69 



and monitoring of interactions would be difficult if not impossible 

 in many cases. 



Monitoring — the monitoring of interactions is deficient in both 

 proposals. The NMFS proposal would apparently continue to rely 

 on annual self-reporting by vessel owners which has been disturb- 

 ingly inaccurate. NMFS statistics show that on average vessel own- 

 ers report killing only one marine mammal for every six calculated 

 by the onboard observer program. The discrepancy is as high as 

 2,100 percent. 



NMFS prioritized observer coverage to fisheries with the highest 

 level of marine mammal mortality. However, the working group 

 document does not. It focuses instead on monitoring fisheries which 

 interact with a short list of critical stocks and virtually ignores 

 mortality in more than 40 of the 64 stocks in which interactions 

 take place. The negotiated document also relies heavily on self-re- 

 porting. 



The deficiencies in this monitoring program we believe are so se- 

 rious that it is doubtful that anyone would be able to reliably deter- 

 mine whether overall levels of mortality in marine mammals are 

 rising, falling, or remaining the same. 



Reducing mortality — neither the NMFS proposal nor the nego- 

 tiated document adequately deals with providing a means to reduce 

 mortality in marine mammals. Although the negotiated document 

 would use conservation teams to focus on reducing mortality in so- 

 called critical stocks, it once again ignores the vast majority of 

 stocks and relies on voluntary reductions. 



Voluntary measures to reduce take have not occurred during the 

 past 5 years of the exemption program, despite Congressional man- 

 date to do so. 



Endangered species — both the NMFS proposal and the nego- 

 tiated document permit the killing of endangered and threatened 

 species of marine mammals. The negotiated document further 

 weakens protection of ESA listed stocks by turning management of 

 these species over to ESA recovery teams. The ESA and Marine 

 Mammal Protection Act both offer different types of legal protec- 

 tion, and we believe that removal of NMFS oversight is a costly 

 mistake for endangered species. 



Funding — the NMFS proposal for centralized registration would 

 generate registration fees to help pay for administration of the pro- 

 gram. The negotiated document lacks even this rudimentary com- 

 ponent. Instead, it relies on a patchwork of State, tribal, and Fed- 

 eral fishing permits, and presumes the NMFS can find the large 

 number of vessels not registered under these permits, and that it 

 can do so without registration fees to pay for the effort. 



Lack of a registration system also makes it impossible to impose 

 user or landing fees if it is necessary to provide additional funding 

 in the future. 



Because of the failings in one or both of these proposals, we rec- 

 ommend the following components to be included in any manage- 

 ment regime. One, centralized mandatory registration of all ves- 

 sels. Two, mandatory observer program, providing NMFS with the 

 authority to place observers on any vessel which can safely carry 

 them. 



