This survey is probably part of a process to help the sport and commercial fishing industry.
To date, there is no real finacial data that shows how valuable the sport fishing industry is to our local economy, and the lively hood of the citizens who fish.
The people at NOAA are all avid fishermen and are on our side, I know many of them and they are against the MLPA process. They are simply trying to get your input so they can show that there is value to keeping sportfishing alive and well.
The people at the Sportfishing Association of CA (SAC) are all on board with this survey probably. There has never been a good study done linking personal income, fishing expeditures, etc, to the total revenue produced from all sportfishing related exspenses. This includes money spent on hooks, line, gas spent travelling to fishing spots, hotel costs if travelling from diffrent cities, food, ice, coffee, offshore overnight trips, etc...
SAC is worried because they have no data showing how important sportfishing is to the economy. And that is one of the biggest things working against them in the MLPA process.
The environmentalist are trying to use this to their advantage by saying that the new marine reserves will generate X ammount of revenue for X ammount of reasons.
SAC needs to be able to defend themselves againt these kinds of attacks, and they are probably working with NOAA on this project. I haven't seen the survey myself but I know if its from NOAA that it will help us in the long term to keep fishing open.
Carry on.
