Like Jonah before them, dory anglers face the whale

Even the casual Bible skimmer knows Jonah. This was the insolent

dolt who dallied about in open defiance of God’s call to the

prophethood. And so the Almighty dispatched a whale -- actually a

“great fish” -- to swallow up Jonah as a reminder of who occupied the

big chair in the executive suite.

There’s some corollary, I think, to the adventures of Jonah and

the looming extinction of one of Newport Beach’s finest landmarks and

traditions. The reference here is to the charming dory fleet --

operating as it has since 1891 on the sands near McFadden Square and

the Newport Pier -- and its imminent consumption by the great

bureaucratic whale.

For 111 years, generations of dory families have scratched out a

hard scrabble living in the unpredictable and unforgiving waters of

the Pacific. On countless mornings, even as the roosters still slept,

and before the seagulls took wing, patriarchs have pushed off from

Newport’s shores in their tiny vessels, breaking the surf line and

heading to sea hoping for enough of a catch to pay their way through

the day.

Onshore wives and sons and daughters have scanned the horizons

craning for a glimpse of their returning seamen. We know of one day

in 1998 when he didn’t come home, when 33-year-old Timothy Meek was

lost to the Pacific. Probably, through the years, some number of dory

men we don’t know about found the same fate.

It’s impossible to understand the endearing treasure of the dory

fleet’s open market without embedding yourself in the middle of it.

To stroll among the pocked and grooved cutting boards, the old spring

scales and the stacks of mackerel and sculpin and rockfish. To

witness brined and sun-weathered hands flawless fillet a sablefish

with old wood handled, razor-edge knives. To engage in the simplest

commerce -- the exchange of cash money for a few pounds of the

freshest red snapper you’ll find in these parts.

But this living slice of history, this small monument to early

American enterprise, may soon become only a remembrance. That’s

because a couple of bureaucratic factories in Sacramento and

Washington, D.C. are on the brink of casting a broad regulatory gill

net over just about all commercial fishing for certain species of

fish off the California coast. And the action has pushed the dory

fleet to the brink of extinction.

Already, the California Department of Fish and Game bans the

harvest of rockfish -- among the dory fleet’s staple products -- in

California waters deeper than 120 feet. By itself, that regulatory

lid has partly contributed to the thinning of the dory fisherman

ranks by more than half during the last dozen years.

Now, that agency is kicking around the idea to sharply curtail

rockfish angling in depths shallower than 120 feet. That move -- were

it to occur, say most of the dorymen -- would almost certainly

swallow up the last vestiges of their fleet.

But if that great fish doesn’t swamp the roughly half dozen dory

enterprises still afloat, a pending action by the federal government

most certainly will. In June, an emergency order from the feds put a

halt to commercial fishing of the California coast for certain

varieties of rockfish, including red snapper. That action, absent a

hastily arranged reprieve for the local anglers, would have

immediately shuttered the dory fleet. Whether or not the ban becomes

permanent or will ensnare the dory families won’t be decided until

September.

To their credit, not even the dory operators are disputing

government findings that certain stocks of rockfish are depleted and

that some kind of resource management is called for. But the blame,

they say, should fall on large commercial fishing operations that

routinely swipe tons of fish from the region’s waters each year.

Their puny hauls (remember, we’re talking about six tiny dory boats)

are insignificant when all things are considered.

Which is why I’m hoping the drones who grease the gears of these

two government factories will exercise a little reasonable

benevolence and grant the Newport dory fleet an exemption or waiver

from the offshore fishing bans they’re mulling over. I mean, it’s not

like they’d be setting a precedent here. The government is forever

handing out either subsidies or exemptions or waivers to whole

industries that would otherwise suffer under, or die, from the weight

of government paternalism.

But understanding that these great whales seldom -- if ever --

dispense reprieves on their own, I’d like to see some political

heavyweights weigh in on the dory fleet’s behalf. Reps. Chris Cox and

Dana Rohrabacher both pack hefty six shooters on Capitol Hill. They

need to pressure federal regulators for an exemption. And the same is

true in Sacramento, where Assemblyman John Campbell should put the

screws to Gov. Gray Davis and the California Department of Fish and

Game.

Given what the dory fleet means to the heritage and culture of

Newport Beach, we need all hands on deck to grab a bucket and start

bailing.

* BYRON DE ARAKAL is a freelance writer and communications

advisor. He lives in Costa Mesa. His column appears Wednesdays.

Readers can reach him with news tips and comments via e-mail at

[email protected]. Visit his web site at www.byronwriter.com.