Learn to read between the lines

This is the second in a non-consecutive series of columns about behind-the-scenes life as a member of the Board of Fisheries.

Last time I mentioned that an annual time commitment of roughly a third of a year (120 days) is necessary to adequately function as a responsible Alaska Board of Fisheries (BOF) member. In addition to meetings, probably the biggest chunk of that time commitment is dedicated to reading all the reports, public comments and other materials supplied to board members to prepare for each meeting.

The volume of material is variable depending on the particular meeting and its scheduled length. The timing of the meeting schedules can also influence reading times. For instance, this coming cycle there will be a statewide (minus Southeast/Yakutat) king and tanner crab meeting. This meeting usually only runs five or six days and probably won’t have more than maybe 40 to 50 proposals, if that many. I would expect the volume of pre-meeting reading materials to be no more than 500 to 750 pages. During the meeting, I wouldn’t expect more than perhaps another 250 pages of material to be submitted.

Also in the coming cycle, the Upper Cook Inlet meeting will be held. This meeting is usually scheduled for no less than 14 days and will probably have 200 or more proposals for the board to deal with. The pre-meeting reading load will probably reach 3,000 to 5,000 pages. Additional materials submitted during the meeting will total no less than an additional 2,000 to 4,000 pages, if historical patterns continue.

Timing of meetings has a bearing on reading requirements as well. Again this coming cycle, the Kodiak and Chignik meetings are scheduled literally back-to-back. That means board members will not only have to have read all the Kodiak materials prior to that meeting’s start, but will also have to have at least started reading the Chignik materials prior to the Kodiak meeting as well. Trying to catch up on reading during a meeting is almost impossible due to the reading load from additional materials submitted daily. I spent most of my evenings during meetings reading these daily hand-ins.

Now, here’s a further complication to the situation. I prefer reading hard copies of reports and other materials because I can highlight important facts for use during deliberations or note relevant biological statistics. Receiving these hard copies usually does not happen any earlier than 10 to 14 days prior to a board meeting. That means I usually had only a week or so to go through as much as 4,000 pages of material to prepare for a meeting. The materials are posted on the board website and are available for download a little sooner, but not always. I learned to read electronically, but for the larger and more controversial meetings, a board member still has a limited time to read all the materials in preparation.

The hard copies of department reports are usually sent from the respective office involved with the particular meeting. For some of the back-to-back meetings, that means reports are mailed from two different offices to board members. If there is a glitch in the mail, reports can come late. This past cycle, one board member did not receive the second meeting reports until after he had already left home to attend the first meeting. Luckily, he kept informed by reading the materials from the website.

The purpose of all this material is to inform board members about the particular fishery referenced and to explain the implications of any specific proposal if it were to be enacted into regulation. The department reports usually contain historical and biological information on the fishery and the public comments usually highlight the social and practical impacts and implications of the particular proposal.

So what happens if a board member is unable to, or simply chooses not to, read all this material? In the case of being unable, the board member is generally not well prepared to make a reasoned vote on a proposal because he/she doesn’t fully understand the fishery or the specific issue being addressed. In the case of simply not reading the material, in my opinion, that member is being irresponsible, not only to the issue but to the other board members, the resource and the public in general.

A board member can learn a lot by simply listening to public testimony and department presentations during a meeting but, in my experience, will still miss several important and relevant points contained only in the submitted written materials if they are not read by the member prior to and during the meeting.

Sounds like a lot of work, huh? It is! Did I whine and complain about it at the time? You bet! Would I do it again? In a heartbeat! I especially enjoyed reading the department reports because they explained historical facts about a fishery and laid out the biological situations, good and bad, involved in the fishery. I was always learning something I had not previously known. The professionalism of the department, generally speaking, in the management of this state’s fisheries never ceases to amaze me.

Howard Delo is a retired fisheries biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. You can leave him a message by e-mailing sports@frontiersman.com.