As promised, more from the Tidal Fish meeting last week:

Watermen are mad about O'Malley's 21-member oyster commission, which we wrote about earlier here on bayblog. They used words like "ridiculous" and rigged" to describe the panel, which includes a real estate agent and a lawyer but only one packer and one waterman.

Neither the waterman nor the packer chosen actually oysters. Both used to, but don't anymore. Some watermen argued that it would make more sense to have someone who actually works on the water serve on the panel. That person give a real-life picture of what's going on in the bay.

But that might not be what the panel wants. Its goal is to come up with solutions to sustain the oyster in the bay, which we well know is struggling under the weight of two oyster diseases and bad water. Its primary goal does not seem to be to sustain an industry for years to come.  I still am somewhat curious about the lawyer and the real estate agent, how they fit into oyster recovery. But nobody asked me for my opinion...

The watermen have asked DNR to allow one more waterman and one more packer on to the committee. If the agency agrees, they''ll do it within the next couple weeks, because the next meeting is mid-October.