Melancon opposes move to give Louisiana authority over red snapper

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Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Secretary Charlie Melancon stated Tuesday he is opposed to a push to transfer management authority of Gulf of Mexico red snapper from the federal government to the fisheries agencies of the five Gulf states.

Melancon said a bill proposed by Rep. Garret Graves (R-Baton Rouge) that's currently making its way through Congress would grant Gulf states management authority without providing necessary dollars.

"Without federal funding, Louisiana could potentially lack the proper resources to manage the red-snapper fishery," Melancon said. "It would be fiscally irresponsible for the department to support any mandate that would result in an unknown amount of fiscal burden placed on the state of Louisiana for the management of a single species of fish."

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"We're very disappointed in the position of the department," said David Cresson, executive director of the Coastal Conservation Association-Louisiana. "It goes contrary to the wishes of the recreational-fishing public in Louisiana and also the wishes of the Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission."

Cresson said it's curious Melancon blamed his opposition to the management-authority transfer on lack of funding. CCA strongly supported last year a bill in the state Legislature that raised the state's annual recreational saltwater fishing license fee from $5.50 to $13. The extra money was supposed to be deposited into a Saltwater Fish Research and Conservation Fund, to be used to fund saltwater-fisheries management and research through the state's wildly successful LA Creel Survey program.

"When fishermen in Louisiana asked for the license-fee increase, they did so with the expectation that a portion of that would go toward managing red snapper," Cresson said. "The department has been doing a great job of collecting data with that new money, and now all of a sudden, we can't? It just makes me wonder."

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