them in the first place, continue to be told through Washington 

 that this will never pass. 



For the fishermen will health benefits, they are finding it harder 

 to keep up with their contributions to their health plans, making 

 a contributions amount higher and harder for others to maintain. 



I would encourage you, Senator Kerry, to develop fiinding sources 

 or fiinding programs to extend unemployment benefits to those in 

 need and to offset the rising cost of health programs. They just 

 simply need to get by this transition in life. 



No. 2, the grant programs are well intentioned. I'm speaking 

 about the Northwest Atlantic Reinvestment Program that is cur- 

 rently administered by Wildlife Federation, something I know you 

 put together, and worked very hard to put together, the other two 

 programs, the newly developed Industry Grants Program and the 

 Kennedy/Saltonstall Grant Program by NMFS. As much it is bene- 

 ficial to get everyone to think about fishing for other species, think 

 about new products, new machines, think about farming or ranch- 

 ing your own fish. 



Most of this waterfront at this present time is looking to simply 

 survive and get out of the financial hole that they're in. And for 

 the small percentage that are looking at these grants seriously, the 

 research and documenting requirements are forcing them to con- 

 sider to go back to school for their doctorate degrees or even hire 

 academic assistants. 



It is the policy that is discouraging many from applying. And I 

 would encourage you to develop real and meaningful grant pro- 

 grams without requirements for extensive documentation. 



No. 3, the well intentioned FOG program, and for those of you 

 who don't know what the FOG program is, that's the Fishing Ves- 

 sel Obligation Guarantee Program run by the National New Eng- 

 land Fisheries Service, this program appears to not be helping 

 those in need. In fact, it's having an opposite effect of what is it's 

 intended to do. 



People dealing with FOG here in New Bedford, the accountants, 

 the bookkeepers, are saying that FOG is attracting and approving 

 loans for the few vessel owners who you could say are the cream 

 of the crop and probably would survive this crisis no matter what; 

 they have the good credit required on the FOG program, and like 

 anyone else wouldn't hesitate to get a much better financial deal. 



Unfortunately, this is leaving the local bank portfolios empty 

 with many better industry loans going to FOG. Those involved in 

 applying these loans say FOG is simply mindboggling with exten- 

 sive paperwork and credit requirements, and that the paperwork is 

 very much overkill. 



I would encourage you to take some action to lessen the require- 

 ments of FOG and convince the Fishery Service to take much more 

 risk and chances with FOG. 



Last, probably the one and only economic package that I'm hold- 

 ing some hope for to aid the short-term needs of the industry is the 

 EDA Revolving Loan Program which is being administered by the 

 New Bedford Corp. Applications have recently been sent out to help 

 those with working capital needs as well as the purchase of equip- 

 ment. I do believe, however, that the $2.6 million available here in 



