YORKTOWN -- Virginia watermen launched a statewide advocacy group yesterday to combat water pollution and what they see as overzealous regulation of their struggling industry.

"We've got to help ourselves," said 79-year-old Hampton waterman Pete Freeman. "If we don't, we're out of business."

About two dozen watermen meeting at the Watermen's Museum, joined by Tangier Island watermen via cell phones, unanimously approved the statewide group. It intends to advocate for Chesapeake Bay protection and more input from commercial fishermen in harvest rulemaking.

"The advice we give is ignored," said Westmoreland County waterman Doug Jenkins, who frequently speaks at public hearings before the state's fisheries commission. "It's time for that to stop."

Jenkins and the leaders of the four regional watermen's groups in the state elected Ken Smith as president of the new group called the Virginia State Watermen's Association.

Smith became active in fishery issues this year when the Virginia Marine Resources Commission closed the 100-year-old winter crab dredging season and took other major steps to arrest a population decline in blue crabs. He maintains that watermen and the state's seafood industry are being forced to pay for problems caused by society's impacts on water quality.

Some 3,000 watermen still ply the bay and Virginia's coastal rivers, a fraction of the work force that once made the state a leader in oysters and blue crabs.

The industry began unraveling in the mid-1980s when diseases wiped out much of the bay's oyster population. Many scientists believe stress caused by pollution is adding to the list of obstacles that have frustrated oyster restoration efforts.

By the same token, the bay's crab numbers have plunged 70 percent since 1990 and pollution has created oxygen-choked "dead zones" and killed underwater grasses that have reduced crab habitat. Gov. Timothy M. Kaine asked the federal government in May to declare the crab fishery a disaster and pave the way for financial assistance for watermen.

Attending yesterday's watermen's meeting were state Del. Harvey B. Morgan, R-Middlesex, and state Sen. Richard H. Stuart, R-Westmoreland, along with a representative from U.S. Rep. Robert J. Wittman, R-1st. Their presence endorsed the group's belief that unification will concentrate their political pull.

"There's power in numbers," Stuart told the group. "It's just that simple."

Other officers elected are C.D. Hancock of Hampton, vice president; Lee Smith of Hampton, treasurer and Lee Anne Washington of Lancaster County, secretary.
Contact Lawrence Latané III at (804) 333-3461 or llatane@timesdispatch.com.