Coastal Conservation Commission v. Gutierrez

Pursuant to the Magnuson-Stevens Act (the act), in 1983, the secretary of commerce (the secretary) (defendant) approved the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Plan for Reef Fish Resources (Reef Fish FMP). The Reef Fish FMP was designed to rebuild overfished reef-fish stocks to stable levels and was implemented through amendments regulating fish quotas, bag limits, and other limitations. In 2000, based on 1997 red grouper stock levels, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) determined that red grouper had been overfished. To address the overfishing, the secretary submitted proposed Secretarial Amendment 1 to the Reef Fish FMP. A 2002 stock assessment determined that red grouper stock was no longer overfished but had not yet attained continuous maximum sustainable yield. Secretarial Amendment 1 was revised and promulgated in 2004, indicating that measures were still needed to restore red grouper stock within 10 years. Pursuant to Secretarial Amendment 1, the NMFS published a rule imposing a recreational-bag limit and a commercial-catch weight limit on red grouper in 2004. In 2005, after recreational red grouper catch levels remained consistently high, the NMFS published an interim rule further reducing the red grouper bag limit, imposing an aggregate grouper bag limit for all groupers, and closing recreational fishing for all grouper species in the Gulf of Mexico for two months. The Coastal Conservation Association and Fishing Rights Alliance (the fishing groups) (plaintiff) challenged the aggregate grouper bag limit and two-month recreational closure for all grouper species.