Governor signs guide bill, but will it stop the Coast Guard?
Gov. Brad Henry has signed SB 277, which will require fishing guides to obtain a license through the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation.
The Oklahoma Wildlife Conservation Commission meets Monday and is expected to adopt the fee and establish requirements for the guide license.
The state fishing license guide bill was hurriedly passed last week and is an attempt to stop the Coast Guard from enforcing its licensing requirements on fishing guides at Lake Texoma.
The U.S. Coast Guard posted flyers around Lake Texoma recently that it was going to start enforcing licensing requirements for operators of uninspected passenger vessels like fishing guides.
Regulations required by the Coast Guard are “way too stringent on a striper guide,” said Rep. Don Armes, R-Faxon, the House sponsor of SB 277.
Lake Texoma is considered “navigable waters” by federal statute and is under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Coast Guard because it is a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers lake.
The Coast Guard hasn’t enforced licensing requirements for 15 years on Lake Texoma, but it conducted a risk assessment on the lake after a fatality last month when a guide boat capsized.
Oklahoma’s Congressional delegation – Tom Cole, Dan Boren and Jim Inhofe – are trying to intervene to prevent the Coast Guard from exercising its regulatory authority.
In a joint news release issued Friday, Boren said that subjecting the average fishing guide to the level of licensing requirements that the U.S. Coast Guard designed for major ports and waterways was like swatting a fly with a hammer.
Boren is urging the Coast Guard to allow the state to regulate the fishing guides.
Armes thinks if there is state license already in place, the Coast Guard “probably doesn’t mess with it.”
But whether the Coast Guard will back off now that the state has its own fishing guide licensing law remains to be seen.
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Comments
As a Coast Guard Veteran I am in complete agreement with Carol Smith’s comments.
ANYONE who takes money to transport people on a boat should be under the control of the Coast Guard, and not governed by local authorities attempting to ease standard licensing regulations which are applicable on all navigable waterways.
Senator Inhofe has earned my respect in the past as regards to certain rights for military veterans, but I feel his energies in backing Oklahoma SB 277 may be misguided though honorable.
As a retired Coast Guard man I fully agree with Carol Smith.
The Coast Guard spends thousands of man hours every week looking for people that did not have proper equipment or life jackets for all on board. If the guides can’t afford to go by Coast Guard requirements they don’t need to be putting other people’s lives in danger.
Lack of rules, lack of responsibility, lack of enforcment, lack of safety….It’s that simple. The USGS is a competent group that does a great job of maintaining quality of enjoying all the navigable waterways in the U.S. What we don’t need is more government regulation because we don’t agree with the rules already in place…
Totally agree with Carol Smith. The Coast Guard should be in charge as long as your in water. This is their job to make sure everyone abide by the rules and they do this to protect lives.
The Coast Guard requirements aren’t that strict – and they are specific to INLAND waters – not coastal! They require such things as knowledge of the navigation rules and a certain amount of experience on the type of waters where they will be working. Oh, and drug testing. And their boat must have proper safety equipment – like enough life jackets and fire extinguishers. I’d personally like to know that the person I hired knew how to not run into someone else and that there were life jackets on board.