David Chando, director of NJ DEP Division of Fish and Wildlife addresses an April 14 meeting at the Rutgers Co-op Extension.

Sixty-seven fishers crowded into the meeting room at the Rutgers Co-op Extension building on Tuesday night to hear David Chando, director of NJ DEP Division of Fish and Wildlife discuss the saltwater angler registry mandated by the Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA).
This registry requirement has sparked much debate about whether or not New Jersey should implement a saltwater fishing license that would meet the requirements of the registry and put money into Fish and Wildlife division.

Chando made it clear what increased funding would do for NJ anglers. As in other states, the money garnered from a licensing system is matched in part with federal dollars. This additional funding could increase the number of biologists, enforcement officers, and data-collection clerks for the Division.
Currently out of a staff of 225, only 67 work on marine fishery issues. Seven biologists oversee 22 different fishery management plans. Data collection often is poor to non-existent.

In states like Florida and North Carolina where funding from licenses is seven times that of New Jersey, marine fishery issues have been supported and enhanced, giving these states an attractive draw to recreational fishers.
The concern in New Jersey by many, including the Recreational Fishing Alliance, is that the state government has been known to take money from dedicated funds for other purposes.

Chando said that he does not think this would be the case, since in his 28-year experience with the NJ DEP, this has never happened to the monies raised through freshwater fishing and hunting licenses—due in great part to the fact that there are matching funds coming from Washington.
The National Saltwater Registry must be in place by Jan.1, 2010. States with licenses will be able to supply directory information and survey data from their lists.

While most coastal states in the United States already have licenses in place, New Jersey and some of her neighbors to the north are scrambling to get a system in place before the deadline.
Delaware is amending their saltwater licensing requirements to comply with MSA mandates and New York is ready to go with a fee-based license.

New Jerseyians fishing in the territorial waters of Delaware or New York will have to buy the state license. If New Jersey had a fee based license, these states have indicated that these licenses would be reciprocal.
State Senator Van Drew and Assemblymen Milam and Albano have put forth a bill establishing a free registry that would address the MSA mandate. While this is certainly attractive to the fishers of New Jersey waters, there is a downside.

Any registry put into place comes with administrative and marketing costs. If this burden is put on the Division of Fish and Wildlife, something else will have to be eliminated.
In an area where there is a real need for increased funding and personnel, it is unrealistic to think that it can absorb the new work.

Chando estimates the actual cost of administering a registry to be about $2 an angler. In New Jersey where the actual number of saltwater fishers is an unknown entity, this could be quite a burden on the budget.
By January 2011, any state without its own registry will be charged a federal fee to register.

The national registry is meant to be a clearinghouse for data collection and fishing surveys. Because we compete with other states for our fishing quotas, neighboring states that have better data collection procedures will be able to make a strong case for their own plans, thus putting us at risk.

While a special lottery and potential marine fishery license plates have been suggested as funding sources for New Jersey’s registry and data collection, this money coming from an outside user group would not necessarily be as protected in the state coffers as direct licensing fees would be.

Anglers who pay for a license will be more invested in how the state apportions the funds collected.
While it is certainly more agreeable to have a free registry, the reality is that without serious funding the only thing New Jersey gets is a ‘phone book’ of saltwater anglers and a very large bill to pay for it.