[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 220 (Tuesday, November 15, 2016)]
[Notices]
[Pages 80038-80041]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2016-27410]


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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

[Docket No. 161017970-6970-01]
RIN 0648-XE976


Fisheries of the Northeastern United States; Summer Flounder 
Fishery; 2017 and 2018 Summer Flounder Specifications

AGENCY: National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and 
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Commerce.

ACTION: Proposed specifications; request for comments.

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SUMMARY: NMFS proposes revised summer flounder specifications for the 
2017 and 2018 fishing years. Updated scientific information regarding 
the status of the summer flounder stock indicates that these proposed 
catch limits are necessary to constrain summer flounder harvest within 
scientifically sound recommendations to prevent overfishing. This 
action is intended to inform the public of proposed reductions for the 
2017 and 2018 summer flounder fishing years.

DATES: Comments must be received on or before November 30, 2016.

ADDRESSES: A supplemental environmental assessment (SEA) was prepared 
for the specifications and describes the proposed action and other 
considered alternatives, and provides an analysis of the impacts of the 
proposed measures and alternatives. Copies of the Specifications 
Document, including the SEA, the Initial Regulatory Flexibility 
Analysis (IRFA), and the original environmental assessment for the 
2016-2018 summer flounder, scup, and black sea bass specifications are 
available on request from Dr. Christopher M. Moore, Executive Director, 
Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council, Suite 201, 800 North State 
Street, Dover, DE 19901. These documents are also accessible via the 
Internet at http://www.mafmc.org.
    You may submit comments on this document, identified by NOAA-NMFS-
2016-0138, by either of the following methods:
    Electronic Submission: Submit all electronic public comments via 
the Federal e-Rulemaking Portal.
    1. Go to www.regulations.gov/#!docketDetail;D=NOAA-NMFS-2016-0138,
    2. Click the ``Comment Now!'' icon, complete the required fields
    3. Enter or attach your comments.

--or--

    Mail: Submit written comments to John Bullard, Regional 
Administrator, National Marine Fisheries Service, 55 Great Republic 
Drive, Gloucester, MA, 01950. Mark the outside of the envelope, 
``Comments on the Proposed Rule for Summer Flounder Specifications.''
    Instructions: Comments sent by any other method, to any other 
address or individual, or received after the end of the comment period, 
may not be considered by NMFS. All comments received are part of the 
public record and will generally be posted for public viewing on 
www.regulations.gov without change. All personal identifying 
information (e.g., name, address, etc.), confidential business 
information, or otherwise sensitive information submitted voluntarily 
by the sender will be publicly accessible. NMFS will accept anonymous 
comments (enter ``N/A'' in the required fields if you wish to remain 
anonymous).

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Emily Gilbert, Fishery Policy Analyst, 
(978) 281-9244.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Background and Proposed Specifications

    The Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council and the Atlantic States 
Marine Fisheries Commission cooperatively manage the summer flounder, 
scup, and black sea bass fisheries. The Summer Flounder, Scup, and 
Black Sea Bass Fishery Management Plan (FMP) and its implementing 
regulations outline the Council's process for establishing 
specifications. Specifications in these fisheries include various catch 
and landing subdivisions, such as the commercial and recreational 
sector annual catch limits (ACLs), annual catch targets (ACTs), and 
sector-specific landing limits (i.e., the commercial fishery quota and 
recreational harvest limit). Annual specifications may be established 
for three year periods, and, in interim years, specifications are 
reviewed by the Council to ensure previously established multi-year 
specifications remain appropriate. The FMP also contains formulas to 
divide the specification catch limits into commercial and recreational 
fishery allocations, state-by-state quotas, and quota periods, 
depending on the species in question. Rulemaking for measures used to 
manage the recreational fisheries (minimum fish sizes, open seasons, 
and bag limits) for these three species occurs separately, and 
typically takes place in the spring of each year.
    On December 28, 2015, NMFS published a final rule implementing the 
Council's recommended specifications for the summer flounder, scup, and 
black sea bass fisheries (80 FR 80689) for fishing years 2016 through 
2018. The Council intended to reconsider the specifications set for 
fishing years 2017 and 2018 after reviewing any updated information. 
Based on updated information on the status of the summer flounder 
stock, the Council is now recommending adjustments to the previously 
established summer flounder specifications for the 2017 and 2018 
fishing years. An assessment update will be available next summer and 
notice will be provided in the Federal Register on whether the revised 
2018 specifications will remain in place or be updated further based on 
any new information. The scup and black sea bass specifications 
implemented through previous rulemaking remain unchanged by this 
action.
    When the Council previously recommended summer flounder 
specifications in 2015, available scientific information indicated that 
the summer flounder stock size was declining and that overfishing 
occurred in 2014. In order to minimize disruption to the industry as 
much as possible, given the necessary reduction in available catch to 
prevent further overfishing and to increase the stock size, the Council 
requested its Scientific and Statistical Committee (SSC) to deviate 
from the standard risk policy and to phase-in the summer flounder catch 
reductions over the 3-year specifications cycle. The SSC complied with 
this request, but requested a stock assessment update in July 2016 to 
determine if its recommended acceptable biological catches (ABCs) 
remain appropriate for 2017 and 2018.
    The SSC met on July 21-22, 2016, to review the stock assessment 
update for summer flounder compiled by the Northeast Fisheries Science 
Center. This 2016 update was based on the peer-review approved model 
from the 2013 benchmark assessment, updated to include data through 
2015. More specific information about the

[[Page 80039]]

assessment information (e.g., biomass level, fishing mortality, etc.) 
can be found in section 6.0 of the SEA for this action. The assessment 
update noted that the consistent pattern in both underestimation of 
fishing mortality and overestimation of spawning stock biomass is 
continuing, even though catches have not substantially exceeded ABC 
levels. This downward trend in biomass is mainly due to below average 
recruitment in the last five years. As a result of this information, 
the assessment update recalculated the 2017 and 2018 overfishing limits 
(OFLs) for the stock. For 2017, the recalculated OFL is 16.76 million 
lb (7,600 mt) and for 2018, the recalculated OFL is 18.69 million lb 
(8,476 mt), representing approximately a 16-percent reduction from the 
previously established OFLs. To keep catch below these updated OFL 
estimates, the SSC recommended revisions to the previously adopted 2017 
and 2018 ABCs. The SSC recommended revising the ABCs by abandoning the 
phased-in approach and instead following the Council's standard risk 
policy. The SSC cited among its reasons for departing from the 
previously approved phased-in approach the continual overestimation of 
biomass and recruitment and underestimation of fishing mortality, 
emphasizing that continuing to overfish in a period of consistently 
poor recruitment represents a substantial risk to the stock. The SSC 
recommended a revised 2017 ABC that is approximately 30 percent lower 
than both the previously established 2017 ABC and the current 2016 ABC. 
The SSC recommended a 2018 ABC that is 16 percent lower than the 
previously established 2018 ABC (Table 1).
    The Council's Summer Flounder Monitoring Committee met July 25, 
2016, to discuss specification-related recommendations for the summer 
flounder fishery, to recommend offsets from the ACL to account for 
management uncertainty, and to discuss commercial management measure 
recommendations, as appropriate. The Monitoring Committee determined 
that no additional reductions were necessary to account for management 
uncertainty because the recreational fishery has had only minor 
overages of the recreational harvest limit in recent years, and the 
commercial landings monitoring and fishery closure system is timely 
enough to prevent commercial overages. As a result, the Monitoring 
Committee recommended that ACTs for the commercial and recreational 
sectors should equal their respective ACLs and made no recommended 
changes to any other summer flounder management measures.
    Following the SSC and Monitoring Committee meetings, the Council 
and the Commission's Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass 
Management Board met jointly on August 9, 2016, to consider the 
recommendations of the SSC, the Monitoring Committee, and public 
comments, and to make their specification recommendations. More 
complete details on the SSC, Monitoring Committee, and Council meeting 
deliberations can be found on the Council's Web site (www.mafmc.org). 
Ultimately, the Council recommended the summer flounder commercial 
quotas and recreational harvest limits shown in Table 1. The 
recommended catch limits for 2017 are nearly 30 percent lower than 
those previously established.

                    Table 1--Comparison of Recommended Measures to Previously Established Catch and Landing Limits of Summer Flounder
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                                                                                             2017                                   2018
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                                                                   2016                                Difference                             Difference
                                                                              Current      Proposed       (%)        Current      Proposed       (%)
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Acceptable Biological Catch:
    million lb...............................................        16.26        15.86        11.30          -29        15.68        13.23          -16
    Mt.......................................................        7,374        7,193        5,125                     7,111        5,999
Commercial Quota:
    million lb...............................................         8.12         7.91         5.66          -28         7.89         6.63          -16
    Mt.......................................................        3,685        3,590        2,567                     3,581        3,006
Recreational Harvest Limit:
    million lb...............................................         5.42         5.28         3.77          -29         5.26         4.42          -16
    Mt.......................................................        2,457        2,393        1,711                     2,387        2,004
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    While the Board action was finalized at the August meeting, the 
Council's recommendations must be reviewed by NMFS to ensure that they 
comply with the FMP and applicable law. NMFS also must conduct notice-
and-comment rulemaking to propose and implement the final 
specifications.

Proposed 2017 and 2018 Summer Flounder Specifications

    Table 2 summarizes the Council's recommended summer flounder 
specifications that NMFS is proposing for 2017 and 2018, including the 
sector-specific estimated discards.

                                               Table 2--Proposed 2017-2018 Summer Flounder Specifications
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                                                                  2016 (current)                       2017                            2018
                                                         -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                            million lb          mt          million lb          mt          million lb          mt
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OFL.....................................................           18.06           8,194           16.76           7,600           18.69           8,476
ABC.....................................................           16.26           7,375           11.30           5,125           13.23           5,999
ABC Landings Portion....................................           13.54           6,142            9.43           4,278           11.05           5,010
ABC Discards Portion....................................            2.72           1,233            1.87             847            2.18             989
Commercial ACL..........................................            9.43           4,275            6.57           2,982            7.70           3,491
Commercial ACT..........................................            9.43           4,275            6.57           2,982            7.70           3,491
Projected Commercial Discards...........................            1.30             590            0.92             415            1.07             485

[[Page 80040]]

 
Commercial Quota........................................            8.12           3,685            5.66           2,567            6.63           3,006
Recreational ACL........................................            6.84           3,100            4.72           2,143            5.53           2,508
Recreational ACT........................................            6.84           3,100            4.72           2,143            5.53           2,508
Projected Recreational Discards.........................            1.42             643            0.95             432            1.11             504
Recreational Harvest Limit..............................            5.42           2,457            3.77           1,711            4.42           2,004
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    Consistent with the summer flounder regulations, the sum of the 
recreational and commercial sector ACLs is equal to the ABC for each 
fishing year. To derive the ACLs, the sum of the sector-specific 
projected discards are removed from the ABCs to derive the landing 
allowances. For summer flounder, 60 percent of the landing allowance 
for each fishing year is allocated to the commercial fishery and 40 
percent to the recreational fishery. Using this method ensures that 
each sector is accountable for its respective discards, rather than 
simply apportioning the ABCs by the allocation percentages to derive 
the sector ACLs. Although the derived ACLs are not split exactly 
according to the allocations specified in the Summer Flounder, Scup, 
and Black Sea Bass Fishery Management Plan (FMP), the landing portions 
of the ACLs preserve the appropriate allocation split, consistent with 
the FMP.
    Table 3 presents the proposed state summer flounder allocations for 
2017-2018 using the commercial state quota allocations described in the 
FMP. Any commercial quota adjustments to account for overages will be 
published in the Federal Register prior to the start of the respective 
fishing year. The final rule for this action will include any necessary 
quota overage reductions for fishing year 2017.

                                       Table 3--2017-2018 Proposed Initial Summer Flounder State Commercial Quotas
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                                                                                       2017 Initial quota                    2018 Initial quota
                          State                            FMP percent share ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                      Lb                 Kg                 Lb                 Kg
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ME.......................................................            0.04756              2,692              1,221              3,152              1,430
NH.......................................................            0.00046                 26                 18                 30                 14
MA.......................................................            6.82046            385,988            175,081            451,998            205,023
RI.......................................................           15.68298            887,542            402,582          1,039,326            471,430
CT.......................................................            2.25708            127,734             57,939            149,579             67,848
NY.......................................................            7.64699            432,764            196,298            506,773            229,868
NJ.......................................................           16.72499            946,512            429,331          1,108,381            502,753
DE.......................................................            0.01779              1,007                457              1,179                535
MD.......................................................             2.0391            115,398             52,344            135,133             61,295
VA.......................................................           21.31676          1,206,372            547,201          1,412,682            640,782
NC.......................................................           27.44584          1,553,233            704,535          1,818,862            825,022
                                                          ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Total................................................                100          5,659,266          2,567,000          6,627,096          3,006,000
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Note: Kilograms are as converted from pounds and do not sum to the converted total due to rounding. Rounding of quotas results in totals slightly
  exceeding 100 percent.

    The Council and Commission will develop recreational management 
measures (e.g., minimum fish sizes, open seasons, and bag limits) for 
summer flounder this fall and NMFS rulemaking will occur in early 
spring of 2017.

Classification

    Pursuant to section 304(b)(1)(A) of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the 
NMFS Assistant Administrator has determined that this proposed rule is 
consistent with the Summer Flounder, Scup, and Black Sea Bass FMP, 
other provisions of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, and other applicable law, 
subject to further consideration after public comment.
    These proposed specifications are exempt from review under 
Executive Order 12866.
    An IRFA was prepared by the Council, as required by section 603 of 
the Regulatory Flexibility Act (RFA), to examine the impacts of these 
proposed specifications on small business entities, if adopted. A 
description of the specifications, why they are being considered, and 
the legal basis for proposing and implementing specifications for the 
summer flounder fishery are contained in the preamble to this proposed 
rule. A copy of the detailed RFA analysis is available from NMFS or the 
Council (see ADDRESSES). The Council's analysis made use of 
quantitative approaches when possible. Where quantitative data on 
revenues or other business-related metrics that would provide insight 
to potential impacts were not available to inform the analyses, 
qualitative analyses were conducted. A summary of the 2017 and 2018 
summer flounder specifications RFA analysis follows.

Description of the Reasons Why Action by the Agency Is Being 
Considered, and a Statement of the Objectives of, and Legal Basis for, 
This Proposed Rule

    This action proposes management measures, including annual catch 
limits, for the summer flounder fishery in order to prevent overfishing 
and achieve optimum yield in the fishery. A complete description of the 
action, why it is being considered, and the legal basis for this action 
are contained in the specifications document, and elsewhere in the 
preamble to this proposed rule, and are not repeated here.

[[Page 80041]]

Description and Estimate of the Number of Small Entities To Which the 
Proposed Rule Would Apply

    On December 29, 2015, NMFS issued a final rule establishing a small 
business size standard of $11 million in annual gross receipts for all 
businesses primarily engaged in the commercial fishing industry and $7 
million in annual gross receipts for all businesses primarily engaged 
in for-hire fishing activity (NAICS 11411) for Regulatory Flexibility 
Act (RFA) compliance purposes only (80 FR 81194, December 29, 2015). 
The North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) is the 
standard used by Federal statistical agencies in classifying business 
establishments for the purpose of collecting, analyzing, and publishing 
statistical data related to the U.S. business economy.
    This proposed rule affects commercial and recreational fish 
harvesting entities engaged in the summer flounder fishery. 
Individually-permitted vessels may hold permits for several fisheries, 
harvesting species of fish that are regulated by several different 
FMPs, even beyond those impacted by the proposed action. Furthermore, 
multiple-permitted vessels and/or permits may be owned by entities 
affiliated by stock ownership, common management, identity of interest, 
contractual relationships, or economic dependency. For the purposes of 
the RFA analysis, the ownership entities, not the individual vessels, 
are considered to be the regulated entities.
    Ownership entities are defined as those entities with common 
ownership personnel as listed on the permit application. Only permits 
with identical ownership personnel are categorized as an ownership 
entity. For example, if five permits have the same seven persons listed 
as co-owners on their permit applications, those seven persons would 
form one ownership entity that holds those five permits. If two of 
those seven owners also co-own additional vessels, that ownership 
arrangement would be considered a separate ownership entity for the 
purpose of this analysis.
    The current ownership data set used for this analysis is based on 
calendar year 2015 (the most recent complete year available) and 
contains average gross sales associated with those permits for calendar 
years 2013 through 2015.
    A description of the specific permits that are likely to be 
impacted by this action is provided below, along with a discussion of 
the impacted businesses, which can include multiple vessels and/or 
permit types.
    According to the commercial ownership database, 553 affiliate firms 
landed summer flounder during the 2013-2015 period, with 547 of those 
businesses affiliates categorized as small businesses and 6 categorized 
as large businesses. The ownership data for the for-hire fleet indicate 
that there were 411 for-hire affiliate firms generating revenues from 
fishing recreationally for various species during the 2013-2015 period, 
all of which are categorized as small businesses. Although it is not 
possible to derive what proportion of the overall revenues came from 
specific fishing activities, given the popularity of summer flounder as 
a recreational species, it is likely that revenues generated from 
summer flounder recreational fishing is important for some, if not all, 
of these firms.

Description of the Projected Reporting, Record-Keeping, and Other 
Compliance Requirements of This Proposed Rule

    There are no new reporting or recordkeeping requirements contained 
in any of the alternatives considered for this action.

Federal Rules Which May Duplicate, Overlap, or Conflict With This 
Proposed Rule

    NMFS is not aware of any relevant Federal rules that may duplicate, 
overlap, or conflict with this proposed rule.

Description of Significant Alternatives to the Proposed Action Which 
Accomplish the Stated Objectives of Applicable Statutes and Which 
Minimize Any Significant Economic Impact on Small Entities

    This action proposes to set commercial quotas and recreational 
harvest limits for the summer flounder fishery for the 2017 and 2018 
fishing years that are consistent with the best scientific information 
available and the most recent catch limit recommendations of the 
Council's SSC. The proposed landings limits for 2017 include a 
commercial quota of 5.66 million lb (2,567 mt) and a recreational 
harvest limit of 3.77 million lb (1,711 mt). For 2018, the proposed 
measures include a commercial quota of 6.63 million lb (3,006 mt) and a 
recreational harvest limit of 4.42 million lb (2,004 mt).
    The only other alternatives considered in this document are status 
quo alternatives that are identical to the summer flounder landings 
limits implemented in December 2015. If these specifications remained 
in place, they would have greater positive socioeconomic impacts than 
the preferred alternatives. However, these alternatives were not 
selected as preferred given that they do not address the new scientific 
information regarding summer flounder stock status, and, therefore, 
would likely result in overfishing, which would be inconsistent with 
the FMP, National Standard 1 guidance under the Magnuson-Stevens Act, 
and the most recent advice of the Council's SSC. Because these 
alternatives are inconsistent with the purpose and need of this action, 
they are not considered further under this analysis.

    Authority:  16 U.S.C. 1801 et seq.

    Dated: November 7, 2016.
Samuel D. Rauch III,
Deputy Assistant Administrator for Regulatory Programs, National Marine 
Fisheries Service.
[FR Doc. 2016-27410 Filed 11-14-16; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 3510-22-P