State reduces initial lease sites in Inland Bays
Nearly a quarter of proposed aquaculture lease sites in the Inland Bays have been withdrawn from a streamlined leasing program.
State environmental officials announced it will simplify the permitting process for commercial shellfish aquaculture in the Inland Bays by using a statewide approval process, which will be facilitated by the state's Wetlands and Subaqueous Lands section.
However, the leasing program will not begin until the department receives approval for expedited national permits through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
The process “is designed to help bring more certainty to applicants and the public through the use of maps that identify areas that are appropriate for aquaculture operations,” state Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control Secretary David Small said in a press release. “We feel this approach gives consideration to property owners who had concerns about aquaculture in their area.”
Delaware Center for the Inland Bays weighs in on aquaculture
By Chris Bason, CIB Executive Director
Starting the SAA process is an important step toward realizing shellfish farms on the Bays. Shellfish are filter feeders and they provide clean water by removing excess nutrients that have entered the Bays from fertilizers, wastewater and stormwater runoff. Shellfish farms provide habitat for fish and other aquatic life, and they provide jobs for farmers and fresh seafood to local restaurants.
This appears to be the first public action in the process in over a year, since the Army Corps of Engineers requested public comments on developing a regional condition for their nationwide permit governing aquaculture operations in January of 2015.
DNREC is proposing a statewide activity approval for aquaculture in a limited number of shellfish aquaculture development areas (SADA) approved in their 2014 regulations. A statewide activity approval is basically a streamlined permitting process. The SADA in Beach Cove is not included in DNREC’s proposal and the acres of SADA in Little Assawoman Bay were cut by more than half. The decisions to reduce these areas were reached after months of private discussions between DNREC and primarily waterfront property-owners. This decision integrates the concerns of these property owners who either did not participate in the public workshops and hearings that informed the regulations or those who did but whose concerns were not acted upon at that time. While no specific justification was provided by DNREC, the reductions likely include some potential conflicts with navigation and a wide variety of concerns expressed by property owners.
It is great news the program is moving forward. However, the removal of the areas, particularly in the Little Assawoman Bay, may make it more difficult for shellfish farmers because it reduces the variety of locations and conditions permissible for farming through a simplified permit process. DNREC still must determine if SADAs have a sufficiently low density of wild hard clams before the SADA can be leased; this would likely further reduce acreage available for farming. Additionally, farming of hard clams was restricted by DNREC’s regulations to the Little Assawoman Bay, where the total SADA area was decreased by over half in this request for approval. During the Center for the Inland Bays’ year-long process to develop recommendations for shellfish aquaculture, stakeholders heard from experts that whittling down the farmable area of a waterbody to a few small locations was not the way to encourage this environmentally friendly industry. However, per regulation, individual applications for leases can still be submitted for areas both inside and outside of the SADAs. It is just that the permitting process for these applications would be more rigorous and costly for the applicant, and success less certain.
In the end, this proposal provides a simplified permit process and retains a good variety of locations and ecological characteristics amongst the SADAs in which to farm oysters. And so we are all one step closer to realizing the fruits of a new industry that will help clean up the Bays.
A public comment period on the statewide approval process is open through April 12.
Delaware's aquaculture regulations, which went into effect August 2014, initially proposed 442 one-acre plots for lease in the Inland Bays, with 118 leasable acres in Little Assawoman Bay, 115 acres in Indian River Bay and 209 acres in Rehoboth Bay.
The process reduces available acreage in Indian River Bay by 24 acres, from 115 to 91 one-acre plots, while in Little Assawoman Bay, only 43 one-acre plots remain from the original 118. Lease sites in Rehoboth Bay have not been changed. All plots are divided by 20-foot wide navigation channels.
A DNREC spokesman said the previously established shellfish areas have not been altered, but some were not included in the statewide application to guide shellfish aquaculture to areas most compatible with boaters and property owners.
No leases will be issued by the Division of Fish & Wildlife, however, until the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers makes a decision on the state's application for an expedited federal permit process. Without the corps' approval, aquaculturists would be required to apply for permits at both the state and federal levels.
After regulations were finalized and published in 2014, coastal residents opposed some shellfish aquaculture development areas, or SADAs, near Beach Cove in Indian River Bay and Little Assawoman Bay, calling for their removal from the program. The new process has eliminated those debated lease areas.
Residents with waterfront property on Indian River Bay and Little Assawoman Bay also complained that aquaculture gear and plot markers would be unsightly and would interfere with navigation and recreation on parts of the Inland Bays. They also opposed the department's public meeting process during the development of the program.
Those original shellfish leasing areas and other program details were developed in part by the Delaware Center for the Inland Bays Tiger Team, established in March 2012, with representatives from the center, DNREC, Department of Agriculture, University of Delaware Sea Grant, Sussex County Economic Development, Delaware Shellfish Advisory Council, University of Maryland Extension Service, recreation interests, commercial clammers and fisherman.
The Tiger Team hosted more than a dozen public meetings throughout more than a year of research and information gathering, followed by the state's formal public workshops, a public hearing and a public comment period in 2014.
Opponent Steve Callanen, who still has complaints about the state's commercial aquaculture plans for the Inland Bays, said he's pleased lease sites in Beach Cove and Little Assawoman Bay have been removed and reduced.
“There are lots of issues that really the public has not been made aware of and this is all being sold as a way to make millions of dollars for the state,” he said, adding that he doubts oysters will have any impact on cleaning up the bays. “I hope that at least they will select some sites that are not going to interfere with recreational boating and that will not also interfere with the people that live right along the shoreline.”
Fenwick Island resident Diane Maddex, of the Coalition for Little Assawoman Bay, said her group is pleased sites in Little Assawoman Bay were removed, but she plans to continue working with state officials to address other issues including “excessive, intrusive markers and the need to make permanent this reduction in the number of shellfish plots.”
Georgetown commercial fisherman Steve Friend, who plans to lease 3 acres in Little Assawoman Bay for clam harvesting, said the state has given in to opponents who didn't give watermen like him a chance to demonstrate what aquaculture will actually look like.
“You're giving up a lot for them to have just because they don't want the view,” he said. “I'm sorry, but that's life. You only own what your property is sitting on. They're making it so hard for the people who actually want to get into this.”
Friend said he's invested tens of thousands of dollars in his future aquaculture venture. He calls it unfair to remove questionable plots without replacing them in other locations.
If the state receives the approval to expedite leases through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Philadelphia District, the first leases would be determined by a lottery, annually renewable for 15 years. The application fee for a 1-acre aquaculture lease is $300, with annual renewal fees for Delaware residents costing an additional $100 per acre. The annual renewal fee for nonresidents is $1,000 per acre. Farmers will be able to lease 1-5 acres in Rehoboth and Indian River bays, and an additional 1-5 acres in Little Assawoman Bay.
For more information, go to www.dnrec.delaware.gov/fw/Fisheries/Pages/ShellfishAquaculture.aspx.
