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heard more than 7 hours of testimony on LD 1957, An Act to Restore Diadromous Fish in the St. Croix River. As originally proposed, LD 1957 would have overturned the 1995 state law closing fishways at the Woodland and Grand Falls Dam to native sea-run alewives. Since the closures, the St. Croix's alewife population has fallen from more than 2.5 million to only 1,300. Nearly 100 people testified during the lengthy and sometimes contentious hearing and nearly two thirds of those of who spoke were in favor of re-opening the St. Croix watershed to alewives. There was strong support for the legislation from Maine's environmental community, the state's lobster industry, groundfish interests, tourism supporters, alewife harvesters, and many sportsmen's groups. Nonetheless, following the hearing, the Baldacci Administration caved to pressure from members of the Passamaquoddy Indian Tribe and ordered state fisheries agencies to work with the tribe in order to find "conclusive" evidence that alewives existed in the St. Croix above Grand Falls before the species would be allowed to be restored to these waters. After additional political wrangling and multiple work sessions, the Marine Resources Committee voted 12-1 on an amended bill that will open fish passage at the Woodland Dam this year; this would give alewives access to another 1,200 or so acres of very marginal, in-river habitat.
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