St. Lawrence River Impressions: Fishing boat seizure kicks hornet’s nest
I’ve spent the last couple of days exploring Clayton and Wellesley Island, traveling the river in my kayak and on a boat driven by Save the River director Jennifer Caddick.
When I mentioned to her the seizure of Roy Anderson’s boat by Canadian authorities, Caddick said, “That’s all anyone’s talking about.”
Anderson, a seasonal resident of Thousand Island Park, told the Watertown Daily Times that he was forced to pay $1,000 immediately or risk forfeiture of his boat.
“I had to pay it on the spot,” Mr. Anderson said. “They seized my boat and I had to buy it back on the spot.”
That hasn’t gone down well in this part of border country, where fishermen and other boaters regularly drift back and forth over the international water boundary.
Anderson was less than a quarter mile inside Canadian territory, he wasn’t anchored, and he hadn’t gone ashore.
According to the Times, New York state has now asked that his thousand bucks be reimbursed. David Sommerstein is reporting this morning that state and Federal lawmakers are moving fast to try to contain the damage.
“Just the Walleye Association had called me this morning to ask if I can intervene because they’re worried about will this happen again to other Americans during the summer,” state Sen. Patty Ritchie told NCPR.
“And I’m actually afraid this could put a real chill on U.S.-Canada relations.”
I grew up in Alaska, where fisheries and border issues with Canada were often tense even before 9/11.
It’s not a great path to go down and there is a lot more at stake along the St. Lawrence, where sport fishing and tourism are essential to both nations’ economies.
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It sounds like a case of overzealous enforcement that has backed the Canadian government into an embarrassing corner. Maybe we need a “fishermen are not terrorists campaign”. Well, maybe they are to fish but the fish don’t have a border to protect.
If Canada wants to play stupid, I say 54/40 or fight.
On a more serious note, why pick on just the little boats? Why not require all the commercial boats to check in at customs every time the meander back and forth across the line?
The cargo ships report in when crossing the water border. The call back to the last reporting station and ahead to the next station. They used to include a lot of information such as: what they are hauling and what their draft is. Now, the general message is ship name, upbound or down bound and approximate time to next report.
I wonder if the agent is related to the woman who fined the farmer for putting his heifers outside in the winter? Just goes to show that there are officious jerks everywhere.
My basic feeling is I am sick of everything since Sept. 11, 2001. It used to be enjoyable to travel in and out of Canada. I haven’t since Oct. 2001 when I went to Detroit to visit my Dad before he died. Hated the border crossing then and probably never will again.
In fairness I have to say either my wife or I (or both) have crossed into Canada about monthly ever since 2001. As it happened we were in Canada on 9/11 and there was some hassle at the border returning to the US but overall it has never been a problem. If the USD still brought over $1.50 Cdn as it once did, we’d cross more often
This has nothing to do with 0-11 or terrorists. This is about some trade disagreement that’s currently going on. Didn’t we read about some timber talks just last week? The border dogs would deny this, but every time there’s a trade problem, there are incidents like this. Some poor bastard, minding his own business, and the border guys pounce on him for nothing.
I firmly believe these incidents are sanctioned (and encouraged) by someone higher up in Canada’s government. There’s no way to prove such a thing, but there’s definitely a pattern.
Who goes fishing with a thousand cash in his pocket?