ComFish debate an opportunity for doublespeak or plainspeak

By STEPHEN TAUFEN

Kodiak, Alaska - The annual ComFish trade show held here in Alaska's most diverse fisheries port offers an opportunity during election years for candidates to engage in the first major debate on the campaign trail. The famous Fish Debate, scheduled for Thursday evening (March 20, 2008) at the local high school auditorium is broadcast statewide. This year, absent a gubernatorial race, it will put the U.S. House candidates on the public firing line early, discussing one of the most contentious industries imaginable.

For the audience and candidates, knowing the doublespeak and navigating the euphemisms will be essential to understanding issues and solutions, and guiding and assessing each candidate's replies.

The typical grist of political candidates' word games, doublespeak's role is to disguise or distort the real meaning of things. And euphemism's role is to avoid detection, by substituting a more mild, indirect or vague expression for a harsh reality.

But Kodiak fishermen and community businesses have a heightened sensitivity after several rounds of federal fisheries "rationalization" management regimes have imposed severe harms on coastal Alaskans. And no greater word trickery exists than that of calling the privatization of once public resources a "rationalization program," when in truth it is corporate welfare, a gifting of public resources without compensation to the People, and a "rationing" that super-concentrates an industry so that a few could get rich quick.

The privatization of pollock, crab and rockfish - coupled with the recent allocation of previously non-allowed bycatch of valuable species such as black cod - has the community on edge about fisheries sustainability and fairness, as well as opportunities for new entrants. The town was built on fathers and sons, and daughters, who set out to harvest the sea and work their way up in an industry increasingly pushing out highly experienced working men and women by lowering their rights and incomes.

To us at Groundswell, the Kodiak event will not be a fisheries debate with two sides favoring or opposing some morally neutral policy. This is now a community argument: with one side immorally seeking private wealth through subversive rationalization and the other side democratically protecting public resources from privatization greed.

There is a split between the People and the way government-backed cronyism has been working everywhere, so why not in fisheries, where it is hyper concentrated? And this rift was recently reflected in the Alaska GOP statewide convention where a reformist majority wants the corrupt old-boys system dismantled and for suspect leaders to step aside for a better future for all.

In fisheries, it's a simple case of wrong or right. The rationalization proponents are resource wealth embezzlers, or just plain thieves. And the opponents are actually guardians of the Alaska Constitution, who care for their communities and want to protect the public commons, especially for future generations.

In other words, there is no debate. The candidates must publicly take a stand. And their elections may well be determined in large part by their answers and stances, especially because Alaska is increasingly looking toward its sustainable resources and other natural commonwealth in order to become more self-sufficient. The candidates take on fisheries will reflect to voters their mindsets on all resource development. That's what has traditionally made the Fish Debate so noteworthy on the early campaign trail.

Accountability and Transparency, or in the words of the new governor, Sarah Palin, 'transparency and trust' are increasingly becoming the guideline for administration and public efforts to responsibly develop the renewable resource commons and to sever exhaustible subsurface rights at a fair price to Alaskans. Given the FBI raids of 2006 and subsequent criminal convictions, it needs little comment to reaffirm that Alaskans are tired of corruption and having a Legislature that was held captive by a crony system. The corruption machine was geared to minimize Alaska's cut of its rightful share of public resources - oil and gas taking the major focus, because giant oil companies were robbing the Permanent Fund. But fisheries represent a SUSTAINABLE Permanent Fund.

On another note: Ray Metcalfe, candidate for the U.S. Senate seat held by Ted Stevens, will be in Kodiak during ComFish and hold a Muckraker's Madness night at the local hangout for fishermen, Tony's Bar, on Saturday night, March 22, at 7:00 pm. That same evening, Alan Austermann of Kodiak, candidate for state House (replacing Gabrielle LeDoux, who is now running for the U.S. House) will also host a meet-your-candidate event nearby at The Second Floor, starting at 6:00 pm.

Check out this website for ComFishAlaska.com that lists the official events and seminars.

The 'Resource Curse' & Spoilation:

Another honest term is "spoilation" - the sale or use of natural resources for the benefit of private actors (in the economy) rather than for the Public Good. Tellingly, spoilation consists of a movement of capital and ways to disguise it; social and economic devastation that follows; and the ultimate losers are ordinary citizens. That pretty well describes all of the subversive (not democratic) rationalization schemes that privatized public commons fisheries.

Likewise, when the phenomenon uses indigenous peoples through their often-corrupt leadership to capture the commonwealth but not share it with all, it is called Patrimonicide. That type of indigenous spoilation of natural resources in fisheries may be best seen in the example of the Western Alaska Community Development Quota (CDQ) system.

A mere 40% of Alaska's native entities not only take an off-the-top percentage of various fisheries programs for their CDQs - a discriminatory tax against the fishermen or harvesters of the species - but they discriminate against other native entities. It will be interesting to see if questions are asked to House candidates about the logic and fairness of such programs.

In the end, the Groundswell Fisheries Movement prefers to call the proponents and beneficiaries of the crony privatization schemes what they really are: Kleptocrats. They are thieves of public resources.

That Senator Ted Stevens was able to be connived, bribed or otherwise convinced to make these programs a statutory law does not remove the truth. And tweaking the programs to greater and greater levels of details, in order to serve the corporate welfare 'resource babies' who were gifted public wealth, does nothing to rid Alaska's coastline of the economic harms.

Rockfish Pilot Program - Unmitigated Failure in Year One:

The rockfish rationalization program's proponents recently placed "Get to know your local trawler" puff-ads in the Kodiak Daily Mirror to help gloss over a great spoilation of public resource wealth for their own private sake. But that Public Relations trickery is just more of the techniques that promote thinly veiled threats of job loss used to enforce submission among deckhands - who might otherwise reveal the greedy truth.

Similarly, the Alaska Groundfish Data Bank tried pushing its lies about year-one success of the rockfish pilot program at the recent Seattle session of the regional fish council (the NPFMC). That was easily contradicted by telling the truth about Global Seafood's local job, profit and related fleet losses. In a recent Mirror guest editorial, Global's management repeated that the RPP is an unmitigated failure - just as proponents and lobbyists designed it to be.

Here's a copy, courtesy of the company:

Hello. My name is Thomas Hennessey. I am the CFO of a Kodiak processor that has been harmed by the RPP. Below is a copy of a letter to the editor that I recently sent to the Kodiak Daily Mirror. Our story is one that should be heard because it illustrates what can happen when powerful business interests subvert the political process to the detriment of free markets. Sadly, this is all too common in America, especially in Alaska.

Rockfish Program an Unmitigated Failure

To eliminate competition and opposition to plans for broader Gulf rationalization, the architects and promoters of the Rockfish Pilot Program needed to inflict financial harm on a specific Kodiak processor. With the first season of rationalized rockfish under our belts, they (the closed-class processors, Julie Bonney and the Alaska Groundfish Data Bank, and their lobbyist Brad Gilman) clearly achieved their intended objective. Now we must listen to them brag.

Yet contrary to the program's stated goal of providing local economic relief, a constant innovator, Global Seafoods has been barred access to a public resource and suffered great financial losses. Our Kodiak employees and suppliers have also been inflicted with significant harms.

The plan's genesis is in the year 2000 when Global first opened the doors on what was a closed, derelict cannery. Investing over 8 million dollars, we created a modern and efficient facility, providing hundreds of jobs for seafood processors, metal fabricators, fuel suppliers, etc., and new markets for fishermen.

In preceding years, groundfish prices were flat and stable. To attract vessels to deliver Global paid the highest prices in town. After suspending operations during 2001 and 2002, rising groundfish prices again went flat and stable, until Global reopened in 2003 - once more raising prices. Cod and pollock prices have doubled, thanks in part to competition we provided.

While developing markets for underdeveloped species (arrowtooth flounder and skate) Global's rockfish production increased eightfold since 2003, until 2006 rockfish landings totaled 2.5 million pounds. Under the RPP it became illegal for us to process on the open market and consequently 2007 rockfish and incidental species (black cod and Pacific cod) landings dropped virtually to zero - resulting in $750,000 of lost contribution to operating profits. Before the expiration of the 5-year RPP, it will be millions more.

If you helped conceive the program and received harvesting or closed-class processing quota, now manage a vessel co-op (or five), or benefit in some other way from this resource grab, maybe your only concern is that the costly (and revealing) observer coverage requirement could be reduced. Otherwise, you've got a resounding success.

On the other hand, if you made new investments in Kodiak, raised prices to fleets, valued all local workers, competition, free-markets and due process, then the RPP - conceived in the backrooms of industry powerbrokers and nurtured by legislative sleight of hand - is an unmitigated failure. Just as designed.

We trust the candidates are paying attention. And we hope to see some of you at the Kodiak fisheries 'debate' exposing more of the pro-ratz euphemisms and doublespeak like "secondary species," formerly known as prohibited species catch. Or what about something proponents call "market-based solutions" and opponents know to be designing Soviet style coercive agricultural cooperatives to fix prices and control markets.

Because only the truth can protect the fish and set our communities free. Let's hope some candidates can stand for it.

By Stephen Taufen - Groundswell Fisheries Movement

© AlaskaReport.com All Rights Reserved.

BERING SEA & ALEUTIAN ISLAND CRAB CREWMEN & SKIPPERS - Past & Present

The Crewman's Association is requesting that all past and present Bering Sea/Aleutian crab crewmen contact us AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.

Just when you thought it would never happen! After thorough research, we've found that the North Pacific Fishery Management Council and NOAA General Counsel skirted US laws to give 97% of crab quota shares to boat owners/investors in Crab Rationalization. The Commerce Department knows it must cure its legal blunder. Just as basic justice and humaneness oblige the Council to restore our historical economic participation rights.

Now is the time for the onboard fishermen - the true harvesters of the crab, past and present - to step up together. You play a vital role in providing information we need to make crew proposal(s) to the Council to overturn high quota rents, to restore incomes to all crewmen and to fishing communities.

We need your name, contact information (full mailing address, email address, and phone numbers), vessel names, and seasons (by year and species), and total years fished. We'd also appreciate names, phone numbers and email addresses of your past crewmates, too, so we can contact them if they don't see this ad.

In addition, copies of your old contracts or settlement sheets, from pre- and post-rationalization, will help in proving crewmen's legal rights. You can request your old contracts from vessels you previously fished for. By law, all vessels over 20 tons were required to have contracts; and we also need to know which vessels were in violation.

Please help protect the future for crab fishermen, and future new entrants into all fisheries, by contacting us soon by email, phone, or by mail. If you'd like to join our organization please note that when you contact us.

Contact us as bscrabcrew@gmail.com
By phone: 253-905-8777
Mail to: Crewman's Association
PO Box 451
Kodiak, AK 99615
Good Fishing & Be Safe,

Steve Branson
Terry Haines
Shawn Dochtermann