In federal waters, lobster fishing is managed by NOAA Fisheries. The full text is available at the NOAA Fisheries Northeast Region website. NOAA Fisheries will accept written comments until October 1, 1999. The ANPR published September 1 is also intended to encourage interested parties to locate and preserve any records that would verify their typical lobster fishing operations up to that date, and to discourage changes in current operations owing to speculation about how effort may be limited in the future. This includes not only changes in area typically fished, but also shifts in the type of gear used.
States have various qualification criteria for entering the fishery.
There is a moratorium on new entry into the fishery in federal waters, and lobster operations must have a permit to fish in these waters.