Serious anglers and boaters, how do you feel about this?

Question

Boat Anglers Avoid Federal Regulation, Big Fines!

You could have been slapped with a $32,500 fine... all for just running your bilge pump. Or letting rain run-off your boat, or pumping water from your livewell. Luckily, that shipwreck has been averted thanks to a government act that, well, disregards a government act.

In 2006, a federal judge's ruling lumped fishing boats in with commercial vessels which must follow strict rules about water discharge. Commercial vessels must get special permits and are subject to an incredible number of regulations about water-based liquids from their rigs for the purposes of pollution control.

If a vessel fails to meet such a rule, it faces a fine up to $32,500 per day. And the way things stood, so would your 20-foot Ranger starting Sept. 30, if you didn't go through the process of getting a permit. But President George W. Bush recently signed the The Clean Boating Act of 2008 (S. 2766) into law, which re-established the fact that small boats are free from such stringent regulations.

Now you can e-mail your friends the coast is clear. And by the way, 39 congressmen co-sponsored the bill... which proves Washington isn't totally void of common sense.

Answer 1

See g-w Is a good prez! Stuiped kerry would have loved this fine idea.

Answer 2

Whew!!...lol. I may not have a boat, but I want one asap. I would have been really worried if a regulation like that had been in place. UG. That is just nuts.

I'm glad Bush fixed that issue. I'm sure as a Texas boy, he's probably been boating before himself and knew what that regulation would have meant. Because you KNOW that states would have been watching for that to try to get that $32,500 into their coffers. They'll do anything for a buck.

Anyway, thanks for letting everyone know.

Answer 3

I'm glad it didn't pass either. I'm sure it would take hundreds of Triton's and skeeters to cause the amount of pollution, emissions, and waste as a single big haul fishing boat. I have a 2 gallon bottle of oil and a 25 gallon fuel tank. That can't even be compared to a Dual Diesel 20 liter engines with about 2 thousand gallons of fuel on board. And to make matters even worse you got people like me and my bass fishing club who will stop and pick up debris or old fishing line others leave behind in the water to do our part for the environment.  

Answer 4

Maybe the government is finally waking up to the fact that boaters and fishermen combined is a 40 billion dollar a year industry and that would be one heck of a revenue loss to this country should we start getting fined for operating our livewells.