Maryland's pioneering effort to conserve Chesapeake Bay blue crabs by buying back commercial crabbing licenses has come up short, state officials say. Too few crabbers were willing to sell, they say, and too many of those who were asked for too much - up to $425 million in one case.
"We didn't get the participation we wanted, so we're well short of the goal we wanted to achieve," said Lynn Fegley, assistant fisheries director at the Department of Natural Resources.
So state officials have decided to reject all 494 bids they received in the state's first-ever Priceline-style "reverse auction." Instead, the state plans to counter with a firm offer of $2,260 - take it or leave it.
Worried that a sudden resurgence in commercial crabbing could jeopardize the recovery of the bay's crab population, state officials want to reduce the number of people able to catch large quantities of them for sale. The DNR mailed notices last month to all 3,676 holders of "limited crab catcher" licenses, asking them to name the price at which they'd be willing to sell their annual, renewable permits.
Though such reverse auctions have been used in a few other states to buy back fishing licenses or gear, this was the first attempt in Maryland.
The DNR had hoped to be able to retire roughly 2,000 licenses. But the state received fewer than 500 responses by its July 31 deadline. And after evaluating the bids, state officials concluded that only about a fourth had quoted prices the department was willing to pay, said Fegley.
The quoted prices ranged from $30 - half the annual fee for the permit - to the multimillion-dollar offer, Fegley said, which officials regard as a joke or a protest.
"I think a certain percentage get upset with any attempt by DNR to restrict what is perceived as a right to fish," said Douglas Lipton, a University of Maryland economist who specializes in the fishing industry. He and Geret DePiper, a graduate student, helped the DNR with the auction.
State officials say they're not sure why more crabbers didn't respond to their buyback offer. Lipton said his graduate student hopes to survey crabbers over the next month to get a better idea.
The economist suggested that active crabbers who didn't want to sell might have submitted high bids they knew wouldn't be accepted, or simply didn't respond.
Even so, Lipton said there were only a few bids he considered "exceptionally high."
