By Walter Ulloa
For Variety
HAGÅTÑA (The Guam Daily Post) — With fishing communities on Guam already watching federal officials eye their waters for potential deep-sea mineral extraction, a regional fishery council is heading to three villages to ask a different but connected question: are the federal rules that govern where and how island fishers work even making sense?
The Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council, partnering with consulting firms Lynker and The Parnin Group, will hold three public meetings on Guam in mid-March to hear directly from fishers and residents about which federal fishery regulations they find confusing, burdensome or simply unnecessary.
Sessions were set for Monday, March 16 at the Dededo Village Community Center, 319 Iglesia Circle; Tuesday, March 17 at the Sinajaña Village Community Center, 117A Chalan Guma Yu’os; and Wednesday, March 18 at the Malesso Village Senior Center, 440 Chalan Joseph A Cruz Ave. Each runs from 6 to 8 p.m., and refreshments will be provided. A fourth session was scheduled for Friday evening in Saipan.
Amy Vandehey, the council’s education and outreach coordinator, said the review targets specific federal regulations that have long drawn scrutiny, among them the Guam Large Vessel Bottomfish Prohibited Area, the structure of bottomfish annual catch limits, and the friction between federal and territorial management systems that fishers who work both inshore and offshore waters have to navigate.
That friction has a jurisdictional root. Territorial laws cover waters from shore to three miles out, while federal regulations take over from three miles to 200 miles. For fishers who operate across both zones, that line in the water means two separate permit systems, two sets of reporting requirements and rules that do not always line up. Bottomfish is one of the clearest cases: the CNMI requires its own license and reporting for bottomfish fishing in territorial waters, while federal rules demand a separate permit and reporting for the same species beyond three miles.
“These community consultation meetings are essential because they give fishermen and local communities the opportunity to tell us which regulations most affect them and how federal and local rules interact in practice,” Vandehey told The Guam Daily Post. “That feedback will help guide a more detailed review aimed at reducing unnecessary burdens and improving coordination in ways that will be responsive to future changes and better serve Mariana Islands fishing communities.”
The meetings come as island fishing communities contend with pressures beyond federal rule books. Vandehey acknowledged the council is equally interested in how fishers are affected by what she called competing ocean uses.
“The Council also recognizes that fishing communities are affected not only by fishery regulations but also by other pressures and competing ocean uses, including military-related closures, offshore energy development, seabed mining, and other activities that may affect access, fishing operations, or the long-term health of fishery resources,” she said.
That last item carries particular weight right now. The Trump administration has been pushing to open roughly 35.5 million acres of seafloor east of the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument to commercial hard mineral extraction. Federal officials visited both Guam and the CNMI in late February to brief island leaders on the process, leaving acting Gov. Josh Tenorio openly dissatisfied and declaring that Guam “will not be anyone’s experiment.”
Feedback from all four Mariana Islands meetings will be compiled alongside Lynker’s analysis of territorial and federal fishing laws and submitted as a formal report to the council. From there, the report will inform recommendations on potential regulatory and fishery ecosystem plan amendments. Vandehey said that process typically takes at least nine to 12 months, with further public comment opportunities built in along the way.
The Mariana Islands sessions are the first the council is conducting in this review. Similar meetings in American Samoa and Hawaii are set for April and May.
“We want the community involved in this conversation from the outset so that on-the-water perspectives help shape the discussion, rather than this being solely a desk-based exercise,” Vandehey said.
For information on the Guam meetings, contact Felix Reyes at [email protected]/. For Saipan, contact Angela Dela Cruz at [email protected]/.
