[Broad Bill]

NJ regulations for 2015 to 2019 were 1 bass 28" to 43" and 1 bass less than 43". 2020 to 2021 changed to 1 bass 28" to 38" plus a bonus. 2022 to 2024 changed to 1 bass between 28" to 31" and a bonus. So for the seven years 2015 to 2021, the emphasis by management was kill the larger fish, predominantly females and the most productive breeders of the stock.

Statistics from the 2022 stock assessment. In 2010, the female population was reported to be 105 million metric tons. In 2021 after seven years off mandating the harvest of large breeders, the female population declined to 64.8 million metric tons or a 40% decline due to the wrong regulations being in place for the better part of the prior decade.

Understand the math. One metric ton equals 2,204.62 lbs. The stock, for the female population alone, lost 40 million metric tons in 11 years when regulations mandated the harvest of larger age classes, resulting in a decline over an 11 year period of a staggering 40 million metric tons in mature female breeders which translates to a reduction in the stock of, I hope you're sitting down, 88 BILLION LBS. of the most productive female breeders from the population. Imagine the impact on egg production of the stock due to asinine regulations. It's an unconscionable number resulting in multiple tens of trillions less eggs being produced. This is no different than what the same agencies have been doing to the fluke population over the last two decades targeting the breeding stock, exactly the same. The added problem with the striper stock is the cesspool the Chesapeake has been turned into for the benefit of Virginia and their corrupt politicians. Where is ASMFC in all this and for that matter the DEP and EPA?

Now add the food chain issues and contributory pollution issues being caused by one foreign conglomerate Cooke Inc. / Omega Protein from removal of 100 million lbs. of menhaden from the bay annually along with an estimated 240 million lbs. more from Virginia waters outside the bay. Add the decline in dissolved oxygen levels in the Chesapeake caused by agricultural runoff, urban runoff and the relentless netting of menhaden by Cooke Inc. which is wreaking havoc economically at minimum on no less than 10 coastal states and risking a complete shutdown in one of the most important fisheries up and down the coast. The issue isn't the population, the issue is the exploitation of menhaden by Cooke Inc., seven years of senseless regulations mandating the harvest of the wrong age classes and the consequential impacts the exploitation of the menhaden stock is having environmentally on the bay along with the removal of that much forage from a food chain almost every predator fish up and down the coast depends on for survival.

Address the causes, not the residual results. A closure and or 15% reduction in quota will do nothing to improve the stock. You can create all the data you want, it's common sense and everyone knows it but aren't willing to make the changes needed because of politics and money. It took a decade to cause the problem, my strong suggestion would be don't try fixing it in one year as that will cause economic ruin to many small businesses. Develop a plan to rebuild the stock but that plan needs to address the problems which created the current situation and still are.

And Dan, I agree with you on the 40% of mortality caused by C&R being yet another unsupported arbitrary number thrown out to support a desired and predetermined conclusion that fits managements ill guided conclusions. That would equate to over 4 million fish killed annually due to recreational C&R mortality. Anyone see the beaches lined with dead bass or massive amounts of floaters? I don't.

That's essentially verbatim the comments I sent ASMFC less my last comment regarding discard mortality relative to C&R.