Mayor Carolyn Kirk, who has become a player in the intensifying national debate over fisheries policy, is reactivating the Gloucester Fisheries Commission — an agency created by the Legislature in 1956 to investigate and advocate for the "promotion, preservation and protection of the Gloucester fishing industry."
Kirk has appointed eight members who will serve with her, but the core of the commission is five active fishermen — four groundfishermen and a lobsterman known for their entrepreneurial adaptivity and political and industry activism.
The fishermen are Joe Orlando, Paul Vitale, Gus Sanfilippo and Al Cottone; the lobsterman is Mark Ring.
In addition, the mayor has named Angela Sanfilippo, president of the Gloucester Fishermen's Wives Association, along with longtime City Councilor Sefatia Romeo Theken and Councilor and former Mayor Bruce Tobey.
The council has processed some of the nominations, with others pending, Kirk said Monday.
The commission slipped into dormancy about 10 years ago. In its next incarnation, the mayor said, the members will decide what it does and how it works.
"We want it to be self-directed," she said.
Cottone, who day fishes without a mate aboard a 60-year-old trawler, said he has no idea what the commission might do.
But he added that accepted Kirk's invitation to become a member because "I've been active and I want to continue to be active."
"I know we've been getting a raw deal, but if somebody's going to kick me, I want them to kick me in the face, not the back," he added.
Cottone and his colleagues on the commission have seen the federal fisheries service slash allocations in this, the first year of catch share fishing allowed in fishing cooperatives known as sectors.
The recipe for consolidation of the fleet was put in place in 2009, when the New England Fishery Management Council chose 11-year catch histories as the new basis of the allocation currency for fishing permits. The controversial shift effectively marginalized many fishermen whose permits had been decimated under the old Days at Sea controls, and it reduced the equity share of nearly all fishermen via the fractional allocations compared to 2009 catch levels.
Kirk has committed the city to a political and litigation partnership with New Bedford. The two world-famous ports are the lead plaintiffs in a lawsuit that challenges the new regimen — called Amendment 16 — for improperly distributing the allocation and denying industry members a right to vote to convert the groundfishery into a limited-access commodity market.
"We're in a unique position to influence policy on a state level and even at the federal level," the mayor said in an interview Monday.
She described Cottone and his colleagues as examples of modern fishermen who have been able to master much of the required computer skills in meeting federal regulatory requirements.
"Fishing used to be a simple life, it isn't anymore," she said.
Gloucester used to be the world's most important fishing port, based on volume and dollar value of the landings, but it isn't anymore. It remains, however, the No. 10 port nationally in both categories, with New Bedford — thanks in large part to the scallop industry — America's No. 1 port in landings-value.
Kirk promised to reconstitute the commission in her second inauguration address on Jan. 2, 2010.
After its 1956 formation, the city commission was modified in 1962, 1970, '78, '80 and for the last time in 1984. Most of the changes involved the panel's size and membership requirements — between active fishermen and others — and capping the maximum amount the city could spend on the commission's work.
The most recent amendment put the budget cap at $60,000 in municipal appropriations, but Kirk said the city will operate for the foreseeable future as a volunteer organization.
She designated her fisheries advisor, David Bergeron of the Fishermen's Partnership Health Plan, to serve as its executive director.
Richard Gaines can be reached at 978-283-7000, x3464, or at rgaines@gloucestertimes.com.
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