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Mr. Benton. I can imagine — I would have to go back through the 

 record, Mr. Chairman, but I can certainly imagine where that is 

 true for virtually all, or at least a large number, of council mem- 

 bers. Most would have some kind of a financial interest in a deci- 

 sion at some time or another. I can point to a number of incidents 

 where council members have voted against themselves as well. 



The point I was trying to make was that overwhelmingly in Alas- 

 ka with regard to the North Pacific council, the makeup of the 

 council has not led to any decisions, or any trends, in voting that 

 would indicate that the Alaska majority has abused itself of the 

 power of sitting on that council. For individual council members, on 

 the other hand, there definitely have been conflicts. And, frankly, 

 I feel that the Secretary already has the authority to deal with this 

 through regulations, and that there could be a tightening up of the 

 procedures that the councils operate under through regulatory au- 

 thority. There is nothing to prevent that presently. The other thing 

 that I would point out is that the Secretary has a fairly extensive 

 review process in choosing council members. I know that there is 

 a lot of consternation of the makeup of some councils and what 

 kind of people they are getting as candidates, and whether or not 

 they have a conflict of interest, and similar issues. I feel strongly 

 that this is a failure of the Secretary, and the secretarial review 

 process. 



The Governor recommends a list of names. The Secretary is sup- 

 posed to do a background check on those people and can either ap- 

 prove them or send the whole darn list back to the Governor and 

 say "these people are not acceptable," or "the makeup of this list 

 is not acceptable, and I want to have broader representation on 

 this council." 



And, frankly, I think that if the Secretary's office took a more 

 diligent approach to dealing with council appointments that would 

 go a long way in answering some of these criticisms of the councils. 



The Chairman. Well, you have given us a good statement on the 

 bycatch problem, particularly with respect to letting them phase in 

 gear and in using an affirmative action approach in developing 

 plans to award those who use the proper gear to eliminate the 

 bycatch problem. But, with respect to the weight of the catch by 

 the factory trawlers — I have heard about that in these previous 

 hearings. You have not said anything about it. 



If I'm fishing here in a regular trawler and come into Ketchikan, 

 I weigh in. But if I have one of those factory trawlers, I do not 

 weigh my catch. Is that the case? 



Mr. Benton. Yes. 



The Chairman. Am I understanding that properly? 



Mr. Benton. You understand that properly, Mr. Chairman. And 

 it is a very large problem. 



The Chairman. How do the big boys get away with it? 



Mr. Benton. Well 



The Chairman. Because they are big boys, huh? 



Mr. Benton. Yes. They are big boys. 



The Chairman. Yes. We can catch them. 



Mr. Benton. I would point out that the — well, there are a num- 

 ber of problems. One is that up until recently the ability to require 

 additional observer coverage on vessels has been restricted. In 



