 Carlos Fetterolf
- Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1999
“The gill netting controversy was one that Michigan wanted to push very hard and Michigan did push it and they were able to get the laws changed so that there wasn’t any gill netting in Lake Michigan — in Michigan waters.”
“We killed enough lamprey and we stocked enough fish so we could have a world class fishery….”
 Howard Tanner
“…we announced, we said we’re gonna manage and we’re gonna manage for sport fishing and these are the things we’re gonna do to commercial fishing. First thing we said — used to be anybody that wanted a commercial license could buy one for $25. We said we’re gonna have limited entry. We’re not going to have unlimited capitalization of this resource.”
“…if you haven’t reported $5,000 average, you don’t have a fishing license. When we did that, we eliminated all the tribal fishermen. That’s with hindsight an obvious mistake. That’s with hindsight, an obvious mistake. That’s when they took us to court. That’s when they won and that’s why they’ve been able to sustain a fishery beyond state authority today….”
“Well, we got the eggs in the fall of ’64 and we stocked them in the spring of ’65 and we stocked them in Wilkins Creek, a tributary of Torch Lake, up in my home county of Antrum County, and Governor Romney was there with a golden bucket and I have a picture of him stocking the fish.”
Wayne Tody
- Traverse City, Michigan, 1999
“We banned gill nets by law and I don’t think anybody’s gonna revoke that law. We don’t think gill nets should be used. I don’t think you’ll get anybody to disagree with that. I hope not. But the Indians are using them in ways that we banned, what we outlawed….”
“…the sport fishing lobby was very strong and financed us, so obviously we were biased.”
Ron Poff
“…when you work with commercial fishermen and any of these industries…it’s always tough because they are harvesters and they make a living off of it. It’s not just a hobby with them…it’s tough and you’re a regulator and you have a lot to do with the well-being of the fish population that they’re harvesting or making their money off of.”
 Myrl Keller
- Charlevoix, Michigan, 1999
“…the Great Lakes fisheries resource in terms of who really owns it — it’s a public resource. It’s owned by the public of Michigan, for instance, Michigan waters, Wisconsin, Wisconsin waters and how are we best serving that public. So that’s where we kind of rewrote the whole program and took a different management philosophy….”
“…most of the management people in the state of Michigan for the old Department of Conservation relied heavily on what recommendations of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife — actually it was the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries then — had to say on various populations, fisheries populations, and how they should be managed.”
 Jory Jonas
- Charlevoix, Michigan, 1999
“…we each have different constituent groups and we have different abilities to communicate with them. We have different governments….”
“…once we opened up the sea to the fresh water, things started coming in. And so you had that problem to deal with and that’s where the Chinook salmon came from. It was an alewife control measure. They weren’t trying to create a fishery or bring new things in. They had to put something in there….”
 Jim Moore
- Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, 1999
“In Wisconsin very much from the beginnings of trout and salmon program it was pretty clear that one way or another there was gonna probably be a commercial fishery existing with the sport fishery.”
 Mike Toneys
- Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, 1999
“Fishermen from other states around Wisconsin have put pressure on sport fishermen here who have tried to put pressure on the DNR to get rid of the killer gill net, so it’s caused us a lot of headaches over the years and we’ve had to spend a lot of time trying to defend our position on the use of gill nets in the commercial fishery.”
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