23 



Well, of course, they do not know, but by all the indications — and 

 now your chum salmon is on the downgrade and they are getting 

 sickly. We could not do it because the year-to-year budget and 

 stuff, and I think — like when you knock off the pollock, or what- 

 ever, the herring getting increased because the pollock feed on the 

 herring, and then your next — whatever the herring feed on, they 

 run out of food and pretty soon they start getting sickly, but you 

 just have a chain reaction. One species depends on the other. 



The Chairman. We get the impression down in Washington that 

 these councils are outstanding entities; they work well. But if there 

 is something slower than the Congress, it is the council. They seem 

 to be hard put to get a decision. For example, would you rec- 

 ommend a fee system? 



Mr. McGiLL. Yes, definitely. 



The Chairman. And what about other fishermen, would they ob- 

 ject to that or would they support it, or has this been discussed in 

 the North Pacific Council? 



Mr. McGill. I do not think they would — would support it. They 

 finally, reluctantly, supported the system to have observers aboard, 

 you know, when there was actually force to it, but they are not 

 going to pay out anything they do not have to. 



The Chairman. I learned long ago as a young legislator, not to 

 charge fishermen a fee if you want to ever get back to public office. 

 But you are saying, let us assess these companies that are really 

 destroying the resource with their bycatch and hand them a fee so 

 that we can get a greater amount of enforcement and observer cov- 

 erage. And there is a big, big area up here to cover. 



Mr. McGiLL. And research, long-term research is what I think is 

 important, instead of just taking a few samples and then say, well, 

 they are catching just as much fish as they did 5 years ago, so 

 there must be just as much fish, but you do not say they have 10 

 times as much gear out there. 



The Chairman. From your good experience, where is the best re- 

 search being engaged in — at the University of Alaska, or down in 

 Washington with the National Marines Fisheries Service? 



Mr. McGill. I would say 



The Chairman. For Alaskan fisheries now. 



Mr. McGiLL. Work through the National Marine Fishery. The 

 university up here, we are not really big enough for it, and I do 

 not — and you take the University of Washington there in Seattle, 

 they do a lot of good work and stuff, but I would write down to the 

 National Marine Fisheries. They have got a lot of good people and 

 stuff that is sitting not doing a heck of a lot since they lost a lot 

 of their fisheries, a lot of offices. 



But there should be long-term research someplace along the line. 



The Chairman. Very, very good. That is what we wanted to hear. 

 Let us see if we cannot follow up on that, because in addition to 

 trying to legislate the CDQ's, we ought to be looking at more exten- 

 sive research and reinvigorating the National Marine Fisheries 

 Service. 



Mr. McGiLL. You know, like I started saying an example, I hope 

 I am not taking too much time, as much fish as you had before, 

 it is just like if I put, say, a 100-fathom net out there and get 1,000 

 fish, and pretty soon the fish go down, I have to put 1,000 fathoms 



