this is not a statewide problem. if the Kenai river charter guides feel that there is a problem then address it as a local problem. all this would do for most of the saltwater guides is add another layer of goverment control and expense that is not needed, because we don't have a problem. It takes several years of sea time before you can even get your captains license, we have to have current cpr and first aid every year. we have Coast Guard inspections of our vessels every year, but mostly if you are a lousy guide and inexperienced captain you wont be in business long. the booking agencies that book many of the clients for the charter boats get feedback from the clients, and it only takes a few negative comments and they won't be sending any more clients to that boat. In our area the least experienced boast captain has been guiding for at least 15 years. we lost the younger business's this year to NMFS charter halibut LEP program. many of these guides were experienced competent guides. If Senator McGuire is so worried about Alaska's sport fishing industry why haven't we heard one word out of her and the rest of our senators and reps. in Juneau over the last couple of years while NMFS has been raping the charter halibut fleet statewide? this is where she needs to stick her nose.

Read SB24 carefully...

Everyone can keep doing what they are doing now. The lodges, charters, single guide operators can all keep going as they are now.
This would not be an additional license. It creates a board so that the sport fishing guide industry, not Fish and Game, controls how sport fish guiding is conducted.
This bill is something that we should all get behind. Now is the time, before there are so many people operating as guides that it is virtually impossible to manage. Look a the Big Game Guide industry. They are having the problems that the sport fishing industry will be having very shortly (or as some think, we are having now.)

Look at all the game that is going to draw, reduced seasons, etc...

Control the growth of our own numbers now, or have others control it for us later.

It is hard to understand those that say "let's let everyone get into guiding that wants in..."
If that is what we are going to accept, then we need to get used to more restrictions, reduced seasons and bag limits for everyone. 

Some critics of SB 24 are stating that it is better to have all user groups spread thin, the sport fishing public, personal use, sport fishing guides, commercial fishermen, subsistence, etc... until everyone gets a paper thin share of the resource.

To those that say 'let the market sort it out', let's take the traffic light out at Dimond and Old Seward and see how that works out.  Who says professionally guided sport fishing trips should be at Walmart prices so everyone can afford it? We have some of the best sport fishing in the world. But not for very long if there are unlimited entrants into the fishery.

Please realize that one of the central critics of this bill, sells diesel engines... no crime there, unless you believe that the sky is the limit for guide numbers and are frothing at the mouth at the thougt of selling crate after crate of fresh off the boat, foriegn made diesel boat engines .
Is this the best way to manage our fisheries resource? Those on a guided trip are statistically way more successful that those that are self guided. If the number of guides continues to grow exponentially, then restrictions will be made to seasons and bag limits for the rest of us. Less fishing opportunity for the sport angler, while continuing to grow the numbers of sport fishing guides.

Is it not preferable to limit the entry of sport fishing guides into the industry now, and protect the angling public from future, and likely more harsh season and bag limit restrictions?

For those of us that know big game guides in Alaska, you know that in some of the prime hunting areas, the guides are over running each other. King Solomon is not available to sort that one out, but for the sport fishing guide issue, SB24 would go a long way towards solving these issues earlier, rather than later.

SB24 is just the latest sport fish guide marketing event out there. Guides want to get rid of other guides and increase what they can charge, SB24 was made to order for that. First the sport fish guides made an open "Master Guide" attempt to grab limited entry for themselves to get rid of some guides and increase fees but when the state told them that it was illegal, they quickly turned and ask Senator McGuire to craft them something which would have the same limited entry effect. A service board may not directly limit entry to specific numbers of guides but that is where it is all headed. Who needs to limit entry to anything if you can just throw up enough STUFF infront of a guide attempting to become a guide. Well that's the deal, just try to do an end run around LIMITED ENTRY and see if the courts allow it. Its all about the money, not the resource.