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Senator Lott. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 



I have run out of time, so I am just going to have to ask three 

 questions very quickly. 



First, Dr. Baker, thank you for being here. We appreciate your 

 testimony and we look forward to working with you. 



I do want to point out, as you know, these fisneries management 

 councils have a very important role and, in many instances, do 



food work. We have vacancies, however, on the Gulf of Mexico 

 isheries Management Council that have been there for quite some 

 time. I wrote a Tetter on February 25 to Secretary Brown, again on 

 May 6 to Secretary Brown, and again on June 1 about these vacan- 

 cies. I have not had an acknowledgement to any of them, and the 

 vacancies continue to be there. 



If you would, I would like you to check into this matter, and I 

 would appreciate the courtesy of a response. More importantly, we 

 would like for those vacancies to be filled. 



Dr. Baker. We will do that, Senator. 



[The information referred to follows:] 



The appointments to the Management Councils for 1994-95 were announced July 

 1, 1994. 



Senator LoTT. I do not want to beat a dead horse even more, but 

 the fees you are talking about obviously cause major problems. In 

 the Gulf of Mexico, our commercial fishermen are quite often very 

 small operators — a husband and wife on a shrimp boat. They have 

 already had to deal with the turtle-excluder device and invasion of 

 imports and all kinds of problems. If you are talking about an addi- 

 tional fee, I think that they would be very, very unhappy with that 

 prospect, as well as other commercial fisheries — not just shrimp, 

 but commercial fishers in the gulf. 



My question to you, though, is: Approximately how much would 

 you anticipate getting from this fee? Do you have an amount in 

 mind? Maybe you have already answered that question. 



Dr. Baker. Well, we are hoping to get as close to $82 million as 

 we can get. 



Senator LoTT. And if you do not get that, of course, then you 

 have got an additional snortfall on top of what is already antici- 

 pated. 



Dr. Baker. That is correct. 



Senator Lott. What would that $82 million go far? 



Dr. Baker. That would go for directly paying for NMFS pro- 

 grams related to conservation and management of fisheries — a one- 

 to-one correspondence there. 



Senator LoTT. Just so the record will be clear, give me a couple 

 of examples. Are you talking about the observer program? Are you 

 talking about the charting of species where they are or what? 



Dr. Baker. An example would be enforcement of ITQ's. As we es- 

 tablish an ITQ fee, we have to know exactly how much is landed 

 and how that is di'/ided up. It has to be followed exactly. The fees 

 would be used for that, for example. 



Senator Lott. The reason I ask this question is I need to be able 

 to tell a fisherman in the Gulf of Mexico what he or she is getting 

 out of it. And they do not think they get a whole lot of NMFS for 

 the most part now. They may get more than they anticipate, but 

 you are talking about very small operators or even medium-sized 



