In my opinion this is another case of commercial fishermen not liking the rules passed by TWRA, which are based on sound science and biology for the benefit of sportsmen - so they go to the General Assembly where they can lobby out of sight and get a bill passed to override TWRA and the Commission.
Everybody keep in mind that commercial fishermen don't pay their own way in Tennessee these days. They are subsidized by sportsmen and our license dollars.
TWRA is already struggling with not enough funds in its budget. And now, we are on the verge of TWRA biologists being pulled away to study new paddlefish fisheries for the sole benefit of commercial fishermen. TWRA's wildlife officers will be spending time keeping an eye on paddlefish harvest in new places like the Old Hickory headwaters, instead of stopping poachers and checking fishing licenses. There's already not enough officers to provide the levels of enforcement that sportsmen want, and this will make it worse. How long will it be before TWRA has to raise our fishing license fees again to cover these additional demands on their resources.
Raise the price of commercial fishing licenses until they subsidize sportsmen, and maybe we won't have a right to complain so much.
But right now, I have absolutely zero interest in letting a bunch of paddlefish netters suck away another chunk of my license dollars so that they can rake in some extra profit on paddlefish at my expense.
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