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Relying On Survey Of Non-Boaters A Bad Idea

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By FRANK SARGEANT | The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 30, 2008

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission under executive director Ken Haddad has done an exceptional job of seeking public input on regulations to manage fish and wildlife, but a recent effort on boating rules might have strayed a bit off course.

The commission is using data from a random Mason-Dixon Poll to show that the public would strongly support requiring all children under 13 to wear life preservers any time they step on a boat.

If the commission wants to assure an end to recreational boating within a generation, they could probably choose no rule better suited to that end. The rule would particularly affect kids from low-income families.

Here's why: In Florida's nearly endless summer, wearing a standard vest-type personal floatation device, the least expensive of all models, is amazingly uncomfortable. The thick foam or other flotation in these devices acts as insulation, and it is like wearing a heavy winter coat, not something most kids want to do when the temperature is 90 and the humidity is 100 percent. But the price is right on these units, as little as $7 each.

It is true that new inflatable PFDs, either suspender or belt types, are far more comfortable. They are so small it is easy to forget you are wearing one. But they are also far more expensive, with prices typically $80 to $160 each, plus about $15 for annual replacement of the air cartridge that makes them inflate when they hit the water. Buy a set of four for the average boating family, and you're out $320 to $640. How many folks boating in a 17-foot utility boat with a 10-horsepower kicker are going to be able to afford those PFDs?

The current rule requires PFDs for children under 6, and that makes sense; many small children can't swim, and the youngest don't have an adequate sense of self-preservation to avoid falling overboard. Plus, parental pressure can assure that these kids will wear the jackets - even the cheap ones.

But forcing older kids to wear inexpensive but uncomfortable PFDs pretty much guarantees that they are soon going to equate boating with a hot and thoroughly unpleasant experience. And as soon as they reach the age where they can decide what they want to do with their leisure time, they'll find something other than boating to entertain themselves.

There is no doubt that if every kid under 13 always wore a life jacket, some lives would be saved. But it's also true that government can't, and probably should not, always protect us from ourselves. Boating is an optional activity; it's not like forcing car seats and seat belts in automobiles, because all of us pretty much must ride in these vehicles.

But making boating unpleasant through regulation means more young people are not going to be boaters. Is that really a direction the commission wants to take, based mostly on the whims of non-boaters in a random survey?

Another topic in the survey was requiring boater education classes for all motor boat operators. Like the PFD survey, this one was supported by the sampling. Boat operators under 21 are already required to take the classes. This one seems to make sense; boating requires special knowledge in many situations, and classes not only make skippers safer, but also make them more confident, more competent and add to their enjoyment of the marine environment.

The commission will propose to the Legislature that the boating safety requirement be phased in during the next 11 years. The PFD rule could take effect immediately if approved.

GULF COUNCIL MEETING: The Gulf Council meeting this afternoon in St. Petersburg seems likely to attract standing-room-only crowds as irate reef fishermen and divers turn out to protest a potential federal reduction in gag grouper harvest. The management agency is considering a number of options, the most restrictive of which would drop the daily bag limit on gags from five fish to one and create a five-month closed season.

The limitations are being proposed at a time when many recreational anglers report excellent catches of gags inshore and offshore, and many are concerned that survey tactics used by the federal agency are at fault, indicating problems in a fishery where there are plenty of fish. The meeting is at the Radisson Hotel, 12600 Roosevelt Blvd. in St. Petersburg, with the public comment period beginning at 1:30 p.m.

TROUT SEASON CLOSING: Spotted sea trout season closes Friday in waters north and west of Fred Howard Park, near the Pasco/Pinellas county line. The season will remain closed in that zone through Feb. 29. Waters south of the line remain open to trout harvest.

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