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What happens in Washington, Doesn’t stay in Washington

Courtesy of NAA:

As a first in NAA’s new webinar series, the legal team from the Northwest Aquaculture Alliance and the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe will provide an overview of the ongoing net-pen aquaculture litigation in Washington state. Join us for an industry-only discussion of what’s at stake, and what it could mean for the entire aquaculture industry!

When
October 2, 2023
8-9am PST

Where
Zoom

Overview

In November 2022, the Washington state Commissioner of Public Lands, Hilary Franz, stunned the aquaculture world by declaring that Washington’s public aquatic lands “will not longer be home to commercial finfish aquaculture.”

In response, the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe, a sovereign Indian tribe with plans to engage in net pen aquaculture, filed suit in Thurston County (WA) Superior Court against the Washington State Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and Hilary Franz, alleging that the Commissioner’s Order dated November 17, 2022, was “a step beyond legislative intent.”

Five months later, the Northwest Aquaculture Alliance filed a Motion to Intervene, which (despite significant pushback from DNR) the Court granted. Recently, the Wild Fish Conservancy (WFC) announced that they seek to intervene on behalf of DNR and Hilary Franz—a move that will assuredly pit peer-reviewed aquaculture science against anti-aquaculture science fiction.

In the first of NAA’s new online webinars, the legal team for NWAA and the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe will discuss the key issues in the litigation, including a potential precedent-setting outcome. We hope you will join us for an industry-only discussion of what’s at stake, and what it could mean for the entire aquaculture industry.

Submit questions for the panelists here.

Register for the webinar here.

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