Guides association honors FWC officers – for 2nd time
News Release
Thursday, September 08, 2011
Media contact: Susan Smith, 850-528-1755
(Back to Commission meeting news)
For the second time in their veteran careers, two law
enforcement officers with the Florida Fish and Wildlife
Conservation Commission (FWC) received recognition from the Florida
Guides Association for their tireless conservation of marine
resources.
On Thursday, during the second day of the three-day Commission
meeting in Naples, the Florida Guides Association explained why its
500 members again honored officers Bill Holcomb and Louis Hinds
with the FWC-FGA Partnership "Trained Eyes Coastwatchers" Officer
of the Year award.
"Fishing guides often work with FWC officers in reporting and
apprehending net-regulation and other fisheries-law violators.
These two officers continue to work tirelessly with our members,
often outside their normal assigned area and in all kinds of
weather, to ensure that our marine fisheries resources remain
vibrant," said Capt. Pat Kelly, FGA president.
The officers' supervisor in the FWC Tampa Field Office, Lt.
Grant Burton, said the two continue to show exceptional initiative
in planning and working special details to detect and apprehend
people violating marine fisheries regulations aimed at protecting
fish populations.
"Over the past year, the efforts of officers Holcomb and Hinds
in enforcing Florida's constitutional net-limitation laws have
resulted in 20 felony and 80 misdemeanor arrests. These two
officers seized more than 22,000 square feet of illegal
monofilament gill net and thousands of pounds of illegally caught
fish," Burton said.
Holcomb was honored with the distinction from the FGA in 2009;
Hines was a co-recipient of the award in 2008.
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