Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act Provisions; Fisheries of the Northeastern United States; Northeast Multispecies Fishery; Framework Adjustment 69

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE <SUBAGY>National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration</SUBAGY> <CFR>50 CFR Part 648</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Docket No. 251118-0171]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 0648-BN23</RIN> <SUBJECT>Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act Provisions; Fisheries of the Northeastern United States; Northeast Multispecies Fishery; Framework Adjustment 69</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Commerce. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Proposed rule; request for comments. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> NMFS proposes regulations to implement specifications and management measures in Framework Adjustment 69 to the Northeast Multispecies Fishery Management Plan, except for measures specific to Atlantic cod; approve Northeast multispecies (groundfish) sectors and allocations; establish recreational measures for several stocks; update common pool possession limits; and clarify and correct existing regulations. This action is necessary to respond to updated scientific information and achieve the goals and objectives of the fishery management plan. The proposed measures are intended to help prevent overfishing, rebuild overfished stocks, achieve optimum yield, and ensure that management measures are based on the best scientific information available. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> Comments must be received by 5 p.m. EST on January 7, 2026. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> A plain language summary of this proposed rule is available at: <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov/docket/NOAA-NMFS-2025-0004.</E> You may submit comments, identified by NOAA-NMFS-2025-0004, by the following method: • <E T="03">Electronic Submission:</E> Submit all electronic public comments via the Federal e-Rulemaking Portal. Go to <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov</E> and type NOAA-NMFS-2025-0004 in the Search box ( <E T="03">note:</E> copying and pasting the FDMS Docket Number directly from this document may not yield search results). Click on the “Comment” icon, complete the required fields, and enter or attach your comments. <E T="03">Instructions:</E> Comments sent by any other method, to any other address or individual, or received after the end of the comment period, may not be considered. All comments received are a part of the public record and will generally be posted for public viewing on <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov</E> without change. All personal identifying information ( <E T="03">e.g.,</E> name, address), confidential business information, or otherwise sensitive information submitted voluntarily by the sender will be publicly accessible. You may submit anonymous comments by entering “N/A” in the required fields if you wish to remain anonymous. Copies of Framework Adjustment 69, including the draft Environmental Assessment, the Regulatory Impact Review, and the Regulatory Flexibility Act Analysis prepared by the New England Fishery Management Council in support of this action, are available from Dr. Cate O'Keefe, Executive Director, New England Fishery Management Council, 50 Water Street, Mill 2, Newburyport, MA 01950. The supporting documents are also accessible via the internet at: <E T="03">https://www.nefmc.org/management-plans/northeast-multispecies</E> or <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov.</E> Copies of each sector's approved operations plan and contracts from fishing years 2023-2024; the Sector Operations Plan, Contract, and Environmental Assessment Requirements guidance document for fishing years 2025-2026; and other supporting documents are available from the NMFS Greater Atlantic Regional Fisheries Office (GARFO), by contacting Heather Nelson at <E T="03">heather.nelson@noaa.gov.</E> These documents are also accessible via the GARFO website. Written comments regarding the burden-hour estimates or other aspects of the collection-of-information requirements contained in this proposed rule may be submitted to <E T="03">https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain.</E> Find this particular information collection by selecting “Currently under 30-day Review—Open for Public Comments” or by using the search function. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Liz Sullivan, Fishery Policy Analyst, phone: 978-282-8493; email: <E T="03">Liz.Sullivan@noaa.gov.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> The Northeast Multispecies Fishery Management Plan (FMP) regulates the commercial and recreational fishing of 13 species of groundfish through the use of various management programs designed to promote the long-term sustainability of the groundfish fishery. The FMP includes the annual specification of catch limits for each applicable component of the fishery. The directed groundfish fishery is divided into the recreational and commercial components, and the commercial fishery is further divided between sectors and the common pool (see “Sectors” below for more information). Annually, the commercial groundfish fishery has a value of approximately $40 million (ex-vessel revenue from the most recent complete fishing year). Recreational fisheries, including the recreational groundfish fishery, contribute substantial value to the regional and national economies. In April of 2024, the New England Fishery Management Council (Council) began development of Amendment 25 to revise the management of Atlantic cod in the Northeast Multispecies FMP from the current management system of two stocks to four stocks. Contemporaneously, the Council decided to address implementing measures in the next framework adjustment. Framework 69 was developed in connection with Amendment 25. The specifications and measures in Framework 69 that were specific to Atlantic cod were dependent on Amendment 25 and would have been necessary to effectuate Amendment 25 changes, if Amendment 25 was approved and implemented by NMFS. Other measures contained within Framework 69 are independent of Amendment 25, and could therefore be implemented (if approved) regardless of the decision on Amendment 25. The Council reviewed the proposed regulations for Framework 69 and deemed them consistent with, and necessary to implement, Framework 69 in a February 26, 2025, letter from Council Chairman Rick Bellavance to Regional Administrator Michael Pentony. On May 16, 2025, the Secretary of Commerce disapproved Amendment 25, after review of the Amendment consistent with the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (Magnuson-Stevens Act). Under the provisions of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the Greater Atlantic Regional Fisheries Office's Regional Administrator reviews proposed regulations for consistency with the FMP, plan amendments, the Magnuson-Stevens Act and other applicable law. The Regional Administrator is required to publish proposed regulations consistent with the Council's recommendations, with such technical changes as may be necessary for clarity and an explanation of those changes for public comment (section 304(b)(1)(A) of the Magnuson-Stevens Act). After public comment, the Regional Administrator may publish revisions to the proposed regulations along with an explanation of any differences between the proposed and final regulations (section 304(b)(3) of the Magnuson-Stevens Act; 50 CFR 648.90(a)). Because the Secretary disapproved Amendment 25, NMFS is excluding from the Framework 69 proposed rule any measures that were dependent on the approval of Amendment 25 in accordance with the Magnuson-Stevens Act and the specification regulations. These exclusions are technical in nature, reflect the disapproval of Amendment 25, and remove measures that NMFS would have implemented under its responsibility to carry out the Magnuson-Stevens Act consistent with the FMP's provisions. The exclusions are necessary for clarity and will prevent confusion about the remaining measures that are necessary and appropriate for implementing the fishery's specifications. The excluded measures include status determination criteria and specifications for the four Atlantic cod stocks, common pool accountability measures (AM) for those four Atlantic cod stocks, and other management measures that were dependent on the revised stock structure. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Summary of Proposed Measures</HD> This proposed action would implement the management measures in Framework Adjustment 69 to the Northeast Multispecies FMP that were not dependent on the approval of Amendment 25. The Regional Administrator is seeking comments on the proposed regulations and intends to promulgate the final regulations after careful consideration of any submitted comments. Through Framework 69, and based on Council recommendations, NMFS proposes to: • Set the shared U.S./Canada quotas for Georges Bank (GB) yellowtail flounder for fishing years 2025 and 2026 and eastern GB haddock for fishing year 2025; • Set specifications, including catch limits for seven groundfish stocks: Gulf of Maine (GOM) haddock, American plaice, witch flounder, pollock, and Atlantic halibut for fishing years 2025-2027; GB yellowtail flounder for fishing years 2025-2026; and GB haddock for fishing year 2025; • Remove a requirement for sectors to submit State and Federal permit information to NMFS; and • Modify the catch threshold for implementing the Atlantic sea scallop fishery's AMs for GB yellowtail flounder and northern windowpane flounder. This action also proposes regulatory changes and other measures that are not part of Framework 69, but that may be considered and implemented under section 305(d) authority in the Magnuson-Stevens Act to make changes necessary to carry out the FMP. NMFS is proposing these changes in conjunction with the Framework 69 proposed measures for expediency purposes. Through this rulemaking, NM ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 146k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━