For the second week in a row, Jim Donofrio of the Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA) and NOAA Administrator Dr. Jane Lubchenco appeared together in a panel discussion concerning national ocean policies. However, while Dr. Lubchenco received a rather warm embrace by last week's hosts at the Society of Environmental Journalists (SEJ), she was met with a chillier reception during a much more critical line of questioning by Congressional representatives sitting on a House Natural Resources Committee hearing in Washington DC.

In an online blog appearing at House Speaker John Boehner's website, RFA's executive director was quoted as saying that President Obama's new National Oceans Policy regulations "stifle job growth" and create "too much uncertainty" for America's angling community. "The recreational fishing industry is 'Main Street America' in every sense; it is largely composed of small, family-run, mom and pop businesses," Donofrio said, going on to say that "creating additional levels of bureaucracy" will reduce the overall productivity of his industry, and that a time of high unemployment "it seems counterproductive to advance and fund the NOP when it will stifle job growth in the fishing sectors."

This week's hearing focused primarily on the President's executive order, an action which bypassed legislative protocol and led to starting headlines in the national news media in 2010 about the future of recreational fishing opportunities. The House Resource Committee which for close to a decade has refused to approve the burdensome oceans policy has been convened twice in the past month to review the presidential edict.

Appearing on Wednesday, October 26th at the Longworth House Office Building in Washington were panelists Nancy Sutley and Dr. Lubchenco on behalf of the Obama Administration, Donofrio as representative of the recreational fishing community, Randall Luthi of the National Ocean Industries Association and Michael Conathan of the Center for American Progress.

RFA encourages anglers to sit down and view the testimony, archived it its entirety at the House Resource Committee website at Congressional Fishing Testimony.