When the scientists of The Marine Mammal Center want to go out on the water to study endangered whales, they’re limited to one 24-foot boat.
The data they collect — no matter how analog — is fed to decision makers at the state, through reams of PDFs, who shape maritime policies that govern commercial fishermen.
This chain of events is one reason Dungeness crab is no longer available in San Francisco in time for the December holidays. Since the start of the decade, regulators have been pushing the commercial crabbing season further into the new year and ending it earlier in the spring out of concern for whales becoming entangled with fishing gear…