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THE PRESIDENT: Very well.
The last were really not formally of-
fered. You may destroy your copies.
Amendment No. 3 is offered by Delegate
Macdonald and seconded by the co-spon-
sors.
The Chair recognizes Delegate Mac-
donald.
DELEGATE MACDONALD: Mr. Presi-
dent, fellow delegates: This amendment
would strike out from section 3.22, on page
6, lines 25 and 26, the phrase "pertaining
to natural environment and resources".
As the section stands now, with those
words in there, the General Assembly will
be able to enact local laws on the subject
of natural environment and resources.
With the words out of there, with the
words stricken, then the General Assembly
could enact only statewide laws on that
subject.
I think it is quite obvious that Mary-
land's greatest natural resource is the
Chesapeake Bay. The Chesapeake Bay is
the greatest natural oyster bed in Ameri-
ca, and probably in the world.
In February of 1966, the Wye Institute,
and that is spelled W-y-e, made a very in-
teresting, complete report on the seafood
industry in the State of Maryland. This
report, ladies and gentlemen, is an eye
opener.
The Wye Institute is a non-profit or-
ganization, chartered in the State of Mary-
land, sponsored by Eastern Shore leaders,
and this report is endorsed by the Eastern
Shore leaders who head up the Wye In-
stitute.
The drop in oyster production in the
State of Maryland, ladies and gentlemen,
in the last eighty-five years has been
shocking. In the last eighty-five years the
drop in production of oysters has been nine
per cent.
A primary cause of this drop and every-
thing I am saying now is taken directly
from this report of the Wye Institute, the
primary cause of this drop has been the
system of county by county laws which we
have followed here in the State of Mary-
land on this subject.
Let me quote from page 5 of this re-
port: "The county laws have strangled
development. Restrictions of gear are in
many cases deleterious. Seasonal laws have
interfered with oyster quality. Yet the
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communal aspects of the fisheries do not
have to stand in the way of development,
provided reasonable changes take place."
The report suggests several methods for
rehabilitating the oyster industry and the
seafood industry at large in the State of
Maryland.
Every one of those suggestions which
the report makes would require that the
present archaic system of legislating on
our natural resources county by county be
clone away with.
In brief, the abolition of this old sys-
tem of county by county legislation is es-
sential if we are to rehabilitate this indus-
try, which I would say is No. 1 in the
State of Maryland.
TPIE PRESIDENT: You have one min-
ute, Delegate Macdonald.
DELEGATE MACDONALD: What do
these county laws do? First and foremost,
they prevent non-residents of county from
taking anything from the county waters.
If you want to take oysters from the
waters of the county of Wicomico you must
be a resident of Wicomico County, and that
is true all the way down the line with
every one of these counties.
Secondly, they restrict the methods of
operation. They restrict the gear which
may be used in harvesting the oysters.
Thirdly, they restrict harvesting seasons.
In other words, these county by county
laws are nothing but restrictions, restric-
tions and restrictions.
THE PRESIDENT: Your six minutes
are up, Delegate Macdonald.
DELEGATE MACDONALD: Fellow
delegates, I urge that you vote for this
amendment.
THE PRESIDENT: Delegate Carson.
DELEGATE CARSON: Mr. President,
ladies and gentlemen: We live in a State
which has been called America in minia-
ture, and I think that phrase has much
truth within it because we have in Wor-
cester County a species of deer unknown
to the rest of the State. We have in
Garrett County a turkey population un-
known to the rest of the State.
We have seafood species in southern
Maryland in the waters of the Bay which
are unknown to the upper Bay, and to the
tributaries of the Bay, and we have some
species of fish in the upper Bay which are
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