President Donald Trump on Thursday declared July 2 National Scallops Day. To mark the inaugural holiday, he announced his administration’s plan to open fishing grounds that have been closed since 1994: the Northern Edge.
The area is about an 18- to 20-hour steam from the nation’s scallop capital, New Bedford, and it’s been closed so long that younger generations of fishermen have never fished its bottom.
“Are you here to wish me a ‘Happy Scalloper Day?’” Tony Alvernaz, one of the older-generation scallopers who has fished that small tip of Georges Bank, quipped when he answered the phone.
“Everybody is like amen, about time, holy Jesus,” he said of the plans to reopen the area.
In recent years, fisheries regulators raised the possibility of reopening the sliver of ocean bottom, but ultimately voted not to take it up. Regulators, informed by research scientists, weigh the sustainability of the resource and the needs of the fishing industry when determining where fishermen can go, for how many days, and how many pounds they may catch.
In 2024, an analyst for the New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) said there was a high density of scallops in the Northern Edge, but that they need the aggregations to ensure the future success of other scallop grounds, The Light previously reported. That was, in part, the reasoning for its closure in 1994: to protect the spawning habitats of scallops and other fish species.
NOAA Fisheries did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the process or timing of the proposed reopening.
The agency announced the priority on Thursday among more than two dozen recommendations for fisheries on all coasts — one of which is to allow the stacking of scallop permits, another long-argued subject on New Bedford’s waterfront.
The priorities are a response to Trump’s April 2025 executive order on “Restoring American Seafood Competitiveness.” It directed regional fishery councils to work with NOAA Fisheries and stakeholders to identify “overregulated fisheries” and suggest actions to reduce the “regulatory burden on them.”
“After considering all input from councils, fishing industry, and the public, we have prioritized actions — many of which align with Council identified priorities — we believe will reduce burdens on domestic fishing, increase production, stabilize markets, improve access, and enhance economic profitability,” NOAA Fisheries Assistant Administrator Eugenio Piñeiro Soler said in a statement.
NEFMC spokesperson Alex Dunn in an email said the council does not have comment on the Northern Edge priority at this time, but “will have more information to share on Monday after the holiday weekend.”
Trump declared the planned reopening on Truth Social, writing NOAA Fisheries “will open up the Northern Edge of Georges Bank to Scallops Fishing, fulfilling the dream to our Great Fishermen who were so badly treated by the Obama and Biden Administrations, and by the Country of Canada.”
“That will mean millions more pounds of beautiful Wild Scallops a year on the kitchen table of Americans, and more Jobs in Norfolk, Virginia, Cape May, New Jersey, New Bedford, Massachusetts, and essentially all parts of the East Coast,” he continued.
Kevin Stokesbury is the dean for the School of Marine Science and Technology (SMAST) at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth and a leading researcher of the U.S. sea scallop resource. To him, there’s a scientific argument to opening the Northern Edge — especially given how little research has come out of its closure.
“There’s always an advantage in a large fishing ground to have an area that’s closed so you can see the natural variation of the animals you’re targeting, and that gives you an idea whether your fisheries management is having any effect or if it’s just a natural cycle,” Stokesbury said. “I will say though, that requires steady funding and monitoring, and that has not really been the case in this area.”
Over the past 20 years, he has seen scallop populations at the Northern Edge fluctuate considerably — an indication that commercial fishing isn’t the only factor driving the boom and bust.
Stokesbury added that Canada has kept its side of the Northern Edge open to fishing, and Stokesbury’s own research has found that scallop populations on that side tend to rebound within a few years.
Stokesbury is currently working on a two-year report on the benthic conditions at Georges Bank, a report that will include greater details on how the scallop population has swung wildly in that area. Over the past several years, Stokesbury’s surveys have also found a thick carpet of horse mussels where there had previously been scallops.
“Which is a shame,” Stokesbury added. “It really is one of the best areas for scallops in the world.”
Alvernaz also said the bottom there has “turned to crap” during the closure, filling with mussel beds.
But he still believes it’s a worthwhile place to fish, and that it will allow the fishing boats to spread out, which he said will benefit both the industry and the resource.
Mayor Jon Mitchell has repeatedly lobbied for the reopening of the Northern Edge, saying it is economically important for the city’s fishing industry and can be sustainably fished.
In an emailed statement Thursday, Mitchell said he “strongly” supports the reopening: “After urging NOAA for more than a decade to reopen these valuable fishing grounds to New Bedford’s scallop fleet, it is encouraging to see the federal government prioritize this effort as well.”
Last fall, state Sen. Mark Montigny wrote to Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, saying that access to the Northern Edge will “provide relief to scallopers facing dwindling quotas in other permit areas.”
“Total scallop landings in 2024 were only a third of the scallops harvested in 2019,” Montingny continued. “This is not a sustainable path, and failure to provide access to additional healthy scallop grounds will only result in existing populations dying a natural death while fishermen and our local economies continue to lose out.”
Alvernaz says he hopes the Northern Edge is open by April, the start of the new scallop season.
“We’re gonna stay on top of these people,” he said. “Lutnick is on it. Trump is on it.”
Email Anastasia E. Lennon at alennon@newbedfordlight.org and Brooke Kushwaha at bkushwaha@newbedfordlight.org.
Everyone’s happy now. Wait until Trump opens up George’s Bank to offshore oil drilling.