Board of Fisheries to weigh pushing commercial nets back from the Homer Spit

The Alaska Board of Fisheries will consider three proposals in December to push commercial fishing back from the Homer Spit, where the people who wrote them say nets get in the way of boats heading in and out of Homer's harbor.

Two would close the water around the Spit to commercial fishing, one for a half-mile and one for a full mile, as Alaska News reported Oct. 11. A third would redraw commercial fishing boundaries in Kachemak Bay to leave a 1-mile corridor around the Spit.

Joseph Brewer, who wrote the half-mile proposal, describes commercial boats beached behind Land's End with nets running in every direction, according to the board's proposal book. He writes that a visitor was told to leave a beach, charter boats have had to steer around nets to get in and out of the harbor, and a private boat got caught in a net. He says a Coast Guard member said a response would at times be impossible. Brewer writes that he is not against commercial fishing.

Kenneth Bingaman, who wrote the 1-mile proposal, says nets can stretch a half to three-quarters of a mile off the Spit and block the traditional routes boats use to reach the harbor.

The third proposal, from Wesley Humbyrd, adds an argument about fish. He says the state has steered Lower Cook Inlet's power purse seine fleet into a corridor near the Spit where wild sockeye, king, coho and chum salmon headed for Upper Cook Inlet pass through. He wants the fleet pointed toward hatchery sockeye or other fishing districts instead, and he also cites the heavy summer traffic of fish deliveries, charters, pilot boats, kayaks and sailboats.

The changes would take those waters away from at least some of the commercial fishermen who fish there now.

The Seldovia Fish and Game Advisory Committee, one of the local groups that make recommendations to the board, takes up the proposals Nov. 13, according to its agenda. The committee will also weigh proposals to repeal commercial beach seines in Cook Inlet and to bar helicopters from flying anglers to some Kenai Peninsula streams.

The board makes the final decision at its Lower Cook Inlet finfish meeting in Seward, Dec. 1-4. Written comments to the board are due Nov. 16.