And that is basically, they are
trying to see if they can take the results of a third party, like the
Seafood Inspection Program, we are going to participate in that, or a
private group of food inspections that occur overseas. So, that is a
change. We don\'t know where they are going with that, whether they will
be successful or not.

Okay, there is also, there has been a lot of bills in Congress of late.
And I would expect the next session, which is apparently a little more
Democrat, might have some bills to offer. And one never knows if these
things will become law or not. But, there is a likelihood that one
might.

And fifth and last, we are currently on a continuing resolution in the
government. There is the last 2008 funds are applied to 2009. There is
not a lot of extra money rolling around for new ideas, new initiatives
and that sort of thing.

But given all of this, and one last thing I have got to say is you asked
us if we would be in the consultation with FDA. I mean, Don Kramer was
in the room last time, he readily agreed. That has not happened, trying
to get FDA to a three day meeting to resolve all of that is like putting
toothpaste back in its tube. But I do have a meeting scheduled with him
next week. Hopefully, we can get to some of that.

So, with all of this, we think the near term may be a little cloudy but
maybe it will clear up. And perhaps we will have a better strategic plan
because we will have a clearer vision in a few months than one that is a
little more appropriate under the circumstance, given all of the change.

We have made, moving on to what we have done, we have made some good
progress on this. We have come up with sort of a rough plan that needs a
little more work and I will go over that with you.

We have three possible visions. Seafood is the safest, most desirable
animal protein source. Safe consistent quality and accurately labeled
seafood benefits the public. The third one is safe consistent quality,
accurately labeled and sustainable seafood benefits public health and
the nation\'s ecosystem.

We are leaning toward the second but the more I read the third, I think
I like it. But that is to be hashed out with our ad hoc committee and we
will come up with a final vision statement. It will be something like
one of those three.

Okay, so we come up with four goals. I will just read them off quickly.
Consumer perception and understanding. Science, NOAA science and
technology, NOAA\'s policies, priorities and organization. NOAA\'s
Seafood Inspection and Certification Program.

So just going over these quickly. Goal One, consumer perception and
understanding. And the tag line is obtain optimal health benefits to
increase seafood consumption. Now, there are several objectives here,
one of which is to take measures to increase consumption to at least 12
ounces per week per person, as recommended by USDA, FDA, and EPA. That
is pretty ambitious. And right now, the American public consumes about
16 pounds of seafood per annum. That would push it up to something like
37 to 38 pounds per annum. So that is, that would probably promote
health. But it will probably will involve a lot of aquaculture products.

So anyway, objective two, establish international clearinghouse for
seafood and health information, dealing with the benefits and risks of
seafood consumption. We recognize that there is just a lot of
information all over the world in different databases and different
genres, held by different governmental sources and private sources. We
would like to see that all come together and be able to use that
information maybe a little more fully.

Establish an external seafood advisory panel to help set priorities on
seafood health research. A seafood safety program can provide input for
the development of dietary recommendations.

Objective four would be establish public information and outreach. We
have our Fishwatch. We would like to enhance that a little more to a lot
of different programs and ways to communicate risk and benefit to the
public.

Support research and development of analytical capabilities. Identify
nutritionally beneficial components of fish and shellfish and develop
tools for consumers to subscribe, an interactive decision to support
programs.

If you belong to Kaiser Permanente, they have some wonderful things on
their website and you see them around on WebMD and so forth. We would
like to develop a few more specifically associated with seafood
consumption.

The second goal, NOAA\'s policies, priorities and organization. And the
tagline is NOAA issues new guidance to improve coordination of programs
and research in support of an adequate seafood supply, and product
quality, safety, and labeling.

Okay, a bunch of objectives here. We have become, NOAA has become a
leader in development of national and international seafood safety
policy. We want seafood inspection and NOAA enforcement would ensure
that most products in the marketplace were accurately labeled, met
seafood standards, safety standards. And we would like to add an
objective to NOAA\'s strategic plan regarding the importance of seafood
and health for the economy of the nation or make safety and consistent
quality of the seafood a priority. Redirect some of what we call Product
Quality and Safety appropriations we get specifically for this purpose
toward improving the nation\'s health and commerce through seafood
safety.

Redirect some Saltonstall-Kennedy appropriations, which are a grant
program that National Marine Fisheries has towards seafood safety
issues. Improve data management through NOAA that could be used for
seafood safety. The Seafood Inspection Program does not have a database
system. That would be part of the thing. So, you would want something
with that kind of reach. New certifications, be able to track trends and
maybe do some management stuff.

Play a larger role in international fora, such as Organization of
International Epizootics, which is animal disease, Codex, which is
international food safety, a food standards body, and various methods,
contaminant, nutrition, et cetera.

Going on to the third is NOAA Science and Technology.

MR. DEWEY: Tim, do you want us to interrupt you with questions?

MR. HANSEN: Absolutely.

MR. DEWEY: So, from a food safety standpoint, I guess I am curious why
more of an involvement with OIE. That is more animal health than it is
anything else, isn\'t it?

MR. HANSEN: Yes. But that is an international organization that deserves
our support, I think is what our scientists are saying.

MR. DEWEY: I don\'t disagree with that. I just couldn\'t see the link to
the food safety.

MR. HANSEN: Okay. Anything else?

The third goal is science and technology. Some of the objectives are
offered. NOAA will survey its science to identify both its current
capabilities and capacities. NOAA will take steps to better coordinate
internally with other agencies on science and technology matters. NOAA
will attain equivalence with other laboratories, both domestic and
international through ISO 17025 certification, provide science support
to international standards setting bodies. Again, Codex, ISO, ISSC. NOAA
will conduct seafood contaminant surveillance like pharmaceuticals,
pathogens, biotoxins, environmental contaminants. NOAA will conduct
research to help modernize methods of contamination detection. And NOAA
will develop the capacity to provide scientific data to risk assessors
or risk managers for emerging seafood safety data and will conduct
seafood risk assessment.

The fourth goal is seafood inspection and certification. The seafood
inspection group was lucky enough two weeks before we got together to
develop this. We had our own strategic planning session and we came up
with about 20 objectives. I will not go through all of them because they
are kind of down in the weeds for you guys.

But the tagline is NOAA increases its inspection, certification and
compliance verification capability in response to consumer industry
needs, and international trade requirements.

So there is three general, I will just kind of characterize this. We
want to increase capacity of Seafood Inspection by creation of a
management database, rewriting the regulations, improved inspector
enhancement, inspector training. We want to take measures to promote the
cooperation and collaboration with state, federal, and international
food safety organizations, such as updating MOU with FDA, and creating
an MOU, Memorandum of Understanding, sorry, with the Animal Plant Health
Inspection Service and, ultimately, Food Safety Inspection Service. It
looks like we will be dealing with them on catfish farms.

[Third, we will provide programs that satisfy the needs of industry and
the consumer, such as creating a joint program with Fisheries
Enforcement and FDA can address economic fraud issues in seafood,
expanding auditing services, possibly eco-labeling services, if
necessary, and new and modernized U.S. standards for grades of fish and
fishery products.]{.mark}

So that is kind of where we are. I think two of these four goal areas
are pretty well complete. I think they need one more makeover. Two of
them probably need some more work and we should have this done in six
months. Any questions on it?

MR. DEWEY: On that last point, you talked about eco-labeling services,
if necessary. And that is obviously something MAFAC has taken up and
talked about in some detail. And my thinking was the direction was not.
I mean, so it says eco-labeling services. Does this mean to be able to
respond to non-profit eco-label?

MR. HANSEN: Well, there is kind of \-- let me tell you kind of what is
going on here. Obviously, there is a non-profit \--

MS. McCARTY: Can you talk a little louder? We can\'t hear you down on
this end.

MR. HANSEN: I\'m sorry. I\'ll speak up.

There is MSC, the eco-label private group party organizations that have
kind of taken the lead on this thing. I think the thought was that maybe
in some way possible, maybe government ought to step up in some way.
That, I don\'t think, is going to be decided by the Agency. But there is
also a lot going on. I was in Europe last week to talk about new
requirements by the European Commission to require every shipment to
have a so-called catch certificate that shows essentially that the
product or the shift in the consignment was caught legal and this
applies to wild-caught fish.

MR. DEWEY: I know we are going to get into the eco-labeling discussion a
little bit more again later. But I guess I was a little bit concerned
seeing it in there about increasing services when, at least the
direction so far from MAFAC is not to go down this path.

MR. HANSEN: Another reason to not finalize this thing because we
haven\'t got a final decision by the Agency.

Yes, Heather.

MS. McCARTY: Tim, I guess I am a little confused as to exactly where we
are with this and what you are expecting from MAFAC and I guess I am
asking this to Tom as well.

I think if we are going to talk about it here, we obviously need to have
it in front of us in some way. Maybe I missed it. Maybe it has been sent
out.

MR. HANSEN: Yes, well, I had provided a three-page summary.

DR. HOLLIDAY: What Tim presented is on the website but the strategic
plan is not. But that is the point of his presentation. It is not ready
to be reviewed by MAFAC.

MS. McCARTY: Oh, okay.

DR. HOLLIDAY: His opening remarks focused on the request for delaying
delivery of that until these other factors were considered and the draft
was completed to the point of being circulated for comment.

MS. McCARTY: So we are not expecting, a this meeting, to comment on this
plan at all?

DR. HOLLIDAY: No. It has not been provided for you to comment on.

MS. McCARTY: Okay.

MR. HANSEN: The ball is on our court, basically.

MS. McCARTY: I was just wondering. Thanks.

MR. BILLY: Dorothy?

MS. LOWMAN: Well, I think there is a little bit of a chicken and an egg
thing though for me. Because you said well, we don\'t know what the
administration, the incoming administration\'s priorities might be and
there is some confusion about who has what authority. But that also
could be seen as an opportunity to try to provide some clarity and
really get, you know, a heads up, which I would hope that you would
take.

MR. HANSEN: Hopefully, we will have some opportunities to \--

MR. BILLY: My understanding is that MAFAC has spoken clearly asking that
the Agency develop a strategic plan that covers the areas I read
earlier. And that process is under way. Tim is here today to sort of
give us a status report and a little flavor of their current thinking,
the options, the possibilities, the scope of the strategic plan, all the
interfaces that he has identified that they need to have to make this
work.

But once there is a draft strategic plan, I assume then it will go
through an Agency process and when it is accepted by the Agency as a
draft, it will then come to the committee like the aquaculture plan did
for our full consideration and input. And then the Agency would consider
that input in finalizing this strategic plan.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: I guess I want to quibble with you wording saying
the Agency would accept it and then send it out to you. I think we would
review it though. It wouldn\'t be accepted until we get the public input
on it, which this would be the most important part but there would be
other opportunities for the public as well. Other than that, I\'m
worried about whether we accepted it and what came out \--

MR. BILLY: Yes. Okay. Are there other general questions? Specific?

MR. GILMORE: Just a little bit off of the topic but going off of
something that Tim said about being in the EU last week. We have been
very interested in the North Pacific about these import certifications
that will be required in the beginning of 2010, I guess. But can you
give us some clue as to where it is heading in terms of \--

MR. HANSEN: Yes, well, it was a positive meeting. The EU-EC officials,
first of all, said, look, we are not targeting the United States. We
don\'t think there is much illegal fishing, unregulated fishing going on
there. We have all these measures in place, these fisheries management
plans, all the states who are doing their work and so forth and we are
not really concerned.

Our big concern going in was that, I don\'t know if you have seen the
draft catch certificate, but there was a lot of very specific
information that would be very hard to track to be able to attest to,
shall we say. They are willing to give us, what do they call it? They
had a term of art, a ministry arrangement where they would just accept
our system. We wouldn\'t have to sign that in order to be certificated.
You would still have to sign the certificate but it would be much
simpler.

MR. GILMORE: Would it be combined with the health certificate?

MR. HANSEN: We asked that. They are not being real hopeful because DGRA
and DG SANCO, the two, one is the health and one is the fisheries
people, apparently don\'t mesh that well. So, it would have to be up to
SANCO to allow that. And apparently, they turned down other, some
developing countries just on that point.

So, it looks like we are probably going to sign a separate certificate.
It will be a simplified certificate, maybe having information about the
consignment and so forth that you see on the health certificate.

So, we are very hopeful that, this seems very doable. We show some of
the fish tickets and how we track things and what our qualities are, you
know, as far as digitally what we have for databases. And they were
pretty impressed. And moreover, they said, well, they might, you know,
if there was some irregularity they would want us to follow up on it and
we would have to figure out the information some how. And it wouldn\'t
be like in the food safety world where they would come and do an audit,
which is if you know anything of the food safety audits with us and FDA
have been very painful. So, it would be very simplified.

So, we came away feeling like, you know, this is a pretty doable thing.
We are going to have to organize ourselves a little better to figure out
how to do it. I would think Seafood Inspection would issue a
certificates for a small fee and that would enable the consignment to go
to Europe.

MR. GILMORE: I\'m sorry. That would be NMFS Seafood Inspection Program
that we should \--

MR. HANSEN: Yes.

MR. GILMORE: Thank you.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Tim, somebody from the European Community was at
the tuna meetings in San Diego last week. You said that the regulations
have just been passed, or approved, or whatever within the last couple
of weeks.

MR. HANSEN: Yes.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: And so, there should be some language out there
that we could look at to see exactly what it says and if they have
decided to enforce it by an administrative thing, maybe that trumps some
of the language that might be there. But they promised to send it to us.

MR. HANSEN: I brought it with me because it was in my briefcase from the
last trip. If anybody wants to see what the regulation looks like.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: But apparently it just adopted them. So, it might
be interesting to get the very final last one that they approved after
any amendments or changes might be made.

MR. BILLY: Maybe that could be circulated to the committee.

MR. HANSEN: Sure.

MR. BILLY: Anyone interested?

MR. HANSEN: I would be more than happy to provide that to anybody who
wants to gaze at a couple hundred pages of regulation.

MR. BILLY: Any other questions? Okay, Tim, one last question from me.

You know, we haven\'t scheduled our next meeting but it is possible it
could be as early as in the springtime. And if that is the case, do you
anticipate that you will be in a position where you will be able to
share a full draft of the strategic plan by then?

MR. HANSEN: I think we are not that far off, essentially. It is just a
couple of the goal areas, I think, needs some rework. A couple, like I
said, a couple of them are in pretty good shape.

MR. BILLY: Okay. So, the answer is yes. Okay. Any other questions? Okay.
All right, thank you very much.

Now, our lunch break. Let me give it to Mark for any administrative
announcements.

DR. HOLLIDAY: So, we are going to break for lunch. We have four
recommendations from the concierge in terms of places you might want to
check out. We asked for some places that would be quick and nearby.
Deanies, from the front entrance, it is a seafood place, two blocks to
the right. Out the front door, two blocks to your right.

Go out the front door from the entrance, two blocks to the left,
Johnny\'s Po\' Boys for sandwiches. Pretty good? We got a thumbs up from
Larry for that.

And the same direction, same as the above, Petunia\'s. They have
everything, including breakfast until 3:00, just in case you are
wondering for tomorrow night or tomorrow morning.

And Bourbon House. Left then right one block. They have a Creole menu.

Or there is the restaurant here in the hotel. So, find some place
reasonably quick. We will be back here at 1:00 to start \--

MR. DiLERNIA: Mark, is this room going to be secured? Can we leave the
laptops here or should we take them back to our rooms? Are they going to
lock up here?

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well, the doors don\'t really lock that well.

MR. BILLY: Okay, see you at 1:00.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record at 11:57 a.m.
and resumed at 1:39 p.m.)

A-F-T-E-R-N-O-O-N S-E-S-S-I-O-N

MR. BILLY: We\'ll get started again. This afternoon we are going to
focus, as I mentioned earlier, on the subcommittee and working group
activities. The committee has found over the years that it is easier to
focus in on a particular issue in a smaller group setting and consider
the issue, get input from staff as appropriate, then bring a
recommendation, a draft recommendation to the full committee. Among
other things, I believe it allows a little more focus and it also allows
us to have a series of subcommittee meetings simultaneously, so we can
cover more ground and provide a broader array of recommendations to NOAA
Fisheries.

As you see here from the agenda, we have a variety of standing
subcommittees.

MR. JONER: It looks like we have some sitting ones, too right here.

MR. BILLY: It almost looks like he is fishing.

MR. BILLY: The idea is to introduce the new members to the work that the
subcommittees have recently been involved in, as well as to open the
door to potential new projects or issues that the subcommittees may want
to take up over the next year or two.

So with that, I will first call on Jim Gilmore to tell us a little bit
about this Strategic Planning, Budget and Program Management
Subcommittee. Jim?

MR. GILMORE: Thanks, Tom. Yes, the name of the committee is pretty
specific and so, fairly indicative of the types of things that we have
tried to get involved in with with the subcommittee. And I think this
has come out of members\' experiences on the committee, where we have
tried to figure out how we can be the most helpful to the Agency, be
relevant with a committee that is meeting, at most, twice a year. And we
would find ourselves getting a peek at a proposed regulation three weeks
before it is going to be issued for comment and saying, oh, we have this
comment, and this comment, and this comment. And the response is, well,
we have been working on this for two years and you have seen it. And
thanks for your input and we look forward to what the public comment is
going to be that we are going to start receiving in three weeks on it.
So, we are trying to figure out some way to be a little bit more
proactive.

The budget is another good example of where the Agency is working on the
current fiscal year and they are already budgeting for the next year and
beyond. And so I am not sure that we have accomplished the objective
that we have set out but that was at least my recollection of why we
picked this subject area as an area to focus on to try to get some
advice to the Agency and help them in their policy development before
the general public gets through it.

And I will say that I missed the meeting where I was made the chairman
of the subcommittee. And so there could very well be other agendas at
work here for what is going on. And \--

MR. DEWEY: Let that be a lesson to newcomers.

MR. GILMORE: That\'s right. Good attendance has its rewards.

But I looked up the subcommittee membership just before this meeting.
And what I found on the website was a little out of date. Some of the
former members like Pete Leipsig of MAFAC were still listed on there.
And so I don\'t have the current membership roster but \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well that is the current membership.

MR. GILMORE: Oh, it is. Okay.

DR. HOLLIDAY: I mean, I did that intentionally because I wanted the
people to realize that was the committee standing as of the July meeting
and then the people who have rolled off and who obviously we would
consider replacing them or adding to it. There is no other listing other
than that one as our official list.

MR. GILMORE: But I guess my, you know, in looking over who is formally
on the committee, the reason I went and looked it up, frankly, is
because we have had such diverse participation in the subcommittee
meetings that, to me, I really do just consider all the members of MAFAC
to be members of the subcommittee. Generally, what we have done is set
aside a block in the afternoon for the subcommittees to meet, sometimes
necessarily overlapping in what they are doing and people go where their
interests are. So, we just have a number of folks who have come in to
various projects that interest them. And I would encourage the new
members, you know, not to look too much at the organizational boxes but
take advantage of your MAFAC membership to do that.

I guess one other point I would make, and let me just say while I might
have been appointed chairman in absentia, I am not quite sure \-- I am
part of that class of four who have just been reappointed for a single
year after the termination of our second three-year term. And so my
guess is I am probably only here for one more MAFAC meeting. Whatever we
do in the spring or early summer. And so, I would just say that I know
we have some committee members who aren\'t here at this meeting. So,
they would be good targets to take over the subcommittee. We have at
least four, I think, potential chairmen there from those who can\'t
defend themselves. But also, I would suggest others.

If we are going to get into \-- I would say right now we are not halfway
through anything. We can talk for a few minutes about this transition
document that we worked on at the last meeting and through to this
meeting. But now might be a good time, also, to change the chairmanship
of that so that you would be going forward beyond just the next meeting
with a new chairman. That would make sense to me, I think.

MR. BILLY: I would like to speak to that. Jim and I talked this morning
and [our thinking was that maybe we would, for continuity reasons, we
would continue with the same chairs of the subcommittees through the
next meeting but invite the current members to consider whether they
would be interested in becoming a chair of one of the subcommittees and
so indicate to Mark before the next meeting. And then Jim and others can
decide how they want to pursue identifying the new chairs of the
committees. It will give a chance for the new members to have this
week\'s experience plus another meeting and we can fit that into the
schedule.]{.mark}

[I think all of us, now that I am the committee liaison, I would like to
be relieved of my duties for the Commerce Subcommittee. As Jim
indicated, he is a short-timer and I think all of the others are as
well. So, we\'ll provide people an opportunity to get more familiar with
the work of the subcommittees and consider whether they want to spend
additional time, it is not a lot, but some additional time involved in
the work of MAFAC. So, we will sort of take care of that at the next
meeting. Does anyone object to that?]{.mark}

[Okay, good]{.mark}. Okay, Jim.

MR. GILMORE: I notice on our schedule that tomorrow morning from 11:00
to noon we are scheduled to discuss the Vision 2020 document and the
transition reports. So, I don\'t know how much you want to get into that
right now. But I guess I would just at least start by highlighting for
folks that MAFAC did look at this current transition as an opportunity
to get its oar in the water. We prepared a transition memo. It is on the
website. And so I hope everybody has had a chance to see it. I will just
run through it very briefly for those who haven\'t seen it.

We pulled out, essentially, three issues to emphasize with the incoming
administration. One was building off or tiering off of the
Magnuson-Stevens reauthorization and the catch limits and catch
accountability measure, those landmark provisions that are a part of
the, a big part of the buy-in for users is going to be knowing that the
stock assessment work is there in the setting of the catch limits, so we
don\'t just keep having the fights that we often have in various parts
of the country that, well, the science is, in fact, how can you pick
that number.

So, we wanted to highlight for the incoming administration that there
does need to be a financial commitment made to enhance stock assessments
around the country, so that we can smooth this transition to the catch
limits and catch monitoring requirements.

We emphasize the LAP provisions in the reauthorization as well. Again,
kind of tiering off of the annual catch limit language to say that we
are really bullish on going beyond that and to individual catch
accountability, we need adequate funding, again, for those line items.
And we emphasis what the FY09 number was proposed at and also the issue
of cost-effective implementation of LAPs, whether that means using
outside observers or agency observers. Whether it is a private sector or
a public sector approach, let\'s find the most cost effective way of
operating these LAPs programs.

And in the issue of IUU fishing, again, a huge area of emphasis in the
Magnuson-Stevens Act reauthorization. And we wanted to highlight again
that this a big mandate from Congress. It is an important mandate but it
needs to be supported by the incoming administration.

So, we lay out those three broad issue areas and then we talk about
aquaculture development, climate change. I am just rereading this this
morning and thinking that I am not sure that we have got the word
ecosystem base management in there. So, maybe I would like to tinker
with that at some point and recreational fisheries.

So, I think this holds up pretty well as a document. And it is, I guess,
officially submitted. Mark had pointed out that we would have had to do
a Federal Register notice in order to get a formal vote of the committee
to meet to adopt this, even by teleconference. So, we sent it out
basically, and said, unless we hear an objection, we are moving forward.
And so this has been formally submitted to the Department. And whether
we talk about it now or tomorrow, I think the issue is what is next with
the transition team on this.

That\'s it for me.

MR. BILLY: Any questions, comments? No? Oh, okay.

MR. FLETCHER: Well, are we going to talk about it now or are we going to
talk about it tomorrow?

MR. BILLY: I think I would like to defer to tomorrow, if we can. I mean,
if there is a general question or comment but we will get into the
substance tomorrow.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Yes, I think for today\'s purpose, we were trying to
explore what ideas beyond what the \-- we wanted to provide information
on what the committee has been working on to date and then brainstorm
some ideas about what the committee could be working on over the next 12
months, what hot issues or topics would be of concern to strategic
planning, budgeting and policies, put those down on paper as at least a
prospectus of a draft working agenda for the next year. And that would
then inform people, okay, that committee is going to be working on these
issues. I would like to work on those issues and I would like to put my
name in to be a member of that committee, even if we have \-- there is
always opportunities for people to attend subcommittee meetings, even if
they are not officially a member, as Jim pointed out but we wanted to
have a core group of people who has some affinity for that. And that was
another of the objectives for this discussion this afternoon of
organizing the subcommittees, both its membership and its sort of
working agenda for the next year, what issues do you think would be on
the table that would fall under these different categories. And that
would help us in the staff support to provide research or an analysis or
speakers, or help formulate agendas for future meetings if we had some
sense of where the different subcommittees wanted to go, we could then
be more active in providing that kind of support.

MR. BILLY: Okay. All right, the next one is the Commerce \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: I\'m sorry.

MR. BILLY: So having said that \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: In terms of process, you can go through each one of these
and come back to membership and topics or do them sequentially. But I
just don\'t want to lose that as one of the objectives.

MS. McCARTY: The chairman was just thinking he got back on schedule real
quick.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well, that is why there is so much time allocated. It was
more than just a report on \--

MR. BILLY: My thought was to circle back after we do, particularly the
new members have a better sense of each of the subcommittees. Plus, I
know you have a handout that we will make available as well in a few
minutes.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Okay. Just checking in.

MR. BILLY: The Commerce Subcommittee, by its title again, has a very
broad mandate. Anything to do with business matters, consumers,
economics in the macro-sense that relate to fisheries \-- both
commercial, recreational fisheries \-- are matters that can be taken up
by the Commerce Subcommittee.

And currently, you heard one of the items that we are dealing with,
which is the seafood safety quality and labeling, which for a variety of
reasons in the last year or two, it has come up on the radar screen of
the Agency and, based on discussions we had at the subcommittee and then
the full committee level, we have asked now for the strategic plan that
you heard sort of a rough outline of.

The committee dealt extensively with aquaculture over the last two or
three years and as a result of those discussions and considerations
asked the Agency to develop a strategic plan which led to what is called
the Ten Year Plan, which has since been adopted by the Agency after a
public comment and input process and is now guiding the activities of
NOAA Fisheries in the area of aquaculture.

Eco-labeling is another matter that has come up. We first were briefed
by Mark and others on what currently is going on nationally and
internationally. We learned a lot about some of the strategies that are
being pursued by the food and agricultural organization of the United
Nations, FAO, as well as some of the NGOs in this area. And had several
in-depth discussions about this in deciding what, if anything, this
committee might recommend to NOAA Fisheries about that. That is an
ongoing area of consideration and it is on the agenda again later.

We have provided a lot of input to the 2020 document, particularly in
the area of supply and demand considerations as it relates to seafood.
Looking at not only what currently is the economic picture for the
seafood business but what it looks like 10, 20, 30 years out, based on
information that is available from various sources. And based on that,
provided input to the drafters of the 2020 report.

And then finally, technology. New technology, the need for technology as
it would relate to fisheries, and providing advice and input into that
broad area as well.

So, those are some of the discussions that the committee and
subcommittee has focused on. Like Jim described, while there is a set
membership, there has been a wide variety of committee members that have
participated, depending on what we happened to be dealing with at a
particular MAFAC meeting.

I would be happy to answer any questions anyone might have. It is a very
broad subject area and it has been quite an active subcommittee, at
least in the three years that I have been on MAFAC.

Yes, Tony?

MR. DiLERNIA: Mr. Chairman, not directly related to the subcommittee,
but while we are on the topic of reviewing the subcommittee structures
that we have, I recall that when I was first appointed six years ago,
there were different subcommittees with different working groups at the
time. And that during my six-year membership here, I have watched the
subcommittees and the working groups evolve and change in response to
issues that have come up with the needs that the Agency has had.

And insomuch as this is an information session for our new members, I
would ask that perhaps we should all keep that in mind, that while these
subcommittees currently exist, there is nothing etched in stone and that
we could always form with new members or if senior members see a need
for a different subcommittee, we could create it. And possibly, if the
members of our current committee don\'t see a need for the continuation
of the committee to dissolve that committee and move on to others.

I imagine that is still the same process that we follow. I just wanted
to reiterate that for our new members to keep that in mind.

MR. BILLY: Yes, in fact, as sort of a working guidance, a working group
is thought of as a good approach for something that is going to be very
finite, going to get into something, we will be involved for two or
three years, whatever it is, and then it will end, as compared to a
standing subcommittee that is open-ended and there will continuously be
issues that should be considered by the subcommittee. Just as a sort of
a general rule of thumb.

Any other questions about the Commerce Subcommittee? Okay. I\'m just
going to keep moving. I know we are a little ahead of schedule but we
are going to come back to some recommendations or considerations for
topics after we work through this initial discussion.

The Recreational Fisheries Working Group is headed by Bob Fletcher. Why
don\'t you \--

MR. FLETCHER: Yes, just to kind of spring off what you said about
working groups maybe for a finite period, I wanted to point out that the
Recreational Fisheries Working Group was created as a result of changes
to the Magnuson Act that required the nation to do a better job of
counting all recreational fishermen, upgrading what was a broken system
of the infamous MRFS, Marine Recreational Fisheries Statistics Survey.

We began by looking at how the Agency would be implementing the new
requirements as a result of Magnuson-Stevens reauthorization. And we are
now in the kind of the tail end of that in that the registry will be,
the process will be implemented in January but I doubt very much if
regulations requiring the registry of all anglers for those states that
are not able to get an exemption, I don\'t think that will be up and
running right away. But I think that in January, the Agency will begin
the process of encouraging those states to recognize that the time has
come and that they will be bringing those states online hopefully in the
near future.

I think the working group felt very strongly that upgrading the
collection of recreational fisheries data was critical as well as
upgrading the nation\'s ability to count how many anglers are out there.
We need to know how many recreational fishermen are impacting the
resources and we don\'t have a really good number as of right now. So
that is really why the working group is up and running and, I think,
there will be a real need for a meeting of that working group.

At the next meeting, there will be a real value to bringing John Boreman
back so that the new members can listen to John, who has really been the
key for the Agency in pulling together a lot of disparate elements into
this new process. And I want to give John Boreman a lot of credit for
all of the work he has done and all of the work that has been done by a
lot of state representatives, federal representatives as they try to get
this system running better.

Now, having said that, there are a few issues that continue out there
and one of those is very much affecting the West Coast in that it has
been kind of ahead of the curve in counting the anglers and getting
better catch information. And I hear, and I am very hopeful, that there
will be some funds made available to assist the West Coast in doing even
a better job. Because up to now, most of the focus has been on pilot
programs in areas where information isn\'t quite at the same level that
we have on the West Coast, especially in the last few years, where
California has gone away from MRFSS and created a little bit upgraded
system that they call the California Recreational Fisheries Survey.

But I know there are some people that are interested in recreational
fisheries that have just joined and I encourage them, Patty, to put
their names forward. I think that the committee at least has a need to
meet again at the next meeting to get a report on the implementation of
what they call MRIP Marine Recreational Information Program.

Beyond the next meeting, I think that would be an interesting discussion
as to whether or not there continues to be a need. It has been a timely
group and there has been some good discussion and I think some good
direction provided. And I will give huge kudos to the three executive
directors of the Marine Fisheries Commission because they have been
involved very directly and their staffs in assisting NMFS in the right
direction in bringing people onboard and getting them into subcommittees
and where there is working groups of their won that do a good job of, I
think, to meet the directive of the Magnuson-Stevens reauthorization.

So, I look forward to being here through next spring and then someone
else can pick up the baton, if that is something that needs to be done.
But I think that, we talked about the difference between a subcommittee
and a working group and I think this was a very good example of that.
So, I will be happy to answer any questions, Tom.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Any questions or comments?

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Of the three commissions, which one did the hardest
work? Probably Randy or \--

MR. FLETCHER: Well, since I work for him, I will have to say that by far
and away.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Just a point of information for those who hadn\'t heard,
Dr. Boreman has announced his retirement effective this December. So we
won\'t have him to kick around anymore.

MR. FLETCHER: Oh, no. Maybe we will get Bonnie to step up. Is she still
there? Well, Bonnie is the current director the Southeast Fisheries
Science Center in Miami. So, she has stepped up to directorship.

MR. FLETCHER: Well, we have got Gordon Colvin and \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: There will be people who can do that, I was just \--

MR. FLETCHER: There will be people that can do that. That\'s too bad.
John did a good job.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Right.

MR. O\'SHEA: Just out of curiosity then, there are really two issues.
One, the big issue is filling that position. But then the other is, it
seems to me, time critical, is honcho and the MRIP.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: John Boreman\'s position, we have advertised that
and maybe the position is even closed already. We are trying to get some
overlap. But if it hasn\'t closed, it is going to close very shortly. We
hope to find someone, somebody who will be, he or she will be here for
the last month.

MR. O\'SHEA: So those two responsibilities, you are looking at covering
them simultaneously, hopefully. Meaning not is it Director of S&T but
the MRIP director or whatever you call it, project leader.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Yes, I guess it is not entirely clear that whoever
we hire, and I am not sure the hiring process will go fast enough to
overlap with John but that was the original plan. But whoever we hire
may have a particular set of skills that aren\'t lined up very well with
MRIP and we may give that assignment elsewhere. Until that, we will be
falling under the S&T head and we will make sure that that \-- we are
paying attention to this. So, we will make sure that we don\'t lose
track.

MR. O\'SHEA: Right. Thanks.

MR. BILLY: Comments, questions? Okay, Bob, you have the floor again.

MR. FLETCHER: Yes, this one \[Protected Resources Subcommittee\] has
been a real easy job because we haven\'t had a meeting. That may change
though. And this is going to be an interesting time for the subcommittee
because with the change in administrations, there may be interest for us
again in bringing this up. I think it is really past due that we have
come back and taken another look at who operates the Marine Mammal
Protection Act. I got sucked \-- I was given this \--

(Laughter.)

MR. FLETCHER: \-- because of my longstanding and somewhat outspoken
belief that there needs to be some recognition that while many, many
marine mammal stocks are still in need of protection, there are a few
who have done a great job of recovering after the act was passed. And
California sea lions are the case in point. And we on the West Coast
continue to struggle. And the Act really doesn\'t address the problem of
robust populations of marine mammals and the interactions that they have
in so many areas. And so from my perspective, and to a great extent, the
West Coast perspective, is that we need to begin to consider ways to
improve the act and recognize the successes that have resulted from the
Act\'s protections.

Now having said that, I know there a lot of you here who are also in
areas where there is significant concerns and that there are populations
that are in decline. Right whales is a classic example of a terribly
threatened endangered population.

So, I think all of this needs to be looked at in the context of
reauthorization of the MMPA. So, the next group of MAFAC members that
choose to get involved in this, I think, need to be ready to provide
some guidance to the agency and, as they begin to develop a position on
reauthorization.

There have been a number of bills introduced and they have gone nowhere.
And some of them I thought were pretty reasonably good looking. And I
hope that under this new administration and this new Congress that they
seriously begin to look at that, even though it is a terribly
contentious issue, I am hopeful.

So, while the subcommittee has not been active in the last few years,
mainly because every time we get an update on legislation, it is to hear
about the latest bill dying. I think perhaps, and I don\'t know, I would
be interested to hear, Jim, if you have any senses about whether or not
this might become a serious issue in the next Congress.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: I guess we are all waiting to see what the new
Congress is about with the new administration and what their priorities
will be. I expect not the first bill they look at will be the Marine
Mammal Protection Act. But NOAA has identified this as one of our
legislative priorities for the new Congress was to get the Marine Mammal
Protection Act reauthorized. There is a number of issues with it and, as
you have said, there has been several draft bills in the past. It isn\'t
clear that they will start with any of those. And so this may be a very
important time to start looking at what some of those issues are.

And I am not sure that the greatest focus is on dealing with those
marine mammals that have become nuisances, you know, overgrow in their
numbers. So, if that is the big issue to MAFAC, I think paying attention
to that is important.

There are other issues about what our species under endangered species
act and how they relate the Marine Mammal Protection Act and a few
things like that. It will probably look forward to getting advice from
this committee.

MR. BILLY: Cathy.

MS. FOY: I would like to put the scientific permitting process on the
table, too.

MR. BILLY: We can\'t hear you, Cathy.

MS. FOY: The scientific permitting process, I would like to see that
discussed at some point. Mike Payne has come a long way. I don\'t know
that, given the intricacy of the way two acts work together, ENC and
MMPA, it is a long drawn out process and it is really difficult to \--

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: That\'s an interesting point.

MS. FOY: \-- conduct good science.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: The permitting division of our protected resources,
the permitting section, I\'m not sure what the right word is, the
Protected Resources Division is beleaguered on both sides, of course.
And they try to keep us out of lawsuits and they try to sort of
negotiate with both parties, as they get permits. I agree with you.
It\'s a problem. So, I don\'t know whether this whole committee would
want to hear it but if we have a subcommittee that is interested in that
aspect, it might pay to have Mike Payne talk to the subcommittee and you
could understand what some of the issues are. Not so all 20 of us
wouldn\'t have to sit around and hear but if there are a half a dozen
that are interested in that specifically, and I can understand why you
would be. That would be a good starting point to get something together
for the committee.

MR. FLETCHER: Just one comment. If this is the direction that we choose
to go, I would suggest that perhaps you offer the opportunity to several
groups in different areas who have faced the same issues and maybe get a
representative of a couple of those to come to be involved with the
Agency to talk about it. Because it is not just Catherine\'s area that
is a problem.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: You\'re talking about geographic area?

MR. FISHER: Yes.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: I wonder if \-- there still may be a way to do it
if MAFAC wanted to, is to facilitate such a meeting around the country
and focus it and bring it to \--

MR. FLETCHER: I think that\'s a great idea.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: \-- me as the Agency, as Mike as PR or MAFAC,
however you wanted to do it. We would be interested in some suggestions
of that type.

MR. BILLY: I\'ve got Randy, and then \-- Randy?

MR. CATES: I have, I think it is directly related to this area maybe of
this committee. In Hawaii we have two real problems right now that are
arising. One is green sea turtles are a protected species. It is very
obvious to most folks there they probably don\'t need to be anymore. And
there is a resistance by some NOAA folks to do the science, to take them
off the major species because there is a calling for potential native
Hawaiians for fishing with them. And we are starting to hear more
problems between the community and whether the science is getting done.

And the second is monk seals. There is a desire to protect monk seals.
And how you do that protection is having some conflicts with fisheries,
bringing them to one area, introducing in another area. It is becoming
more of a public issue that I would say needs to be looked at.

MR. BILLY: Okay, thanks.

MR. JONER: And it is also appropriate to address this now as we are
moving toward ecosystem management. Because how can you manage the
ecosystem when one of the main species in the ecosystem is unmanaged. I
mean, if it is protected, you can\'t do anything about it.

MR. BILLY: Any other comments? Are you all set? Okay.

Okay, then finally, the Ecosystem Approach Subcommittee. Chris, welcome.

MR. DORSETT: Thank you.

MR. BILLY: I haven\'t said welcome to you. I am glad you arrived.

MR. DORSETT: I appreciate it.

MR. BILLY: Yes, you might want to, all of us sort of introduced
ourselves, particularly to the new members.

MR. DORSETT: Sure.

MR. BILLY: So, you might want to start by doing that.

MR. DORSETT: I am Chris Dorsett and my title has changed. I am now Vice
President for Fisheries Conservation and Management with the Ocean
Conservancy in Austin, Texas. And I, like three others, am serving an
additional one year term with the committee.

This, like Protected Resources Subcommittee, has been a pretty easy one
to chair because we also, to my knowledge, never met after we initiated
this. I think there are a couple of reasons for that. One is we started
the Vision 2020 process and Magnuson implementation really geared up.
And so a lot of the members on this committee were very active in
working on recommendations for ecosystem approaches to management and
also engaged in the Magnuson discussions about this topic.

It was put together to review initiatives for the development and
implementation of ecosystem based approach to fisheries management. And
just to give you a sense of a timeline in MAFAC activities, when I first
started, there was actually an ecosystem-based management task force.
And in May 2003, that task force issued a report to the administration.

In January 2005, at our meeting, we probably had a half day of
presentations from the Agency on the ecosystem-based approach to
management which led to, at the subsequent meeting, formation of this
subcommittee. Then again, because of other issues, of picking up steam
and to my knowledge I haven\'t heard a whole lot out of the Agency on
this topic in quite a while. We have been pretty dormant.

One issue we did pick up in July 2006, we got a presentation on the
United Nations initiative on bottom trawling. So, we did pick up that
international component but again, never really did anything with it.

This is obviously, still, a very hot topic and we should consider how
best to utilize this subcommittee or it might be one where we want to
switch directions. For example, at the last meeting we heard a lot about
focus on climate change and where that might fit and what kind of role
we want to play there. And then one other advice to the committee as we
move forward is it is great to have a number of these subcommittees but
let\'s make sure we are going to actually utilize them. Because the more
we have, since people are spread across various subcommittees, it can be
difficult, I think, to get people who are interested in the issue if it
is sort of, people feel like the ship has sailed and they can be more
productive in other subcommittees.

MR. BILLY: Okay, good. Questions or comments?

I do have that same sense like my first meeting we talked a lot about
ecosystem approach to management and that all just seems to dissipate.
Is that true?

MR. DORSETT: No.

(Laughter.)

MR. BILLY: All right.

MS. McCARTY: I actually think, Mr. Chairman, that the ecosystem approach
to management is being integrated into the management and it\'s being
adopted, I think. And that is my impression, is that it has become an
accepted part of fisheries management, at least in the North Pacific. I
guess maybe I am speaking just for the North Pacific. That is my
impression.

MR. BILLY: Is that true?

MR. DORSETT: I think bits and pieces are spread across all of these
subcommittees. But I haven\'t seen quite the integrated big picture
framework that we saw at the Hawaii meeting in, what was that, January
\'05 in terms of developing the tools and all that good stuff.

I know there are various initiatives regionally on trying to develop
modeling approaches and things like that.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Dorothy.

MS. LOWMAN: Yes, I think that, I mean, there are a lot of topics. We
were looking at the transition document but that is how we do fisheries
management now. And I think it does mean different things in different
regions. It is \-- I think that this could be a committee, since we come
from all over, that we could spend, you know, provide some useful ways
of how to integrate this more. And I also do think that the climate
change issue comes this place. I mean, and then again, looking at those
NOAA transition documents, it seemed like lots was focused on climate
change and I didn\'t see the little place where fisheries fit into those
very well. And that might be \-- I don\'t know if that is the right
subcommittee to park that in but I do think it does need some work in
the next year or so.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Tony.

MR. DiLERNIA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. From my perception on the East
Coast, and Vince can help me out or correct me if I am wrong, but I
don\'t see a major rush to start to replace single species management or
quota management with any type of ecosystem management plans. I think
there has been a lot of discussion and there has been review but no one
is ready to jump in. And I haven\'t even seen any serious modifications
to the FMPs to go along the lines of the ecosystem management.

The closer you look at the ecosystem management, in the East Coast is
the Northeast, New England Fisheries Management\'s Council\'s
Multi-species Plan. But beyond that, I mean, I just haven\'t seen it
yet. I guess we need to know more about it, understand it more before we
go modifying plans.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Tom.

MR. RAFTICAN: Yes, I think a couple of things. One, I would agree with
Heather that a lot of this is already being incorporated into the plans
that are out there. But the other thing is it still is kind of a
piecemeal approach. And you are looking at, you know, predator-prey gets
to be pretty easy. But we are also looking at habitat management and how
does that factor in forage fish. You really get into an awful lot of the
zone management, marine protected areas. You know, looking at aerial
management, is this the next step in that?

And I think the other thing that often is overlooked is exactly what Mr.
Fletcher was saying before. You have got some populations that are
robust and those aren\'t factored in. And I think there is a way. And
maybe this is a place where MAFAC, instead of sitting back and reviewing
what is coming forward should really take a step toward trying to lead
in some of these areas.

MR. BILLY: Thanks. Randy?

MR. CATES: My question would be does MAFAC or NOAA, does it have a
definition of ecosystem-based management? It means so many different
things to so many different groups that, what is the definition of it?

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: I believe that we do have a definition. But my
comment would be the same. People use that term hoping to get to a
different ends. And of course, Tony\'s idea about groundfish in New
England, a lot of people think that ecosystem management there means
that you can ignore the fact that \-- not Tony \--

(Laughter.)

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: \-- but some people think that you have got 11
species that are in great abundance. You have got three completely
intermixed with those that are hardly existing at all anymore. And so to
protect those three, you only fish the 11 that are in good abundance.
And actually, there\'s a few more species than that, 17, perhaps, in
that plan. There is a couple of them that are hurting. And so to protect
those, you have very low levels of fishing you have to put on the rest
of them.

Some people, some fishermen, think ecosystem management means you don\'t
worry about those weak ones. It is an ecosystem so you just fish those
that are in abundance and you don\'t worry about the individual species.
I mean, a lot of people look at that.

The opposite end is true and some people think when you have only
850,000 tons of pollock in the Bering Sea, you should subtract off maybe
500,000 tons for marine mammals, explicitly. And that is their idea of
ecosystem management. And those are as dramatically different as you
could want to be when it comes to the purposes for having it.

I think that we have lost a little bit of progress on ecosystem
management with the emphasis on examining climate, potential climate
change impacts on our resources. We have lost some lawsuits where we
didn\'t include what we think is likely to happen in 100 years because
of climate change and what that impact may have on rivers, fresh water,
and the salt water estuaries. And we didn\'t consider that, and so we
have been required by judges to go back and do that. Well, that is a
huge part of ecosystems stuff, the climate change on top if it. And so
we have, perhaps, lost some progress in multi-species predator-prey
kinds of things.

There is a club I go to in Washington, D.C. sometimes. The band that
plays there thinks I am in charge of the environment in Alaska. The last
time I went there, they asked me if I was still in charge of environment
and yes, I am. Does that include the human species as well? I said,
sure. And he says, well what is up with Sarah Palin if you are in
charge?

(Laughter.)

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: And so, that is the other thing that \--

(Laughter.)

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: So, I think that Randy is right. MAFAC ought to say
here is what we think we are talking about when we are doing ecosystem
management and here is how to make some progress on that set of issues,
at least.

MR. CATES: Yes, it helps to have a definition.

MR. BILLY: Dave Wallace.

MR. WALLACE: Yes, you know, I guess Tony\'s right. At least he brought
New England up. New England Fisheries Management Council happens to have
an initiative where they are going to combine all of their EFH\'s into
one overarching plan. And it is called the EFH and Ecosystems Management
System.

And I just happen to be on their advisory committee. I actually happen
to be the chairman of that advisory committee. And I can assure you that
they have gone through the 27 species that are managed by the New
England Fisheries Management Council. And they have gone through all the
right stages. They have gone through all of the predator-prey. They have
gone through the difficult issues of the environment, especially the
habitat in state waters and not just fish in particular. And so, and now
they are started, and phase one is done. That is, we have accumulated
all of this information from all of these states, the federal
government, and all these academics. And it was a major undertaking. It
is already 1500 or 1600 pages long, just on basic information. And now
we have started into the how are we going to use this information with
marine protected areas, a whole myriad of things to try to then take all
of this information, put it into a program where you are going to have,
protect and rebuild the species that are grossly over-fished, allow
opportunities to fish those, like haddock, which is in a very abundant
supplies. It is completely rebuilt. The problem is that when you catch
haddock, you also catch cod. Cod is, you know, in very bad shape. And so
there is a 35,000, 37,000 ton haddock quota and they can\'t catch it
because of they might catch a cod and so it becomes a very interesting
situation. The real issue is the political issue of how do we, now that
we have all of this really wonderful information, what do we do with it.
And the answer really is that you have to go to the lowest common
denominator to the over fish stocks. And that is what both the
recreational and the commercial fishermen are afraid of.

And so, ecosystems management, on the surface from my perspective, is a
wonderful idea. How do you implement it?

MR. FLETCHER: Just a comment. I was fascinated by what you said. But I
remember a few years back. I might have still been on the Pacific
Fishery Management Council when we first began talking about this. And
it started off with a discussion about ecosystem management. And after a
year of everyone wondering just how in the world you can get there and
what did it mean, the Agency redefined what we were talking about with
this new phrase, ecosystem approaches to management, which is a sliding
scale, depending on what you are talking about. In California, we have a
huge predator called the California Sea Lion, which overwhelms us in a
lot of fisheries and yet can\'t be managed. And so by using this
approach to management, we could say well, we\'ll do what we can to look
at these relationships. We will do what we can to try to come up with
some kind of an overarching approach.

But the reality is, what you said, which is where we are on the West
Coast, is you manage weak stock. And if there is something else, in our
case, we have got a deep water complex and we trawl fish with trawls
that needs black cod to access that deep water complex that because some
of the other fishermen want black cod, they get a quota and, therefore,
when they hit that, which is an unavoidable bycatch, they are shut down.

And there is an ecosystem out there that you certainly can\'t truly
manage it because of all of these other restrictions that come in. So, I
think the definition that you talked, Randy, is you use it when you can
when it doesn\'t conflict with some of these other certainties which
exist, which is weak stock management, which is protected species or
endangered species. We don\'t manage them, but they are part of the
ecosystem. So, we are trying to approach where you can to look at this
bigger picture. And 1500 pages, I bet that was a lot of fun to develop
that. And then the question is, how do you use it? Because the other
things trump all that good information about your relationship.

MR. WALLACE: The law does.

MR. FLETCHER: Yes.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Cathy.

MS. FOY: I have a question for Jim about the ecosystem approach.

MR. BILLY: You have got to speak a little louder.

MS. FOY: Sorry. I have a question for Jim about ecosystem approach. Have
the survey assessment methods changed? Are we using that same, single
species assessment and then trying to incorporate it into an ecosystem
approach or are we doing ecosystem type surveys?

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Well, I think we have lots more observations
systems, including satellites, including things like continuous plankton
reporters and all of the at sea processor boats or at least some of them
on ferries across the Gulf of Alaska, Ferries in the Gulf of Mexico. So
there is all kinds of new information. So, I don\'t think it would be
accurate to say we have stayed with the old stuff exclusively.

But probably the basis for setting TACs, which we still set on a species
by species basis, largely, are the old surveys that we have done for 25
to 30 years.

But the good news, I guess, is that our author of our ecosystem
approaches ideas, definitions moving forward, Dr. Steve Murawski is
going to be here tomorrow, I think. So, we should que these questions up
for him. I think that would be a really \-- I\'m not sure what he has
scheduled to talk about it but get rid of that and have him tell you how
this is going to \--

MS. FOY: Has there been any funding slide within NOAA towards putting
more funding on the surveys so that you can get a broader understanding
of what is going on out there when the surveys are out?

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Yes, part of the development through our system of
out-year budgets has included the need for more surveys, different kinds
of surveys and even modeling programs to try to figure out what would
bring them all together. I don\'t know whether Gary has information
specifically on the numbers or not.

MR. REISNER: We have asked for funds for the latest ecosystem approaches
to manage \--

MR. BILLY: You have got to speak up.

MR. REISNER: We have asked for funds related to ecosystem approaches and
integrated ecosystem assessments. In fact, we are waiting for \'09 to
see what happens. But we have gotten and continue to ask for large
increases in our survey lines. And to the degree those are funded, we
will be able to expand on our ability to do the integrated ecosystem
assessments, even if we don\'t get a specific line called ecosystem,
integrated ecosystem assessment. Because the underlying data is really
what we need to be able to move forward on it.

MS. FOY: Okay. Well, modelers don\'t come cheap either.

MR. BILLY: Yes, Jim?

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Listening to this conversation and going back to
some of the buildup this morning of who we are and what we do, I think
they are saying that the formal chairman of this is the Undersecretary.
And we haven\'t always had the ear of the Undersecretary. It is probably
a fairly good guess climate change is going to be the passion of the
next Undersecretary and command a lot of attention.

It just seems to me that while the ecosystem subcommittee might have
been somewhat dormant, the discussion here about what it is, how it is
going, what resources are going to it and not getting lost in the
shuffle of climate change and trying to get a hook on the incoming
administration would seem to be a [Climate Change Ecosystem Approach to
Management Subcommittee would be in our best interest]{.mark}, as well
as being, I think, beneficial for the incoming administration.

MR. FLETCHER: Do entertain leading the posse or get chased out of town
by the posse?

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Okay, Eric?

MR. SCHWAAB: You know, if you think about the role of this committee as
looking at sort of some of the big strategic, big picture issues, you
know, I don\'t think there is one more important than this concept of
ecosystem based management or ecosystem approaches to management. And I
think \-- I agree with Jim and it might be that there is some benefit in
sort of a labeling opportunity there because climate is just a piece of
that.

You know, all of the implications of climate change on our coasts are
having, you know, have all kinds of implications for the future of
fisheries management. I guess my point is, I think we ought to stay
focused on this. The question is you know, how to go forward.

You know, Chris mentioned that report that was done. We came out and I
thought it was earlier, you say 2003, that had a series of
recommendations. You know the task force that NOAA put together \-- okay
but the one that preceded that, that where NOAA brought together all of
the scientists and they came out with a series of recommendations and I
don\'t know that anybody has paged through that lately. I know I
haven\'t. I think I still have a copy around somewhere.

But I suspect that there were a lot of recommendations in there that not
only still have relevance but perhaps are more important today than they
were then. And if we can play a role in sort of revisiting some of those
recommendations and surfacing those issues anew, perhaps under a new
packaging that we ought to not lose sight of the need for that.

MR. BILLY: This subject has certainly triggered a lot of interest in the
committee. And that is a good sign that what you just said here we ought
to follow up on. And I will remind you all again that we are going to be
thinking about new chairs of subcommittees. It would seem that
identifying someone that \-- not only knowledgeable but interested and
willing to lead this area or this subject area would be important. So,
we ought to keep that in mind.

We have got about 15 minutes before the coffee break. I think what I
would like to do now is have Mark hand out and introduce a listing of
potential subject areas, issues and ideas for the existing subcommittees
that was put together by he and his staff. And again, these are just
ideas and they were meant to trigger our thinking as well. So, if we can
before the coffee break sort of learn a little bit more about thinking
on these items.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Yes, let me just clarify a little bit where these ideas
came from. These are topics or issues that the fishery service is going
to be working on over the next 12 months. So these are \-- some of them
are more detail-specific management and regulatory actions that are
going to be important to fisheries but they have potential implications
for MAFAC with respect to positions on policy, guidance, direction or
priorities in the future that you could weigh in on.

So, what we have done is try to bin them into these different
subcommittee structures and say, hey, you know, some of these things
have implications for the long term that you may want to get involved in
or look at it, not necessarily from the specific action perspective but
the policy implication of that, or the guidance that one or the
direction one might offer on these various things.

And so it was designed to help stimulate some thought as opposed to, we
propose that you undertake something to do with management of summer
flounder. No. Management of summer flounder is triggering questions
about inter-jurisdictional management, sharing of management of these
inter-jurisdictional fisheries. It crosses over into MRIP. And if we
revise statistics in the long term how does it effect our policy
decisions in the past for allocations between commercial and
recreational fisheries? Those kinds of policy questions are going to be
addressed over the next year. Does MAFAC want to help frame some of the
discussion about what is fair, what is equitable, what is scientifically
defensible, or from whatever perspective you want.

So, we are not asking you to jump in and say you have an oar in the
water on summer flounder but what is the implication of some of these
issues we will be addressing that MAFAC could attack from a policy
perspective on a higher level integration of different activities. Does
that make sense?

So it is not proposing that you become a Regional Council decision-maker
but these are issues that are going to be in front of our agency that
may have \-- that may benefit from MAFAC taking a look at the broader
questions that are going to be of concern and aligned with these five
subcommittee structures.

So, it is to stimulate some ideas to help you generate \-- and I think
if I could just editorialize for a brief moment, the follow through of
an Ecosystem Approach Committee or a Protected Resource Subcommittee,
once the committee is formed, there has got to be some process or some
objective in mind.

So, for the next year, if you have something for the Ecosystem Approach
Committee to work on, then there will be a reason for them to meet and
to exist. But if there is nothing there that you have chosen to
undertake as a topic or an agenda, then of course, there is no reason
for it to be convened. So it is up to the committee to decide if there
are relevant topics that they want to look at. And that helps support
the idea of continuing it. But if there is not, then the observation
posed earlier, well maybe you can reconstitute it as something else.

There is absolutely no requirement to maintain the subcommittee
structures as is. You can have new subcommittees. You have the
discretion to form new subcommittees and terminate subcommittees as the
overall Committee sees fit. So, I just wanted to reinforce that
observation.

MR. CATES: Mark, are you asking for us now to come up with areas of
topics for these committees?

DR. HOLLIDAY: My point \-- yes. At this meeting, I wanted to have at
least the beginning of a discussion about issues that these
subcommittees might want to undertake in the next 12 months.

MR. CATES: When do we do that, now or later?

DR. HOLLIDAY: This afternoon. I had proposed to do it between now and
5:00. Not necessarily finalized, but we need to start stimulating that
discussion and that will then help inform people, "Gee, I am interested
in that and I would like to work on that. And therefore, I propose that
I support that subcommittee by volunteering to be on it."

It is hard to say you want to be on a subcommittee if you don\'t know
what they are going to do. And all we have now is just the framework
that is, in general, the strategic planning subcommittee does these
types of things. You have got to put a little bit of flesh on the bone
of that structure and say, well, perhaps they could take on these kinds
of issues in the next year.

MR. BILLY: Yes, Martin.

MR. FISHER: I have a procedural question. I\'m not quite sure. How can
you sit on or participate in one subcommittee at a time, more than one
at a time? Don\'t they meet at the same time during the larger group?

MR. BILLY: What we often do is we will set aside an afternoon for
subcommittee meetings and then we will arrange it so that let\'s say
three of the subcommittees are going to meet, we may have two hour
sessions in sequence, so that you can participate in one and we will get
a sense of the committee of the interests and then try to plan it in a
manner where it optimizes participation by all of the interested
committee members.

MR. FISHER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Because I would like to participate
in more than one.

MR. BILLY: Yes. I think most of us feel that way. Yes, so we try to
manage that as best we can. And we even have gone into the evening and
sometimes had another meeting, you know, right after dinner or over
dinner or that kind of thing.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Or early breakfast meetings.

MR. BILLY: Or early breakfast meetings, sometimes.

DR. HOLLIDAY: It depends on the \-- I\'m sorry.

MR. BILLY: Yes, so we try to work it out so that it is possible. Did you
want to add anything?

DR. HOLLIDAY: I\'m good. Sorry.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Let\'s say we take a break now, give you a chance to
mull these over. And then we will come back and sort of work through
these and answer any questions anyone has about what they mean, what
might be entailed, that kind of thing, so we have as clear an
understanding of this list as possible. If you have other items you
would want to suggest be added to this list as well.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Yes, I think it is open. I mean, you need to create your
own lists and you can choose from anything that is on this list or your
own ideas or any place else. So there is nothing concrete about this
list at all. It is just to stimulate your thought process. We are going
to be involved in these issues over the next year, right.

MR. BILLY: Okay, let\'s take about 20 minutes for coffee.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record at 2:54 p.m.
and resumed at 3:16 p.m.)

MR. BILLY: Okay, let\'s get started again. Mark, do you want to go
through and \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: You were going to give Larry a minute to \--

MR. BILLY: Oh, sorry, Larry. I forgot.

MR. SIMPSON: One last time for the reinforcement. For tonight\'s
function, the lady that did all of this is sitting right here, Ms. Ginny
Herring. She is \--

(Applause.)

MR. SIMPSON: She is a contracts officer and executive assistant
commissioner. She has been there six months longer than I have. And this
is the directions. You go out the front door, take a right and that is
Bienville.

MS. HERRING: Then you take, go down Bienville, take Dauphine out the
front door \--

MR. SIMPSON: No, no. Don\'t confuse it. I\'ve got it down pat.

MS. HERRING: I just got the directions again.

MR. SIMPSON: No, no, no. This is one turn.

MS. HERRING: It\'s one turn my way, too.

MR. SIMPSON: Iberville. Take a right and go to Iberville, you will
probably say eye-ber-ville, but Iberville, and go straight all the way
down \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: Turn left. Right?

MR. SIMPSON: \-- to the Aquarium of the Americas. So, use your little
map. Okay? If you didn\'t get a dining guide, please, there is a few
left here. Ginny brought some extra note cards. I think I put them, some
at everybody\'s place. If I haven\'t, please see me and there is half a
dozen left here. I don\'t want to take them back home.

6:00 tonight. It is about five blocks, six blocks. I think the dress was
business casual, Ginny, which means everybody here is just perfect.
Right?

MS. HERRING: Yes.

MR. SIMPSON: Okay.

MS. HERRING: And if it is inclement weather and you want a taxi, because
I am wearing heels, it is under \$10.

MR. SIMPSON: Okay. And you want to do the badges there or just bring
them?

MS. HERRING: No. I had a badge mess up. So if anybody \-- if everybody
could just bring their name tags, I would appreciate it. And Mark, bring
the ones that are on the table just in case they come \--

DR. HOLLIDAY: Sure.

MS. HERRING: \-- to the meeting.

MR. SIMPSON: Anything else?

MS. HERRING: And make sure your staff comes.

MR. SIMPSON: Anything else? Enjoy yourself. Thanks.

MR. BILLY: Thanks. So I would like to call on Mark so to highlight any
of these items that he thinks might need a little further clarification
or make sure the committee understands. Some are obvious but maybe there
are a few that you would like to just highlight.

MR. FISHER: Excuse me. Mark, when you do this, are you going to tell us
which are the policy issues versus which are just things we have got to
work on? There is a difference.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Right. And I think some of the things that we are working
on are \-- have policy implication but they are decisions that are going
to be made but they have perhaps a \-- the decision is regional but
there could be a precedent being set or there could be a need for some
guidance or instruction. So there is a mix of them here. Others are
obvious policy questions that the committee has already been undertaking
in terms of eco-labeling, seafood inspection, the aquaculture issues,
transition, out-year planning.

And so if there is any specific \-- I think it might be more efficient
if there are specific questions about \--

MR. FISHER: Okay, that is fine.

DR. HOLLIDAY: \-- something that piques your interest, I would be glad
to explain it. But if not, I think an effective way to go about it is,
what are the ideas that you think are important. You know, it doesn\'t
matter what I think. But policy questions, directions, guidance, things
you want to work on and some of these things were just designed to give
you the sense of what the range of actions that we are going to be
involved with over the next year.

Okay, is that fair enough?

MR. BILLY: That\'s fine. Sure.

DR. HOLLIDAY: You have some hands.

MR. BILLY: Sure. Erika?

MS. FELLER: Just clarifying, Mark, are there any items on this list that
have any particular priority in terms of timing or urgency for the
Agency that might make some higher priority projects for MAFAC than
others?

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well certainly, there are some things that are going to be
happening sooner versus later. I mean, Bob mentioned earlier some of the
policy exchanges that are going to take place with the Marine
Recreational Information Program that is a congressional mandate to get
things in place by the beginning of next year, the anniversary of the
Magnuson Act in February.

But again, even after that deadline occurs, there will be other policy
questions with respect to execution of that that could be on the table
for that working group to undertake. So, I don\'t have them listed in
chronological order or any type of priority.

I think we were just, again, I am overemphasizing it but I don\'t want
to give too much weight to this. It was just, as I explained to Topher,
I wanted to have a plan B in case there was just deadly silence and
nobody had any ideas about what to talk about, I would bring this out
and suggest that as a stimulus to spark discussion.

MS. FELLER: It just, it struck me, you know, just on that in Jim\'s
comment that either this is helpful because from the Agency\'s point of
view, these are the things you are going to be wrestling with but Jim
made the point that it is really hard to kind of figure out how to get
ahead of some of these issues.

So, having some kind of sense about when decisions are going to be made
and what might be appropriate in timing to pick stuff up, I think would
help the priorities for agenda items.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Right. And just to respond, I think the other confounding
factor is because of the way MAFAC is structured to meet twice a year,
you have to kind of intersect that opportunity, there may be something
that is timely for us but you just can\'t fit it into the schedule
between now and the next meeting and a subcommittee to work on. So, even
though you may want to, it may not be feasible to do something.

MR. FISHER: Well, can I?

MR. BILLY: Eric?

MR. FISHER: It seems to me that on the, you just look at recreational
fisheries and stuff, my feeling is generally that a lot of that is done.
Now that the law or the reg is going to be out on the street, there will
be some stuff finished and I can\'t visualize there will be a lot of
policy stuff left right from what we have already gone through to get
where we are now.

I mean, so, that is my take on that one.

DR. HOLLIDAY: That\'s fine.

MR. FISHER: Well, I\'m just saying because these guys get to decide. I
don\'t to decide. But that is my feeling.

DR. HOLLIDAY: It\'s up to you.

MR. FISHER: The other thing is, if we have a meeting, the next big thing
that is going to happen is we are going to have, obviously, the
transition issues. And somebody probably is going to be meeting with
somebody at some point in time during the transition.

And so it seems to me that they are going to be asking questions like
well, what you do you think should be funded, what do you think about
this that or the other thing. So, I believe that the planning one, the
second group of things is probably going to be very important. And then
under those, then you would start to ask questions about whether or not
you would change some of the funding priorities of the agency now or
what we think is important as a group in the future.

I guess you could talk about aquaculture but my personal feeling is if I
talk about it much more, I am going to be ill. Because, and the reason
why I say that is we have had a lot of discussions about that. That bill
is already gone. The new administration will figure out whether they are
going to pick it up or they are not. I don\'t know what else you could
do in terms of this committee dealing with aquaculture.

Seafood quality and safety, I think that one is of interest because I
think it has huge implications on whether or not the agency is going to
pick that up and if so, how the hell they are going to fund it. Is the
money going to come from somewhere else or, you know, whatever we think
about that.

Fisheries disasters, I don\'t know what you do about those except for
the fact that we are involved with them when they happen. And you know,
I guess the only issue there is maybe the policy issue there is whether
or not we set up a fund which they have the 75 million and how that
could be distributed. But I guess that is a policy issue that we could
talk about.

All of those other issues of limited entry and all that stuff are being
dealt with by each of the councils within their own framework. I don\'t
think this committee has that much to deal with those.

Protected resources, I think the discussion we had and Mr. Fletcher\'s
discussion about how to deal with, this one is going to be important
because there will be legislation changing what is going on. And I think
that would be something that we could talk about probably a fair amount.

MS. DOERR: But in general, what is the committee role when it comes to
legislation, historically?

MR. BILLY: We can provide guidance in terms of provisions that
legislation ought to include. We don\'t normally draft legislation or
play any particular role in that. We can review drafts of legislation
and provide reaction. That is about it, as a committee. Is there
anything else?

MR. DiLERNIA: Well, we\'re not supposed to lobby.

MR. BILLY: Yes.

MR. DiLERNIA: So we can provide, if we are asked to provide comments, we
can provide comments on proposed legislation. That is our role but
sometimes initiating it is a little hinky, there.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Heather.

MS. McCARTY: On the aquaculture bill, for example, we gave extremely
detailed advice, or whatever you might want to call it, to NOAA on what
that bill should like. And we went through it line by line, basically.

MR. BILLY: As I recall, a draft, an initial draft, provided that kind of
input. So, yes. Martin?

MR. FISHER: In terms of LAPPs, I think there is room for this committee
to weigh in on providing continuity. There don\'t seem to be any
national standards for IFQs at the moment, in terms of how they are
implemented and how the user, how the stakeholders can participate in
the programs, especially when it comes to determining who is eligible.
There are no standards for that. There is no standard definition for a
substantial participant or substantially fish. Anybody entering into
that LAPP would benefit from some input or guidance on those issues.
That is of particular interest to me. I would think that that would be
more of a policy approach than a micro-management approach.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Dorothy.

MS. LOWMAN: I think also we need some LAPP-related suggestions in our
transitions. And I think that there are some policy issues, like we say,
well, you know, we need to make them cost effective. Well, are there
some sort of policies that ought to be changed to help, you know, make
them more cost-effective or things that we could invest in now that
would have high returns, in general, you know, more, rather than as a
specific region basis, but in a more national way.

So, I think there are some issues that rise to the higher policy level
in LAPPs. But I do think it belongs more under the strategic planning
budget and management subcommittee than the Commerce subcommittee.

MR. JONER: Well, and I think we did a whole\-- way back when we did a
fairly extensive review of what this committee felt about individual
fishing quotas at the time, and we probably should go look at what we
said.

MR. BILLY: Okay.

MR. CATES: I have two comments or issues. First is aquaculture. This
committee has done a great deal of work on that. And I keep referring to
that we are an advisory board. I think what we need to do is refine and
advise NOAA and Commerce on how to move it forward. Basically, we said
we think it is a good idea, it should be done. But now, how do you
implement it? How do you make it happen with a different set of
questions?

Secondly, under the Protected Resources Subcommittee, I think one thing
we need to look at is how to reinstate species that have been recovered.
And there is a resistance going on. And I think it is, in my point of
view, coming from NOAA, where we say, \"Well, we need to do the science
on this species first,\" but there is an unwillingness to do the science
because it is not a very popular thing to do. For ten years now, they
have been asking to do the science on the green sea turtle. No, there is
an unwillingness to do it.

So, when you do have recovery, how do we de-list it?

MR. BILLY: Okay. Bob?

MR. FLETCHER: I guess I have a bit of a different take on Recreational
Fisheries Working Group than Randy does. While much of the policy work
is pretty much concluded, I think it is important that this committee,
at least those who are interested, be kept apprised of the
implementation phase of the amendments to Magnuson Act. And perhaps,
depending on what we learn at the next meeting, there may be some things
that we can provide back in terms of guidance or recommendations.

So, while the policy, to a great extent, is about over and
implementation is starting, I think MAFAC can still be a valuable
sounding board for the Agency. So, I see a short-term reason to have
another meeting.

The other issue is, and I am unfortunately very intimately involved in
this, and it is down under Commerce. And it says, \"Management of highly
migratory species through regional bodies such as the WCPFC.\" I am a
U.S. Commissioner on the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission, and we
just had an extraordinary meeting last week that was a total abject
failure. And we are now two and a half years into a total abject failure
of any conservation and management.

Having said that, there is only really a limited ability to input that
international process. And the Agency that is probably more in the
middle of it than anybody is the State Department. And there is an old
saying, nations don\'t have friends, they have interests. And it appears
to be in the interest of the United States not to really get after a
nation that chooses to throw blocks into getting anything done. I don\'t
know how to deal with that. But I do know that having this on this
agenda does make a lot of sense because I don\'t think what we can do is
going to have much ability to have an impact. But it is a terrible
situation. And there is an entity\-- the Inter-American Tropical Tuna
Commission has been in existence since 1949, ostensibly managing
harvest. And the nations who are interested in management have figured
out a way to block any progress. I don\'t know what the solution is. It
seems to me that the United States needs to get tough with some of these
nations. And the IUU process is not the way to get tough with them. That
is an easy way to address a concern, but it is a real\-- it is a crisis
because yellowfin and bigeye are slowly but surely going down hill and
nothing is being done.

Is that an example where we could provide some get tough advice to the
Secretary or hopefully through the Secretary to the State Department on
options, ideas of how to get the attention of some of these countries
and change their practices? Is that an appropriate quote?

MR. FLETCHER: You know, what do you do to get their attention? That is
the problem. It is not speak up in support of the science which is very,
very good, but which is totally ignored. And I almost think that there
must be some other way to get their attention but that gets into that
high realm of political influence that I don\'t know that the United
States is ready or willing to get involved in. Now, maybe this new
administration might have a new approach. It would be interesting to
find out.

But right now it is almost beyond life support. The Tuna Commission is
looked at as just impotent. And something has got to be done if we are
going to try to rebuild these stocks. It is a crisis.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Bill.

MR. DEWEY: At the risk of making my friend Randy Fisher ill, I am going
to get into aquaculture as well.

MAFAC asked NOAA to develop a ten-year plan. And I for one would like to
hear at least periodic updates from NOAA as to how they are doing on
implementing that. So, I think that should stay on MAFAC\'s agenda.
Sorry, Randy.

And a couple other new issues that aren\'t on the list here that I would
like to at least throw out there. Whether they are policy related or
not, I am not sure, but areas that maybe MAFAC wants to delve into.

One is ocean acidification. There are bills both in the House and the
Senate related to that. And our industry thinks we may actually be
feeling some of the first effects of that in our recent failures on the
West Coast, both in our hatcheries and in the wild. So, it is an area we
are keenly aware of. Dr. Feeley with NOAA has been the leading scientist
on this issue, and may be someone you ought to think about bringing to
NOAA and depending on it to bring people up to speed.

The other is, with this new administration, I think there is going to be
a big interest in clean energy. And from a biofuel standpoint, we have
had a number of companies contacting us recently about biofuel
production. That may be another area of opportunity to push and see if
the Administration is going to help us to do that.

So, I throw those out there. Now I need to apologize and excuse myself.
I have to go get on a conference call.

MR. BILLY: Tony.

MR. DiLERNIA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am going to return to the
Recreational Fisheries Working Group topics because the last bullet
point there illustrates, is a specific issue that I think illustrates a
larger policy issue and discussion that I would like to see the
committee review and perhaps make recommendations.

On the East Coast, summer flounder is managed both by the National
Fisheries Service and the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission.
It is conceivable, although it doesn\'t happen, it has only happened
once since real management has occurred, I mean Fishery Management Plans
were in place since the early \'80s but effective management didn\'t
occur really on the federal level until \'91. And I guess on the A7OC
level after MAFAC that was passed sometime in the early \'90s also. So,
summer flounder management really began to develop steam in the early
\'90s.

And again, I use summer flounder only as a species to illustrate what I
think is a larger problem or may be a larger issue. And so what we have
on the east coast is we have this species, which is caught by both
recreational and commercial fishermen, managed by two different
agencies, NMFS and the Commission, United States Marine Fisheries
Commission. And it is possible to have two different sets of
regulations.

This happened in the recreational fishery in the past. It was 1995. The
federal regulations and the state regulations were different. And what
also happens is a fisherman in the regulated community finds himself
having to go to two sets of meetings all the time to apply their input
as to the final development and final regulations. You have to go to
both council meetings and the commission meetings.

And often there is a duplication of effort. And the regulated community,
as educated as they become over the years, still there is some confusion
of time as to how the process should be, or how they could be most
effective for the process.

Well the policy issue that I would like to see the committee review and
perhaps make a recommendation to the Secretary on would be to review
this concept of dual management. It is conceivable, I have actually
proposed it in the past in comments to the Mid-Atlantic Fishery
Management Council, but again when you propose an agency to give
something up, it is always easier to take something on than to give
something up, there is a natural institutional resistance.

It is conceivable that just to streamline management of summer flounder,
that the secretary could, in effect, withdraw summer flounder management
plan and actually have a federal management of summer flounder extent
out in the EEZ through the provisions of the Atlantic Coastal Fisheries
Conservation Management Act (ACFMA). And so you wouldn\'t have, in a
sense, two different agencies passing regulations on one regulated
community and perhaps have that one regulated community have two
different sets of regulations, a federal set of regulations and a state
set of regulations.

So, what I would like to see the committee review is the possibility\--
and this is the policy decision\-- would be examine in the year 2008,
soon to be 2009, is dual management still a necessary tool. This dual
management is something that we backed ourselves into over the years.
And again, if you look at the development of summer flounder plan from
the original plan, which was in the early \'80s on the federal level and
perhaps on the state level, we actually backed ourselves into the
position where we are now.

Now in 2009 with MAFAC, perhaps we should reexamine that entire
management process and perhaps recommend to the Secretary that, hey,
listen, you don\'t need to do this as much anymore. We can do it through
perhaps the Commission.

And so I would like to see that to be a discussion item for the \-- and
I don\'t know if that situation exists in the Gulf or on the West Coast.
I see the West Coast shaking their head no, and I don\'t know about the
Gulf, but\-- so it might be just an East Coast issue. So perhaps it may
not be within the responsibilities of the Committee. But if possible, I
would like to see that discussion occur and perhaps make a
recommendation to at least the NOAA administrator.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Heather?

MS. McCARTY: I was just going to comment that I think a number of these
things on the list are very regional in nature and probably not
necessarily things that this committee should deal with, though it
sounds like the larger issue that is behind what you are talking about
might be. I\'m not sure.

MR. DiLERNIA: Can I?

MS. McCARTY: That wasn\'t all I was going to say but you can speak to
that if you want to.

MR. DiLERNIA: Okay. To that point?

MR. BILLY: Sure.

MR. DiLERNIA: Yes. What we are looking at there, on this particular\--
you know, it is the entire East Coast as far as management. And it is,
the Secretary is pulling the Fishery Management Plan, the FMP. So, you
know, we have precedent for it, actually, on the East Coast already. It
occurs with lobsters and it occurs with herring, where the management
are proposing, this management process they are proposing is ongoing.
They are going on.

So, I could see where it is a regional East Coast issue but then again,
you know, when does it take up the whole country?

MS. McCARTY: It might be more than a regional issue. I am just not sure.
I guess what I was going to say was that under protected resources, the
list that we were provided, there is a number of regional issues for
example that I think are not necessarily appropriate, piece by piece for
us to take up.

But if you took the Protected Resources Subcommittee\'s Work to mean
working on a reauthorization of the Endangered Species Act, for example,
that many of these sub-issues would be part of that discussion. And I
just, could I just go through the list and talk about\--

You know, I agree with Bob that there is a short-term need for the
recreational fisheries working group. I can see that really clearly.

Going to the next one, Strategic Planning Budget and Program Management,
I think that LAPPS should be in that one, and I think we should look at
the old document.

I don\'t know about climate services, Climate Research Organization. I
think that is probably meant to mean the formation of a legal element in
the management hierarchy of NMFS or NOAA. And so I think it is different
than the science issues associated with climate. So maybe that does
belong in there.

Under this Commerce Subcommittee, I think seafood safety and quality and
aquaculture, I agree with who said it should stay. I think illegal,
unregulated, and unreported fishing is not something that we would
necessarily want to offer advice on. I think that one is \-- well, I
don\'t know. I don\'t know for a fact but I think it is pretty clear
cut.

I think the tuna issues are not something that we can have an effect on,
but I think for equilibrium should stay there. And then, I already spoke
to the Protected Resources Subcommittee, and maybe add the
de-listing/recovery criteria for that one, because that would be part of
any new ESA anyway, I would think.

I think the Pacific Salmon, again, is too regional. All the rest of
those things seem to me to be pretty regional, including the Pacific
Salmon stuff and the ocean sound, I think is maybe not.

Ecosystems, I would say Ecosystem Approach/Ocean Science Subcommittee,
maybe, and add some of the things that people have mentioned like ocean
certification, biofuel, and then put climate change issues under that
one.

Take out NEPA, environmental review process under the MSRA and put it
back under tracking implementation of the MSRA under strategic planning
budget.

Those would be my suggestions.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Bob?

MR. FLETCHER: Just kind of responding to Tony. I think the closest to
your issue on the West Coast would be groundfish. And they are kind of
both in the same federal laws. And we manage them regionally. We have
got management lines under the different regulations up and down the
coast because there are different impacts on those stocks and there are
different habitat, aggregations, et cetera.

But in the case that you are describing, it sounds to me like you have
got a real regional problem. It is not something we have had to deal
with. And salmon on the West Coast is managed regionally. We have
regular lines up and down from Canada to Mexico, divided up in a number
of different areas. They are all managed separately, even the beach.

Then the states have management authority in internal waters for that
species as it goes up the river. But we have never had a situation.

I do remember when I was at the Department of Fish and Game I tried to
assert state management authority, and I got preempted. So, we didn\'t
do that anymore. So, it is not really something that we have had an
issue with out there.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Vince?

MR. O\'SHEA: Thanks. You know, I think there are, listening to what Tony
said and a little bit of what Heather said, it seems to me that the
couple of strategic issues that really come out of this is state-federal
alignment. And I think, you know, not only on the East Coast, but I
think my experience in Alaska, there was also issues there about what
the state thought about managing fish in state waters and what the North
Pacific Council thought.

So, I think those issues are around the country, but I am not sure what
particular advice MAFAC would want to give on that. It was a thorny
issue and they are tough issues.

The other global issue seems to me the commercial-recreation allocation
issue, which is embedded in the summer flounder thing. And if people
aren\'t talking about it yet, they are going to be talking about it in
the next five years. But and we have other species, you know, halibut
charter boat issue is another example of it. And the 2020 Vision talks
about this conflict between commercial and rec. But again, I don\'t\--
this process is in place right now with the governing structure to deal
with them.

So, I don\'t know what advice MAFAC would want to give on that. But if I
stand back two feet and look at the Marine Recreational System, bycatch,
landings reporting system and observers, you know, the meetings that I
go to, there is pressing need for all that data and there is no clue as
to how to pay for it. And I don\'t know how the Agency is going to do
it. The industry says we can\'t do it. But on the other hand, these are
big chunks of data needed to manage the fishery.

This MRIP thing is going to come out. We are going to have all kinds of
fancy things on it, and I think one of the big things is who is going to
pay for it and how are we going to pay? So maybe there is this strategic
issue that MAFAC could weigh in on is to say it has got to come from
either the users\' pay, or there has got to be a strategy to make this a
higher priority for the government, or you have got to find somebody
else to pay for it.

But I mean, just to give you an example, you guys in the North Pacific,
they are talking about five percent observer coverage in New England
fisheries saying the industry can\'t pay for it and the agency doesn\'t
have money to pay for it. They haven\'t a clue as to what they are
getting on bycatch.

So anyway, those are some, to me, those are more global than trying to
solve the summer flounder problem.

MR. BILLY: Larry?

MR. SIMPSON: I was just, Mr. Chairman, going to give a little general
comment or two about the Gulf region about this. What you are talking
about is state-federal management issues in a broader sense. Flounder is
much too small of an issue, I think, for this group.

But in the Gulf we have had kind of good and bad. We have had issues
with regard to federal system giving back to the state certain
management authority, especially in Florida for some, I believe stone
crab and spiny lobster. It is not stated in the whole mess. It is pretty
much a state issue.

And then there is some recent occurrences of some not-so-good management
of red snapper. If we got a problem with anything, we are red in the
Gulf states. Red snapper\-- and we are working through the throes of
those issues of differential ideas and philosophies about how best to
manage that species.

So, I am kind of like Vince. I am not sure what this body could
contribute, but I think, you know, any comments might be useful. They
don\'t necessarily mean that they are going to be used, but it might be
useful. But it is a broader sense.

For example, we \"manage\" shrimp very well in the Gulf. But it is
really the states setting the seasons and so forth and so on. That is
the true management.

MR. DiLERNIA: It\'s not? I\'m sorry.

MR. SIMPSON: It is the true management of the animal. So, I mean, just
to take in the EEZ, there is one issue that is so-called \"Texas
option,\" that you close out to 200 miles. But other than that one
thing, that is about the only issue that is federal.

So anyway, it is a mixed bag.

MR. DiLERNIA: It sounds like something, what I am asking for is
something that you are doing.

MR. SIMPSON: We are doing and not doing.

MR. DiLERNIA: I am trying to get the \--

MR. SIMPSON: We are doing something sometimes and sometimes we are not.

MR. DiLERNIA: \-- East Coast to the point that you are at.

MR. SIMPSON: But it is not always a friendly thing, Tony. Sometimes it
is.

MR. DiLERNIA: Welcome to Fisheries Management.

MR. BILLY: Okay, Tom?

MR. RAFTICAN: Yes, I know a lot of this has been covered already and
touched on. But when you start looking at a Ecosystem Approach
Subcommittee, I think the first thing is, climate should be in there.
But the other things as we go down, designation of management of marine
protected areas, corals\-- what we are talking about over here is ocean
zoning. And maybe it is about time we got the elephant out of the corner
of the room and really started looking at it.

And maybe it is time that we should, you know, we are looking at marine
managed areas instead of marine protected areas. It covers a number of
\-- energy, development, offshore, alternative energies, ecosystem
protection. You also have got aquaculture in there. You need to look at
commercial corridors. But you know, let\'s try and take an overall
picture. I think where we should be coming from is how do you take the
broad-based picture of the entire thing.

And I think there are some real pluses in here when you do that. You
know, we were talking about weakest species management before, where you
managed the weakest species. We haven\'t looked at marine-managed areas
or marine-protected areas as an offset to this weakest link species. You
have got great protections in there for certain species in certain
areas. And if you take the broad picture, you don\'t simply go, you have
to manage by catch in one part and nothing there.

And I think it is really important that we take a look, you know, when
we start looking at an ecosystem approach, how do you look at the entire
picture. And the entire picture includes not only marine-protected
areas, marine-managed areas, including the commercial corridors in there
and also very important that the human element is also included in that.

MR. BILLY: Randy?

MR. CATES: I was just going to comment we have the same issues going on
in Hawaii. State, federal management, big conflicts about what to do.
One federal agency wants to do something about it, sometimes the state
doesn\'t want to lost control over it. So it is not just in the East
Coast region, it is in our area.

MR. BILLY: It sounds like it is shaping up into a useful issue for us.
Vince?

MR. O\'SHEA: Well just because there are these problems around the
country that all have the same theme, you know, the thing that I am
trying to get my head around is, so what sort of universal advice do you
give the Agency? It seems to be along the lines of, do you have
confidence in the ability of the local governing structures to deal and
resolve with those issues or there is a better way to do it. That to me
seems to be the sort of strategic question. But to try to get in there
and muck around with a formula of how to solve Randy\'s problem and
solve Tony\'s problem, you know, generically from a group like this, I
am not exactly sure how you would do that.

MR. BILLY: One of the considerations that popped into my head earlier
when we were talking about it was the process, I believe is going to
occur looking for ways to reduce federal government spending.

And, you know, if in fact the new administration is serious about
addressing that, and it looks at all of the existing programs that have
been discussed, it could be one of the driving forces for sorting out
how this is approached if there continues to be interest on the part of
the states and they are looking for ways to save money at the federal
level, maybe that could be one of the considerations. Just a thought
that occurred to me.

Tony?

MR. DiLERNIA: Yes, in response to Vince\'s questions regards what might
we come out of the committee with, that is why I would like to have the
committee discuss it. If I had an answer as to where we would definitely
go in a final decision, I would make that the recommendation and save
the committee a lot of time. There is an issue I see of duplication of
effort on the East Coast. There is an issue there of the possibility of
having conflicting regulations on the regulated community. And so I
would like to see the committee, if the condition doesn\'t exist on the
other two coasts, I would like to see the committee discuss it. They
might be able to come up with a recommendation. They might not be able
to. But the fact that there is some uncertainty I think is all the more
reason why the committee should examine the issue. And again, it is not
specific to summer flounder. There is a larger issue. I used summer
flounder as an example. But I believe that it really could be expanded
to many other species. And the management policy if not for the entire
country, definitely for the East Coast. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Steve?

MR. JONER: I think I would agree that we leave these in there for now,
Heather\'s wise comments notwithstanding. But these are federal policies
and laws that are driving these local issues and it is our problem with
sea lions and salmon on the West Coast. But guess what? You are next.
And it is not a local law or policy that is driving it. It is federal.
And you know, this has to be addressed on a national basis.

And I think these regional issues are the examples we use to develop the
recommendations. Without them, you know, what would be the problem?

I guess my vote is for leaving them in rather than tearing them out,
because they are just local.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Any other comments? Okay. Mark, where would you like to
go from here? I don\'t mean\-- per the discussion. Should we consider
all of this and come back with something at the next meeting?

Heather?

MS. McCARTY: What if we go through these and just agree, number one, if
there is going to be a subcommittee for each of these areas. And then
just say the top three things or whatever for each one of those areas.
See if we can agree on that and just be done with it, and then people
can give their names to Mark if they want to chair or they want to be on
it.

MR. BILLY: We can certainly do that. I don\'t know that we have a
uniform list at this time.

MS. McCARTY: Okay, well, I have been writing everything down.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Do we want to do that, or do we want just to let the
subcommittees decide? Maybe have top three issues that the full
committee wants addressed and then the subcommittee come up with
additional issues.

MS. McCARTY: Okay, that will do.

MR. BILLY: Okay.

MR. FISHER: But once again, the intent here is to give policy direction.
Isn\'t that what this is all about?

MS. McCARTY: Yes.

MR. FISHER: I just wanted to make sure we remembered that.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Well, let\'s run through them, then. And the first
question then for the first area, which is Recreational Fisheries
Working Group is to continue having that working group, at least through
the next meeting, and have a briefing as was suggested by Bob, and then
see where we go from here.

Yes, Bob.

MR. FLETCHER: Clearly the first two items on this one page that Mark
handed out are going to be the topic of discussion and some updates. And
I am of the assumption that we will be closer to Washington, D.C. at
that next meeting. So, it will be easier for people from the Agency to
be able to drop by and provide us an update.

And then the subcommittee can discuss these other items, as well as any
others they think might be the subject of future discussion or not, and
come back to the full committee after the subcommittee meets and make a
recommendation to the full committee.

So, I think for now I would just suggest that all four of these be left
there. And any others that any members of the working group have can be
the topic of the future meetings\-- the next MAFAC meeting\-- and then
report back with those. Is there a need for this working group to
continue? If so, what are the items, such as identified.

MR. BILLY: Okay. One of the \-- the last bullet item there, management
of summer flounder, seemed to evolve in our discussion to a broader
question of the respective management roles of the federal government
and the states.

MR. DiLERNIA: Yes.

MR. BILLY: And I am not sure that should necessarily stand. They are
recreational fisheries. I understand why it is there, but I don\'t know
where else. We don\'t have any \-- I guess that is the all-inclusive
ecosystem approach would encompass it.

I don\'t have any objection to \--

MR. DiLERNIA: Strategic planning. I would put it with Strategic Planning
and Budget \--

MR. BILLY: Strategic Planning?

MR. DiLERNIA: \-- because one of the things that you mentioned, Tom, was
the fact that the duplication effort and how you could probably save
money on the federal level if you just limited it to one set of
management.

MR. DORSETT: I was thinking Commerce Subcommittee \--

(Laughter.)

MR. DORSETT: \-- Mr. Chairman. With all due respect, Mr. Chairman.

MR. FLETCHER: But then he might have handed that off anyway. So, he
doesn\'t mind. He\'ll go with that.

MR. BILLY: Yes. Dave?

MR. WALLACE: I understand where Tony is coming from and we can make a
recommendation to the Secretary of Commerce. However, I really think
that it would require legislation to do that. It would almost have to go
to Congress. You know, you would say, \"Hey, Congress, this is what we
recommend.\" And I think that you would find a number of states that
might support it and a number of states who said they are very much
against it. But I see this as\-- it flies right in the face of the
Magnuson Act.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Yes, Tony?

MR. DiLERNIA: Yes. No, you don\'t have to go to Congress.

MR. WALLACE: Oh, okay. Good you practice law.

MR. DiLERNIA: No, I\'m just using the \--

MR. O\'SHEA: Red drum. They just did it in red drum.

MR. DiLERNIA: Yes, you did it. You didn\'t have to go to Congress on
that, did you?

MR. WALLACE: But South Atlantic withdrew the red drum one.

MR. DiLERNIA: And you didn\'t have to do it with lobster.

MR. WALLACE: No, there was legislation on lobster.

MR. DiLERNIA: There was. How about herring?

MR. WALLACE: There is joint management of herring.

MR. DiLERNIA: Yes, but it is mostly Commission now?

MR. WALLACE: No.

MR. DiLERNIA: All right. I know during\-- not the last administration,
the Clinton administration\-- they wanted to pull a number of plans. As
a matter of fact, I think this originally originated from it. They
wanted to pull the Fishery Management Plan for bluefish. And the concept
was you could still have federal management for MAFMC. There was another
species.

But there was like proposal on the part of the administration to pull
those plans for the management.

MR. BILLY: Chris?

MR. WALLACE: You know \--

MR. BILLY: Oh, sorry, Dave. Go ahead if it is on the point.

MR. WALLACE: Yes. You know, I don\'t see any reason why this committee
could not recommend to the secretary that they go to Congress to change
the law. You know, you can request that they do that. The administration
proposes changes in all the laws all the time. So that is not an issue.
I think that it is a very, very broad policy issue and Congress would
want to be involved in that also.

So, if you are going to do it, just remember that we will be doing this
five or six or ten years from now.

MR. BILLY: Chris?

MR. DORSETT: I was curious about the first two bullets and if things are
going to take effect in January and we don\'t meet until the spring, as
Randy said, then what do we do other than get maybe an update? I mean,
are there some activities beyond that that we would be engaged in and
provide assistance?

MR. FLETCHER: Just\-- my view on this is that there is a number of
states that aren\'t excited about the registry and the implementation of
new surveys that may require participation by the states financially.
There is a number of issues that while they are in the reauthorization
of Magnuson Act, it is not at all clear how they are going to be
implemented, when they are going to be implemented. This is a moving
target. So, I think that until we have a better sense of just how the
federal government plans on implementing this, we need to keep this on
our radar, at least for one more meeting, to find out from them where
they are. What have you done? What is your plan? And if we see a member
of the subcommittee, there might some things that we might be able to
recommend to them to help them more smoothly move past this so we get to
the goal of having all anglers identified, and get to the goal of having
a better data collection system. Maybe we can, in fact, be involved in
the policy, a new direction, once we see what is going on.

So, I just felt like one more meeting was important for the working
group to just see where are, now that January first has come and gone,
where we are five months or six months later. So that was why I felt
like these two items should definitely be topics, and some of the NMFS
people who are involved, whether it be Gordon Coleman or Pres Pate who
are key players, might be able to come back and tell us what is going
on, so that we have an idea after all that we were involved in, that it
is going in the right direction.

MR. DORSETT: And then I just wanted to put a plug in for this third
bullet. I think this is a critical issue, especially the, I guess
accounting probably is referring to the accountability measures and the
accountability amongst various sectors and managing fisheries to the
extent it is not incorporated in the emirate. This is one that is going
to be a real challenge, and I think it will be useful for this committee
to engage on advice to the secretary.

MR. BILLY: Okay, good. Thanks.

Okay, we still have bullet item number four. Jim Gilmore, the chair of
the Strategic Planning, Budget, and Program Management Committee, has
chosen not to step out of the room. It doesn\'t matter to me where it
is, but I think it is logically placed there.

MS. LOWMAN: I\'m not sure it fits to \-- in my mind, it may not be one
of the top three priorities for this committee. I mean, I think
obviously the transition, and hopefully we will be able to figure out
the way to interact with the transition team prior to our next meeting,
our document and our recommendations on transition. And it may be that
that is going to be an iterative process. There will be feedback
important to this subcommittee then to work on at the next meeting.

So, that seems to me that we actually want the high ones. You know, I
would like to see some of the issues, they were big ones, that we put in
under LAPPS continue. I mean, how do we actually make these cost
effective reasonable things that work?

And then in my mind what Vince brought up is in an even broader sense
that we have a lot of things that cost a lot of money but how are we
going to pay for them. And are there new ways, maybe there are some
creative new ways that have been possible for funding and so on and so
forth in partnerships that we might be able to come up with here, too,
that could help.

But you know, obviously, we want to be sure that as that scaffold is
being put here, let me know if this vacancy survives.

MR. BILLY: Bob?

MR. FLETCHER: Just a clarification. Mark, up on the Recreational
Fisheries Working Group, you talk about challenges of applying allowable
catch limits. Isn\'t that annual catch limits? Because you have got it
down under strategic planning, annual catch limit rule. Isn\'t that what
it is, ACL?

So, shouldn\'t that logically just be erased from the recreational
fisheries working group and covered under that third or fourth bullet?

DR. HOLLIDAY: There is no science behind putting it in one bin versus
another. They are talking about the same issue. And there was a
particular issue associated with ACL for the recreational sector and the
accountability measures associated with them that we thought perhaps
that the ad hoc working group might be best suited to address that
specific question to the more general policy question about ACLs in
general was what was more of a strategic, broader question.

So, as we said earlier, a lot of these things cross the jurisdiction, if
you will, of different committees. And since there was particular
emphasis on that ACL for the sectors and how do we choose appropriate
accountability measures. But it could be one versus the other. Again,
there is no hard and fast rule.

MR. FLETCHER: Yes, and it kind of ties into the MRIP in a way. The
better catch data that you have, the better you will be able to
determine when those limits have been reached and you can take
appropriate action.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Sure.

MR. FLETCHER: But it just felt to me like one might be better served by
having it all in the same place, the whole issue, even though there was
some recreational component that maybe stands out more.

DR. HOLLIDAY: Right. And I am having second thoughts about having done
this list, because people are paying too much attention to sort of the
words and the bins. It was really just an aid to help stimulate some
brainstorming as opposed to \--

MR. FLETCHER: Well, you did it.

DR. HOLLIDAY: \-- voting on it as, you know, do we want this one or that
one. These are just things that are issues that are important to NMFS
because we are making decisions on these issues over the next 12 months.
Some of them have very big policy implications. Some of them taken
together will have some policy implications or precedent or would be
better informed by having some guidance from a group like MAFAC, but
there is nothing sacred about any of them or which bin they have been
placed.

So, I know I said it already, but I just don\'t want to get too caught
up in it. It is what you think is important and what you think MAFAC can
contribute in providing advice, prioritization, guidance, instruction to
NOAA, to the administration, that has to do with budget, that has to do
with policy decisions, that has to legislation, things that will help
the organization fulfill its responsibilities for Living Marine
Resource.

MR. BILLY: Okay. So, we will keep the first three and move the fourth
bullet under Strategic Planning, Budget, and Program Management? Okay?
That is summer flounder, but really it is the broader issue.

MS. McCARTY: It is the broader issue.

MR. BILLY: Yes. Dual management issues. State-federal.

MR. FISHER: State-federal alignment.

MR. BILLY: Yes, that is good. Okay. Then let\'s move on. Strategic
Planning, Budget, and Program Management. There seems to be an obvious
need to continue that subcommittee.

MS. McCARTY: Add LAPPS to that.

MR. BILLY: Add LAPPS to that?

MS. McCARTY: Take it out of Commerce and put it up there.

MR. BILLY: Yes, go ahead.

MS. McCARTY: If you are talking about implementation of the
Magnuson-Stevens, maybe that is just a subtopic. If you had that whole
implementation, it could include a number of things, including LAPPS.

MR. GILMORE: Yes, I had from my notes, NEPA, the catch limit and LAPPS.

MS. McCARTY: Bringing NEPA from the last category up into that one.
Right?

MR. BILLY: Okay. How about this climate services, climate research
organization item?

MR. GILMORE: We are going to say the same thing. I think we are going to
say the same thing.

MR. BILLY: Go ahead.

MR. GILMORE: Well, I guess my only thought on that is I understand from
an organizational chart standpoint within NOAA that this falls neatly in
here. And so I think as long as we would be clear in our subcommittee as
to what aspect of it we were looking at. But you know, clearly over here
would be ecosystem, climate change, ocean situation. I mean, I think
that is where \--

MR. BILLY: Shall we scratch it out here?

MS. McCARTY: It seems to be part of the transition planning at NMFS or
lower. And it seems to have a life in that sense in that there may be
another, I don\'t know what you call it, line office or whatever that
might be dedicated to that.

And, if NMFS NOAA\-- we could be doing that, then perhaps it would be
useful to have advice from us on that. Just that part of it, not the
science.

MS. LOWMAN: In sort of how they are integrated into the whole picture.

MS. McCARTY: Yes, and how the fisheries might be involved.

MS. LOWMAN: Right.

MS. McCARTY: How it fits.

MR. BILLY: Okay.

MS. McCARTY: I\'m assuming though.

MR. BILLY: Okay, MAFAC advice on how fisheries fits into it. Okay.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: We make sure we fit into it.

MS. LOWMAN: We make sure you do. We should have.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: We want to be their number one client.

MS. LOWMAN: Yes, that is right.

MR. BILLY: Okay. How about the next item under it, the performance
metrics and sub-bullets?

DR. HOLLIDAY: Well, I think I heard someone they are not clear what it
meant. But the program management aspect of this subcommittee is looking
at the performance of programs over time. And this was getting to how do
we measure the program accountability of things like habitat
conservation. I mean, for the things that we do in fisheries management,
there are metrics that we use in annual performance, you know,
Government Performance Results Act. But for some of these other issues
in program management, how do we know if they are successful and is
their advice about improving or increasing programs when we don\'t have
good metrics for them. So, is there something that MAFAC wanted to say
about performance management or program management of things having to
do with these non-sustainable fisheries office-type programs. So, there
are questions that are important to us, as we are being asked to look at
the accountability and performance of our programs. Is it something that
MAFAC is interested in weighing in on? If not, that is fine. If so, that
is fine, too.

You had a question?

MR. REISNER: Yes, on this performance metrics, I have to tell you that
in terms of the budget and justifications for either changes or
increases in our funding, they are critical. And to the degree that you
guys look at them and decide these don\'t make sense or they could be
better or they are fine, it would be helpful.

MR. BILLY: Your druthers. Something we should keep on the list?

MR. GILMORE: We have out-year programming budgeting that we can kind of
roll those all in with the performance metrics.

MR. BILLY: All right. The Commerce Subcommittee?

We have heard endorsements for the Seafood Safety and Quality, the
ongoing effort. Continue to be involved in aquaculture, at least in the
form of updates, eco-labeling. The fishery disasters, I think we might
have a better sense of that, after the discussions in the next couple of
days. Seeing, particularly from a national perspective, there is gaps
or, you know, recommendations you want to make in terms of how that is
handled or is being handled.

So, I would say it is okay to keep it on the list but it is not one of
the top priorities at this point. We have moved LAPPS.

Illegal, unregulated, and unreported fishing\-- there is a particular
part of that that relates to the European Commission and some
requirements that they are imposing, which could affect Commerce. But I
don\'t know if anyone wants to speak to that, if that is broad enough to
include \-- I think it is being addressed by the Agency. So, I \--
scratch that one for now?

MR. BILLY: Okay. Management of highly migratory species. I just find
that idea of the problems challenging. And I am not sure what this
committee could do, but maybe it is a future topic where we could get a
more detailed briefing on.

MR. FISHER: Why is it not working now?

MR. BILLY: Why and why. Put our selves in a stronger position to
consider what the real issues are and decide whether we are in a
position to make recommendations, and what they might be.

Okay? All right. Next subcommittee, Protected Resources Subcommittee.
Should the Marine Mammal Act be included under that?

MS. McCARTY: Yes.

MR. BILLY: Okay. And then how to deal with recovered species?

MR. FLETCHER: Maybe those populations of marine mammals should \--

MR. BILLY: Yes, all of those cover words.

MR. SIMPSON: We are, Mr. Chairman, looking at a good thing and that is
how do you take something off of an endangered species list? We are
approaching a good milestone. And how do we do that? All we have ever
done is make a list. I think grey whales.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: And the Caribbean monk seals.

MR. SIMPSON: But I mean, those are the \--

MR. FLETCHER: Don\'t think cars wouldn\'t kill them.

MR. JONER: Twenty-five were killed, and that was a problem in whales.

MR. JONER: I mean, there is another law coming in. It was de-listed, and
then the court said \"Well, wait a minute. You have got the Marine
Mammal Protection Act that supersedes your treaty.\" That is just kind
of the first time we heard that. So, now it is back in Jim\'s lap. Not
the LAP here but \--

MR. SIMPSON: Unusual circumstances.

MR. CATES: In Hawaii we have this issue for years and years and years,
where there is an overabundance of turtles creating many other problems,
like a significant increase in shark attacks. It is their main source of
food. All of a sudden, we have a little problem in Hawaii right now. A
lot of people eat them, where we once didn\'t have that.

MR. DiLERNIA: Who is eating them?

MR. CATES: Tigers. I mean, my own back yard, I haven\'t seen a tiger in
my entire life in this bay. And you can\'t go there without seeing them
now.

MR. DiLERNIA: Because they are eating turtles?

MR. CATES: Oh, yes, it is their main diet.

MS. FOY: So they are hanging out where the turtles are.

MR. CATES: So that is why an ecosystem-based approach, you can create
other problems by protecting one species, and it becomes overabundant.

MS. FOY: So what I think I am hearing, Mr. Chairman, is we need to talk
about some de-listing standards and some protocol to help NOAA go
through that process. Larry is right. This is a good thing. And I think
that \--

MR. JONER: You want to de-listing into management of these things.
Because that is going to be the big challenge. You can get it de-listed,
but it is still there.

MR. BILLY: Okay. We have got a lot of items on this list. Are there two
or three that are the most important?

MS. LOWMAN: I mean, I like Heather\'s idea about the larger issues, the
issues related to the ESA and the authorization of those, and this issue
of de-listing and covering in management. And then these are all sort of
examples that all relate to that, and they can be kept on there sort of
under these umbrellas.

MR. JONER: They could be sub-bullets.

MS. LOWMAN: Yes, because they are sort of regional aspects and examples.

MR. BILLY: It sounds like a good way to approach that. Comments? Okay.

And then finally, the ecosystems approach subcommittee. Beyond the, we
have struck out the NEPA, discovered previously. And we have got climate
change. This idea of acidification issue. Commercial-recreational
conflicts. At least that is what I wrote as I heard it. The
state-federal jurisdiction, although I think that is now covered under
Jim Gilmore.

MR. DiLERNIA: Yes, Jim.

MR. BILLY: That\'s good. No?

MR. GILMORE: I heard he was a crappy chair anyway.

MR. BILLY: And this idea of ocean zoning, which is a big idea. And
wasn\'t there a recent issue about the declaration of monuments?

MR. SIMPSON: Yes.

MR. BILLY: Is that ocean zoning? Anyway, that broad issue, however,
ought to be kept on the list, I think, at least. Yes, Tom?

MR. WALLACE: Well, I think if you do that, you have to look at number
one, number two, number three and number four there, are really
basically subtopics of that. So, you could actually cut the list down.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Okay, yes, Vince? Oh, sorry.

MR. O\'SHEA: Thanks. On the commercial-recreational, it is not clear to
me why that ends up in the ecosystem thing. It seems to me that it is
either going to be whose dollars are bigger than the other dollars or it
is going to be part of a broader strategic policy issue for the Agency.

So, I think that might be one to move, Mr. Chairman. I think it would
fit either under Commerce or the Strategic Policy.

MR. BILLY: I feel obligated.

All right. And then, \-- oh, Patty. Sorry.

MS. DOERR: Since Steven and I\-- we operate reauthorization down there,
how about a discussion about authorization of the Sanctuaries Act? There
is potential that they might tinker with how they manage fisheries
within the sanctuaries.

MR. BILLY: Okay. Yes?

MS. FOY: Tom, I don\'t know if I am speaking out of context here, but I
really think we ought to [move the ocean acidification into a full
discussion, briefing and discussion. I think that is going to be a
monster issue.]{.mark}

[MR. BILLY: Maybe start out with a full briefing by appropriate people
at our next meeting.]{.mark}

MS. FOY: Dr. Feeley, yes.

MR. BILLY: Okay.

MS. FOY: And then move to a subcommittee, if it is necessary.

MR. BILLY: Sounds all right to me. Okay. All right, good.

Okay, any other thoughts on this? I think we have got a good working
list. I appreciate all of your input. Thank you.

I think we have pretty well covered the agenda for today.

MR. DiLERNIA: Are we on time?

MR. BILLY: We\'re early.

MR. DiLERNIA: Ahead of time.

MR. BILLY: As I promised.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: Well let\'s see, we were going to get more explicit
or repeat the directions to the event. So maybe we can do that.

MR. SIMPSON: Out the front door. Turn right. Iberville all the way, five
blocks.

MR. BILLY: Which way do you turn on Iberville?

MR. SIMPSON: You turn left.

MR. BILLY: Left on Iberville.

MR. SIMPSON: Right on the river. Aquarium of Americas 6:00. Bring your
name tag. Something happened to the first page, Jim, and yours didn\'t
get, Ginny didn\'t bring yours. So somebody needs to know who you are.

MR. BILLY: We\'ll get you in.

MR. SIMPSON: I\'m just repeating what she said.

VICE CHAIR BALSIGER: If I can\'t get in, I\'m going to go to a blues
band someplace.

MR. BILLY: Just see Mark. Tell Mark what you would like to do.

So they are going to come to you if they want to be on one or more of
the subcommittees.

MR. SIMPSON: If anybody wants extra of these things, come get them.

MR. DiLERNIA: Are those the directions to the aquarium?

MR. BILLY: Turn the machine off.

(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record at 4:36 p.m.,
to reconvene Thursday, November 13, 2008 at 8:30 a.m.)