Nobody, cares more about the health of the bay and specifically about the health of the menhaden stock than those who provide a living for their family with that stock.  Those of us that live off the menhaden stock intend to do so for a long time.  The last thing we want is the bay's health to wain it is literally or financial lifeblood.  We want this industry to continue in perpetuity so that our children can fish this resource and provide a living for their children should they chose to do so.  If this petition were to pass the amount of human cost that would occur would be enormous.  There will be hundreds of directly affected blue collar families that will lose income.  Resulting in home foreclosures, the financial destruction of nuclear families working in a tertiary level industrial job.  You will we spikes in divorce, single parent upbringing, crime, poverty and all manner of devasting effects as the jobs that are lost will not be easily replaced in the Reedville area.  All that will happen before the secondary effects of lost work and money to the community from the contractors and local businesses that provide outside labor and goods to the menhaden industry.  There is no other job for a young blue-collar family to get in the Reedville area.  So, before we go tearing down an entire community, I think everyone should consider what would happen if the same thing happened in their own community.  What would happen to all the people if the company that provides most work in their area particularly to the youngest blue-collar families in their area.  How many addiction centers will be opened in the next 5 years after when poverty strikes and people resort to drugs?  How many children grow up without fathers as they turn to crime and lose their way?  As a child myself from for the coal country of West Virginia I saw first-hand the devasting effects of industrial closures in small one company towns.  The people who work in the menhaden industry have the largest most vested interest in the sustainable harvest of the fish.  Without them the industry collapses.  All I ask is that the human cost is considered by those who ask for such drastic measures.  That cost is very difficult to calculate but I would be very willing to meet with anyone that doesn't understand the magnitude human loss that is purposed in this petition to help them weigh out the variables and calculate the return on investment of human capital lost vs menhaden stock gained.  As I see the equation, the complete removal of purse sien fishing wouldn't change the stock nearly as much as people think.  As all the science I have seen shows the stock is actually INCREASING.  Make the menhaden fisheries one of the only fisheries IN THE WORLD that sustainable long term.  The alternative side of the equation in human loss would be so large it is difficult for me to even quantify it.  In fact it would be much easier for me to show it.  I'm a very measured and analytical person and love meeting new people even those who're devoutly opposed to my views.  If anyone would like to help me measure the human capital lost from this proposal, I will gladly meet with them and show them my figures and variables.  Then from they could calculate the ROI as they see it.

Please consider the human cost.  If you need a good example, please see any of the dried-up coal towns in West Virginia that's a good example of excepted returns.