TWRA proposal on commercial kayak outfitters

[JoelO]

Not sure if you guys have seen this but I saw it mentioned by Byron on his latest LRO fishing report.

https://www.thedailytimes.com/news/locals-fear-townsend-tube-traffic-overlooked-in-new-twra-rules/article_2114432a-306f-591d-9294-7cf8d95cc2c0.html

As noted, it won't do anything to regulate traffic.  I'm guessing the fees will just be passed along to the consumer.

[Bfish]

The whole proposal is dumb.  Yes something needs to be done. 

However it is not TWRA jurisdiction, it creates a new division for them. The fees collected won't pay for TWRA's work.  TDEC all ready regulates commercial river usage (whitewater rafting outfitters).  Why doesn't TDEC do some capacity studies (to figure out a reasonable max. usage), then regulate the outfitters with a simply only release a certain number of users per day, with a reasonable cap on the number per hour? It works pretty well on the commercial whitewater rivers.

[bee]

I will just throw this out there. 

Put a bill together that makes a outfitter responsible for the actions (LITTERING, IMPAIRMENT BY ALCOHOL OR DRUGS, ETC) of the "renters/clients".

Limit the number of commercial kayaks /rental canoes on a river, determined by the size of the river.

Make all paddlers/renters buy a river use permit, daily or seasonal, on some cost roughly  equivalent to fishing permits.

Earmark all proceeds for enforcement personal on the waterways. 

[MikeA]

While they're at it raise our license fees again so we can pay even more to not fish the places we already paid to stock and access. From the looks of this I will pay about as much to run a few guide trips a year as the dude dumping hundreds of kayaks, tubes, floaties, public intox, trash, sex on the gravel bar, fight clubs, etc, every day. Seems fair to me....  When license sales are all but gone because we consistently fail to protect the resource, what then?  Is that when Dollywood will put a zip line and a log ride down the middle prong?

SMFH

[MikeA]

I guess the upside of this is that we should all open a kayak buisness and rape the hell outa the rivers for the pure profit it promises. Looks pretty clear that the State doesn't care and has given it a big thumbs up.

[grumpy]

I think someone's pocket is  being lined on TWRA commission.