Senate Bill 80 - known as the Freedom to Fish bill - is sitting in senate committee for the second consecutive legislative year, despite the fact that the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control’s (DNREC) Tidal Finfish Advisory Council voted unanimously, April 21, to support the bill’s passage.

At the advisory council meeting, May 19, S.B. 80 broke water again with an update from council member Bernard Pankowski, legislative chairman for the Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA), a national umbrella group with thousands of members in saltwater states around America and many other local groups and clubs which support the RFA initiative.

Pankowski explained that legislative equivalents of S.B. 80 have passed in Rhode Island and are currently being debated in Maryland and Massachusetts. The RFA Freedom To Fish initiative, Pankowski explained, is to ensure by force of law that salt water fishing areas will not become sanctuaries closed to fishing without good reason.

Pankowski noted that several high-powered environmental groups have come out strongly opposing Freedom to Fish legislation here and around the nation.

“RFA and the bill’s sponsors (Sen. John C. Still III, R-Dover; Rep. George Carey, R-Milford; Rep. Gerald Hocker, R-Ocean View; and Rep. Bobby Quillen, R-Harrington) have made plenty of attempts to meet with the environmental groups who oppose this,” said Pankowski. “We want to see this legislation pass. We have an open mind and are at the table ready to talk, but when we contacted the Sierra Club, they said they had no interest in helping us word-smith this particular bill.”

The bill drew strong criticism at the advisory council’s April meeting by representatives of Coastal Ocean Coalition, which has battled Freedom to Fish bills in several states.

Pankowski explained how DNREC Secretary John Hughes is adding some language to the bill that would underscore other state law emphasizing that DNREC has the right to close salt water fishing areas in case of emergency oil or chemical spills or for a strong conservation need supported by scientific findings. Pankowski said he believes the added clauses to the bill will enable to it to clear committee and move onto the Senate floor for a vote this session.

“In the future, we’ll keep working on this,” said Pankowski. “We strongly feel it is absolutely vital to protect fishermen from arbitrary closures of bodies of water. Environmental groups do not have all the answers to what we do as a hobby.”

Advisory council member Clyde Roberts said the bill “sets up a guard against extreme environmentalists who could close something without there being a real, scientific-based need.”

Roberts also suggested that if all coastal states are currently considering Freedom to Fish legislation, he feels there must be a real threat from “extreme environmentalists” on the horizon.

“Recreational fishing has finally gotten a voice in Delaware,” said Pankowski. “And it all arose in California where the state closed a number of areas to fishing, all while the recreational fishermen were sleeping. We will not have that happen here. We don’t want to wake up one day and find out we can’t fish at Bowers Beach or Slaughter Beach.”