Compensation of displaced gill netters pursuant to proposition 132

Proposition 132, also known as "The Marine Resources Protection Act", was passed by the California electorate in November 1990. One of the purposes of the Act was to prohibit the use of gill nets in an area referred to as the "Marine Resources Protection Zone" or MRPZ, which is roughly equivalent to all State waters south of Point Arguello, with some important exceptions such as additional fishing depth restrictions in the Los Angeles/Orange County area, and alsoaround the Channel Islands. The Act instructed the Department to compensate displaced gill net fishermen for the loss of their fishery. Payment of compensation was contingent upon each applicant meeting certain conditions that were specified in the Act.Out of the original 136 applicants, the Department identified 86 who met all the requirements for further processing of their claims. The Act dictated that qualified claimants were entitled to compensation in an amount equal to the average annual value of their gill net catches (excluding rockfish) from within the area now closed to gill nets (the MRPZ), during the period of 1983 to 1987. Based upon our historical landing receipt and logbook databases, the Department reconstructed the past fishing activities of those qualified claimants. Data available to the Department were not originally intended to address the specific eligibility criteria that were specified in the Act, but we were able to calculate the amount of each claimant's compensation by using the fish receipt data to determine what each claimant caught (and the value), and the logbook data to determine where he/she caught it. The combined total amount of compensation paid the 86 claimants was $1.2 million.This report describes the Department's activities with respect to the processing of claims and payment of compensation to displaced gill net fishermen. (19pp.)