State deals setback to opponents of aquaculture lease on Maquoit Bay
COURTESY / MERE POINT OYSTER CO.
Mere Point Oyster Co.'s Dan Devereaux and Doug Niven plan a 40-acre lease in Maquoit Bay. The state Department of Marine Resources rejected a citizens petition that requested a moratorium on aquaculture leases of over 10 acres.
The Maine Department of Marine Resources has rejected a citizens petition that requested a moratorium on aquaculture leases of over 10 acres.
The petition was submitted March 20, with 189 signatures, by a group called Save Maquoit Bay. The petition was drawn up in response to an application by Mere Point Oyster Co. for a 40-acre lease in the bay, off Brunswick, in order to cultivate Eastern oysters, bay scallops and sea scallops.
Although the proposed moratorium targeted one project, it would have applied statewide.
In its decision, the department wrote that it doesn’t see a basis for a moratorium.
“The Legislature has limited the size of any single lease to no more than 100 acres,” the decision reads. “Leases of greater than 10 acres may be appropriate and suitable in some areas and for certain aquaculture activities, just as leases of less than 10 acres would be required in others. The department can adequately deal with the size of a lease requested under the current lease decision criteria.
"Lease applications greater than 10 acres have been found to meet the decision criteria and have been granted, and other lease sites have been reduced in size by the department’s lease decision where the proposed sites were found to be unreasonable. Further, a 10-acre limitation on lease size may have the unintended effect of causing applicants to apply for multiple leases, as opposed to one single lease of a size that is suitable to meet their needs.
"Without further justification, a moratorium on leases of greater than 10 acres is arbitrary, and the department will not implement such a moratorium.”
In addition to the moratorium, the citizens petition called for an overhauled review process for where aquaculture leases are granted, particularly with regard to the potential for competition with lobstering and fishing; and a retroactive review of current pending leases, according to a Save Maquoit Bay news release.
“The in-water aquaculture leases are huge in Maine,” lobsterman Tom Santaguida said in the release. “One person can have ten 100-acre leases or, in other words, own 1,000 acres of the bottom. That is going to impact all of us who are trying to make a living.”
“The concerned citizens group has grown substantially in the last eight months,” The group’s spokesperson, Crystal Canney, said in the release. “One of the issues we will bring forward in January is the transferability of these leases.”
Mere Point Oyster Co. is owned by Dan Devereaux and Doug Niven. In March, Devereaux told Mainebiz the original plan was to get approval by summer, when the oyster cultivation season gears up.
“We believe that every rule we could possibly follow has been followed, plus some,” Devereaux said. “We think, unfortunately, that this group is pitting lobstermen against aquaculturalists. That’s unfortunate because we’re all out on the water trying to make things better for our communities and our seafood industry.”
He added, “When we started talking about this a few years ago, we paid particularly close attention to where the lobster fishery was fishing.”
Hearings on the application closed Feb. 1 but the Department of Marine Resources hasn’t yet issued its decision.
A public hearing on the application was held May 22. Commenters opposed to the 40-acre lease said they were not opposed to aquaculture per se, according to the transcript.
“We are not against aquaculture, but against the ways they go about getting applications verified and approved,” said Rocky Alley, head of the Maine Lobstering Union.
Concerns included the potential reduction of fishing grounds, impacts on habitat and wildlife, and navigational conflicts.
Those who opposed the petition agreed that aquaculture should not conflict with traditional fishing territory, but cited aquaculture as a burgeoning industry with positive economic impacts for the state.
Most Recent
Most Recent
1 Comments