The North Carolina Marine Fisheries Commission faced strong pushback from commercial and recreational fishermen during its first quarterly meeting of 2025, held at the Hilton Garden Inn in Kitty Hawk on March 12 and 13.
It was the first time since 2018 that the commission convened on the Outer Banks, drawing more than 30 speakers who voiced concerns about regulations, stock assessments, and the future of commercial fishing in the state.
As Island Free Press reported, Joe Romano, a commercial fisherman from Wilmington, spoke at the meeting. “Over-regulation has been the default course, and commercial fishermen have borne the brunt of it. We called it death by a thousand cuts, one ruled after another, reducing access, increasing cost, driving more watermen out of business. For years, it was easy to marginalize commercial fishing because there were so few of us.”…