[Broad Bill]

It's a simple solution but politically charged and decisions are made based on funding and lobbying efforts by the commercial sector and made from the top down by the Commerce Department.

Models assume 25% natural mortality every year in the stock. So if the daily bag limit went back to 8, the assumption is 2 would die from natural mortality even if they weren't harvested. So an 8 fish limit is really a 6 fish limit. Add to that smaller fish, younger sexually immature age classes, make up the majority of fishing related discard mortality due to recreational regulations and the harvest of larger fish commercially. Those age groups don't maximize catch values for commercials and are less likely to be retained and the recreational angler is forced to release them with these asinine size minimums.

Reduce recreational minimums, add slots with sensible and not paper thin ranges, close the spawn to commercials for a month when the offshore migration starts to protect the spawn and you'll see the healthiest fluke fishery with the most benefits for both sectors any of us have seen in our lifetime.

Problem is management decisions with this stock are slanted toward the commercial sector and not the health of the stock and changes as suggested will never happen because every regulatory decision made over the last two decades has moved the harvest of larger sexually mature fish to the commercial sector to promote higher catch values and restrict the harvest of younger more gender balanced age classes for the recreational sector. Remember the key metric used by NMFS in managing this fishery is catch value for the commercial sector and fishing effort for the recreational sector. Translated the commercial sector will continue to selectively harvest sexually mature fish with a high percentage females killing juvenile age classes in the process while the recreational sector will be mandated to do the same. Someone tell me how regulations like that are for the betterment of the fishery.