A federal district court judge in New Hampshire has ruled against a group of fishermen in the region who had sued the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for allegedly violating their rights by forcing them to pay for government-trained monitors to observe their catch.
The fishermen, who this year began paying hundreds of dollars every time a monitor accompanied them to sea, argued that the costs were excessive and would put many of them out of business.
But Judge Joseph N. Laplante ruled last week that it was legal to require fishermen to pay for monitors.
"I am very disappointed by this decision," said David Goethel, a plaintiff and longtime fisherman from Hampton, N.H. "I've made a living fishing in New England for more than 30 years, but I can't afford to fish if I have to pay for at-sea monitors."
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Officials from NOAA did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
In June, after months of heated debates with fishermen, NOAA officials announced that they had found the money to cover most of the costs of the observer program for the rest of the fishing year.
NOAA officials said that a contractor hired to place monitors on vessels failed to do so on about one-third of the days they were expected to. As a result, NOAA has enough money to cover an estimated 85 percent of the monitoring program for the rest of the year.
In April, NOAA also eased the cost to fishermen by reducing the number of days observers must accompany them to sea. They now have to take monitors on only 14 percent of their fishing trips, down from nearly a quarter of all trips.
Environmental advocates have argued for greater coverage, saying observers help curb overfishing, assess the abundance of certain species, and prevent fishermen from discarding fish they catch that exceed their quotas.
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Fishermen must bring in everything they catch, even if that exposes them to costs for overfishing that could negate their profits.
David Abel can be reached at dabel@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @davabel.