By Margaret Bauman
Alaska Journal of Commerce

A federal council edging toward a five-year review of the controversial plan that privatized the multi-million dollar crab fisheries gathered additional testimony June 6-7 in Anchorage in support of and opposition to the program.

All of the testimony, as well as detailed discussion papers, will be considered as the North Pacific Fishery Management Council moves toward completion of its five-year review, which could be in October 2010, said David Wetherell, deputy director of the council.

The plan, which went into effect in August 2005, allocated quota shares for harvesting and processing of the crab based on historic participation in the fishery, plus a portion of the allowable harvest to community development quota groups established in 1992 to enhance the economies of Western Alaska coastal communities.

Points of contention within the current crab plan range from processor quota shares, which dictate that 90 percent of the harvest must go to certain processors, to the lack of quota shares for crew, and the economic havoc the plan has leveled on communities.

King Cove Mayor Ernest Weiss said the city of King Cove and the Aleutian East Borough were opposed to processor quota shares, "but would like to work with the reality that is."

His concerns include a loan program that would allow for the purchase of community quota shares.

Dave Frasier, testifying on behalf of Adak Fisheries and the Adak Community Development Corp., asked for consideration of a processor quota share plan more equitable to that community.

"In the four years before the crab plan was implemented, $16 million worth of (western Bering Sea brown) crab crossed our docks in Adak," he said. "In the four years subsequent to the plan, $5 million worth of crab crossed our docks, including custom processed crab, and that was not because we did not want to buy the crab, but because we were legally prevented from buying that crab."

Among those testifying on behalf of the industry was Arni Thomson, executive director of the Alaska Crab Coalition, whose organization strongly supports the existing program.

Thomson testified that analyses by the council's own staff and his coalition show that despite the fact that crew pay has decreased as a percentage of vessel revenue, their total income has dramatically improved.

"Crew positions in the fisheries are more stable, the crew typically know the amount of quota that will be harvested and terms of payment prior to beginning fishing, allowing them to project income for a season," Thomson said in written testimony. "Prior to implementation of the rationalization program, compensation hinged entirely on success in the limited access derby fishery. The consolidation of catch under the rationalization program has reportedly allowed some crew to rely exclusively on crab fishing for their incomes."

Thomson said that industry participants maintain that many of the vessels that departed in the first year of the program would have retired from the fishery earlier, but for the prospect of the rationalization program.

While consolidation resulted in the loss of hundreds of crew jobs, the bulk of the vessels and crews were from the state of Washington, Thomson argued. Most of the vessels that left the crab fisheries are still operating in other fisheries in Alaska waters and providing employment for tendering and some are doing long term research related charters.

Thomson also said that the increase in revenues from consolidation of the fleet, which resulted in dramatic increases in vessel harvests, more than compensated for additional deductions and charges and decreased share percentages for crew.

Since rationalization, the average crew share for Bristol Bay king crab increased 166 percent, from $9,244 to $24,550, and for opilio crab, from $14,220 to $18,939, a 33 percent increase, he said.

The overall comparisons for the two fisheries combined is $25,474, pre-rationalization, to $43,489 for post rationalization years, he said.

Frank Kelty, a resource analyst for the city of Unalaska, and former politician considered highly influential in government and business circles in Unalaska/Dutch Harbor, also lent his full support to the plan. Unalaska is the largest crab processing community in Alaska and the crab plan has been a major boost to the island's economy.

"During the past four years, we have seen increased investments in the Bering Sea Aleutian Islands crab fisheries by Alaska communities and community development quota groups," he testified. "These investments in purchasing processor quota shares, individual fishing quotas and vessels are in the many million of dollars, and this investment and its impact should not be overlooked."

Kelty said harvesters are getting a fair price for their product and that safety in the crab fishery has been greatly improved. He also said that if the processor quota shares were to be taken away, there might be a good case to compensate processors for that.

Shawn Dochtermann, a Kodiak fisherman and 23-year veteran of the Bering Sea crab fisheries, addressed the council on behalf of the Crewmen's Association and the Bering Sea Crab Crewmen's Association.

Crewmen's compensation ratios were drastically reduced "due to exorbitant lease rates that are being charged as a result of excessive harvest quota shares that were initially allocated to limited license plan holders," he told the council. "Processor quota shares must be removed due to their clearcut restraint of trade."

Dochtermann supplemented his testimony with copies of settlement sheets for a crew member in the 2008 Bristol Bay red king crab fishery, which showed that the crew and the vessel received $1 a pound for the $5 a pound red king crab they delivered.

Copies of the settlement sheets for crewman Corey Eisenbarth showed his net compensation for 45 days of shipyard and gear work, plus 64 days at sea fishing came to $23,624, once food, fuel, bait and lease fees were deducted, he said.

Dochtermann said that the rationalization program has allowed holders of harvest quota shares to extract exorbitant lease fees, giving them inordinate control over crewmen and vessel owners.

"We've come forward and put on the record that coercion is occurring in the industry, as the processors and harvest quota share holders keep the vessel owners and crew captured in their low compensation ratios," he said. "Crew are scared of speaking at council meetings or putting their settlement sheets forward because of job loss and other forms of retaliation. Some vessel owners if they speak out take the risk of their leased quotas being removed by a co-op controller. We wonder when a council member will even ask us a question about it. Are any of you even interested in this issue?"

The council also heard a report on safety issues in the crab fishery from Jennifer M. Lincoln, an injury epidemiologist with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, within the Alaska region office of the U.S. Public Health Service.

Lincoln noted that from October 1990 through March 1999, some 73 people died in the Bering Sea/Aleutian Island crab fisheries as a result of capsizing, sinking, man overboard and industrial accidents, such as being struck or crushed by crab pots, which weigh several hundred pounds. A primary cause for many of these fatal capsizing/sinking events was vessel overloading or being fully loaded in icing conditions, she said.

Stakeholders saw the need to develop a tailored program to address specific hazards these vessels faced, she said. After a dock stability and safety compliance check program that was developed in October 1999, six years before the crab rationalization plan went into effect, the only fatalities associated with the fleet were three man overboard fatalities, she said.

The only exception was in January 2005, when the F/V Big Valley capsized, and five men died at sea. A subsequent investigation revealed that the vessel left Dutch Harbor grossly overloaded and had not been the subject of that safety compliance check, she said.

The safety program was a cooperative effort of the 13th and 17th Coast Guard districts and several other organizations.