PART II: Virginia Looks at the Future
Although the Board set the 2026 TAC at its October 2025 meeting, future TACs, and the future of the Bay cap, were not yet established. To help resolve that uncertainty, Virginia legislators have introduced four bills addressing the menhaden resource, which range from the conservative to the improvident ends of the spectrum.
The most conservative bill of the four is arguably House Bill 1048 (HB 1048), a very short bit of legislation which would outlaw all reduction fishing for menhaden in Virginia’s portion of the Chesapeake Bay unless and until “the Secretary of Natural and Historic Resources [determines] that research specific to the Chesapeake Bay has demonstrated that the menhaden reduction fishery does not negatively impact other fisheries or menhaden-dependent species…”
The bill strikes a precautionary posture, not closing the door on reduction fishing within the Chesapeake Bay, but allowing it only if research demonstrates that the reduction fishery has no negative impact on the Bay’s other fisheries or other natural resources. In doing so, it seems vulnerable to the same sort of criticism that Mr. Landry leveled against the Board, as it specifically targets the reduction fishery, and does not apply the same conditions to the menhaden bait fishery, even though that fishery, too, might negatively impact other fisheries or “menhaden-dependent species” in Virginia waters.
HR 1048 was referred to the Chesapeake Subcommittee of the Virginia House Agriculture, Chesapeake, and Natural Resources Committee, which unanimously voted to table the legislation, killing any chance that it might have had of becoming law.
A second bill, House Bill 1049 (HB 1049), would allow the reduction industry to continue to fish in the Chesapeake Bay, but would also direct Virginia’s Marine Resources Commission to “develop and maintain a quota period management system” which would “ensure that the removal of menhaden from the Chesapeake Bay is more evenly distributed throughout the harvest season…to mitigate the negative impacts of concentrated, high volume menhaden removals from the Bay.” HB 1049, if passed, would require the Marine Resources Commission to either cap monthly reduction fleet harvest at 15% of the Bay cap or to establish a “trimester system” that would see one-third of the Bay cap harvested by the reduction fishery each trimester. Should fishermen fail to harvest their full quota in any month/trimester, the unharvested quota could be rolled over into the next period.
HB 1049 would also create an observer system, and require that a “trained observer” be carried on at least 10% of all reduction fleet trips “to document the composition and weight of the actual catch and…report such documentation to the Commission.” The legislation neither defines the term “trained observer” nor establishes who would pay for the observer’s training, time, and services.
It also fails to create an exception to section 28.2-204C of the Code of Virginia, which states that “The information collected or reported shall not be disclosed in any manner which would permit identification of any person, firm, corporation or vessel, except when required by court order…” Since the entire menhaden reduction fishery in the Chesapeake Bay is conducted by Ocean Harvesters, any observer data related to the reduction fishery’s landings, bycatch, and similar issues would be deemed confidential and unavailable to the public.
HB 1049 has also reached a dead end. It, too, was referred to the Chesapeake Subcommittee, which, on a vote of 7 in favor, 3 opposed, recommended that the Agriculture, Chesapeake, and Natural Resources Committee report the bill out of Committee and refer it to the House Appropriations Committee. While the Subcommittee’s recommendation found unanimous approval, the Appropriations Committee failed to approve the legislation.
HB 1048 and HB 1049 were almost certainly introduced in good faith, and if passed, might well benefit the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem. Still, the people and organizations that support those bills, and who say things like, “We look forward to working with legislators…to chart a sustainable, productive future for the Bay’s fisheries,” are engaging in a bit of hypocrisy.
For while menhaden, like all of Virginia’s other regulated marine fish species, are currently managed by the state’s Marine Resources Commission, that wasn’t always the case. Until early 2020, the Virginia legislature had retained management authority over Atlantic menhaden, while delegating the management authority for all other marine species to the Marine Resources Commission. That allowed legislators friendly to the reduction fishery to block menhaden conservation efforts, a situation that led to a confrontation between the Virginia legislature and the ASMFC, and ultimately between the legislature and the United States Secretary of Commerce, after the ASMFC reduced the Bay cap from 87,216 to 51,000 mt in 2017, and the legislature refused to make a corresponding change to Virginia law.
Conservation advocates were happy when the legislature finally handed menhaden management over to the Marine Resources Commission, with one announcing, “Great news for menhaden! Today key committees in Virginia’s Senate and House of Delegates passed bipartisan legislation to transfer management of Virginia’s menhaden fishery from the General Assembly to the Virginia Marine Resources Commission.”
But now that the Marine Resources Commission isn’t taking the actions that the menhaden advocacy community is calling for, the same people who once argued that the Commission, and not the legislature, should have the authority to manage menhaden are reversing course and, like the reduction industry in years past, are seeking to have the Virginia legislature dictate menhaden management measures.
But not all of the recently-introduced menhaden bills are seeking to restrict the reduction fishery. Senate Bill 474 (SB 474) would create an “Atlantic Menhaden Research Fund” (Fund). SB 474 also provides that the Virginia Institute of Marine Science
shall utilize moneys from the Fund to produce research relating to Atlantic menhaden necessary to inform a scientifically defensible and ecologically meaningful harvest limit for Atlantic menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay and an annual report summarizing such research…The report shall address the seasonal abundance of Atlantic menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay; the movement rates of Atlantic menhaden between the coast of the Atlantic Ocean and the Chesapeake Bay; the impacts of predator demand, such as striped bass and osprey, and predator consumption of Atlantic menhaden on the Atlantic menhaden population; the spatial and temporal patterns of the Atlantic menhaden commercial fishing efforts in the Chesapeake Bay, and the possibility of localized depletion of Atlantic menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay. [formatting omitted]
Unlike HB 1048 and HB 1049, which would immediately impose restrictions on the reduction fishery, SB 474 would effectively defer any management actions until sufficient research reveals the nature and extent of management measures that would best conserve Atlantic menhaden in the Chesapeake Bay. However, SB 474 shared a similar fate, with the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee voting unanimously to continue the bill to its 2027 session.
The fourth menhaden bill introduced in the Virginia legislature the year is Senate Bill 414 (SB 414). Sponsored by a long-time advocate for the reduction fishery, it seeks to avoid reductions in the menhaden TAC, and possible reductions in the Bay Cap, by withdrawing Virginia from the ASMFC. There is a real likelihood that such effort would be futile, and that even if Virginia withdrew from the ASMFC, the language of the Atlantic Coastal Fisheries Cooperative Management Act, which granted the ASMFC the authority to enforce the provisions of its fishery management plans on Atlantic Coast states, would still compel Virginia to adhere to the terms of the menhaden management plan. However, since SB 414 is more an expression of the reduction industry’s pique rather than a bill that has any realistic chance of becoming law, there is little reason to discuss it further. While it isn’t technically dead yet, the Senate Privileges and Elections Committee, on an 11 to 3 vote, chose to refer it to the Finance and Appropriations Committee, where it met the same fate as SB 474, a unanimous vote to continue the bill to the 2027 session.
Thus, none of the four menhaden bills introduced in the Virginia legislature will become law in 2026, as state legislators struggle to address the issues surrounding the menhaden reduction fishery in the Chesapeake Bay.
Despite all of the meetings that have been held, and all of the management measures that have been put in place, menhaden management in the Chesapeake Bay remains a contentious, yet poorly understood, issue. The ASMFC is seeking a way to maintain the menhaden population, in both the ocean and the Chesapeake Bay, at a level that will provide enough forage for predatory fish, birds, and marine mammals, without causing unnecessary harm to the fishing industry. The Virginia legislature, more focused on menhaden within the Chesapeake Bay, cannot agree on a clear policy, with some members favoring conservative menhaden management, and others favoring the menhaden fishing industry.
It will probably take years before all of the questions are fully resolved. One can only hope that when that resolution comes, it is based on science and good data, and not on mere emotion, and that concerns about industry’s short-term cash flows are not elevated above the health and long-term sustainability of the menhaden resource.
