Three West Coast seafood industry groups filed suit in U.S. District Court in Portland, OR, on Friday to force the Department of Commerce and its National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to follow rules laid out by the Supreme Court on tribal treaty fishing. The three groups - the West Coast Seafood Processors Association, the Midwater Trawlers Cooperative, and the Fishermen's Marketing Association - represent fishermen and processors involved in the Pacific groundfish, pink shrimp, and Dungeness crab fisheries.

The suit charges that the federal government acted arbitrarily and capriciously when it allocated nearly 71 million pounds of Pacific whiting (approximately 14% of the U.S. whiting harvest) to Washington treaty tribes this year. According to the government's own calculations, the amount received by the tribes this year represents nearly 233% of what they should have received. "The 71 million pound allocation was opposed by the Pacific Fishery Management Council, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, several members of the U.S. House and Senate, and the seafood industry," said Rod Moore, Executive Director of the West Coast Seafood processors Association. "NMFS could have easily obeyed the law and followed the recommendations they received. Instead, they chose a political solution which leaves us no choice but to take them to court."

The regulations used by NMFS to allocate Pacific whiting to the tribes apply to all species of groundfish, such as Dover sole, petrale sole, and rockfish and could also be extended to apply to shrimp and crab. Those regulations have been challenged in court but have been tied up in procedural battles for nearly three years.

"In our view, the Supreme Court interpreted tribal fishing rights to allow the treaty tribes to harvest up to 50% of the fish found in their usual and accustomed fishing areas," said Moore. "The federal government's own scientists have determined that number to be about six and one- half percent of the total allowable U.S. harvest, yet NMFS has allocated more than twice that amount. Both the seafood industry and the tribes obey the rules - it's time for NMFS to do the same."