when it does nothing of the sort.
Instead of dealing with the problem of over-fishing and trawl fishing, it
simply closed off areas to people who had already figured out how to live
in balance with their local resources, in areas where these problems don’t
even exist. Trawl drag-boats operate beyond the three-mile limit of state
waters and the MLPA.
So, sea-weed gatherers at Point Arena and the mosquito-fleet hook-and-line
fishermen out of Shelter Cove took it in the rear while, while the huge
trawlers and factory ships continue to rape Nor Cal fisheries.
Not to mention the fact that our friends, the insanely rich, wonderfully
polite, (until you cross them) corporately endowed sponsors of the
RLFF/MLPAI – deliberately kept all other threats to our marine environment,
beside sustainable local fisheries – off the table.
Not to mention: the increased interest by 17? or so North Coast tribes who
have now, since the MLPA boondoggle came to town, re-asserted their rights
to harvest in the new MPA’s. So, essentially whole idea of these MPA’s is
now a moot point, to say the least. All caused by the total stupidity and
ignorance of the college educated fools with Eco-Trust and the MLPAI – who
were warned at the outset that the Tribes were not being considered.
Meanwhile, the deluded environmentalists, who spent too many years of their
lives in florescent lit classrooms, are patting themselves on the back as
the new Teddy Roosevelts and John Muirs, who have given us “Yosemites of
the Sea!” (I’m getting sea-sick)