African American Union Leader Rebukes Former Virginia Cabinet Secretary Matt Strickler For Ignoring Menhaden Workers

Darawn Kenner, an African American union worker, chief shop steward for United Food & Commercial Workers Local 400 at Ocean Harvesters in Reedville and cook aboard the F/V Reedville, has responded in the Richmond Times-Dispatch to former Virginia Secretary of Natural and Historic Resources Matt Strickler's call for additional restrictions on the Chesapeake Bay menhaden fishery.

In his guest column published October 17, Kenner directly challenged Strickler's portrayal of the issue as a fight against "one foreign corporation," saying that framing effectively erases the working Virginians whose jobs and communities are at stake.

I am an African American union worker in Virginia's menhaden fishery. When former Natural Resources Secretary Matt Strickler reduced this debate in the pages of this newspaper to the interests of 'one foreign corporation,' he left people like me out of the picture."

Kenner continued:

"The menhaden fishery is a workplace. UFCW Local 400 represents fishermen in the Reedville fleet, and the fishery supports hundreds of family-supporting union jobs in Virginia's Northern Neck. Our union members are second-, third- and fourth-generation fishermen whose livelihoods depend on this work. My fellow workers are not an ‘industry,' as Strickler labels us. They are Virginians supporting families and communities."

Strickler, who served as Virginia's Secretary of Natural and Historic Resources and Chief Resilience Officer under Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam, wrote in his earlier Times-Dispatch guest column that the company "doesn't give a lick about Virginia or the Chesapeake Bay." He urged Gov. Abigail Spanberger to pursue the strongest management restrictions under consideration and argued that Virginia officials should represent Virginians rather than "the interests of one foreign corporation."

Kenner said that rhetoric ignores the people who actually work in the fishery.

"Strickler's column gives those workers almost no attention. Instead, he writes that the company ‘doesn't give a lick about Virginia' and describes the fishery as an operation that ‘vacuum[s] up' the base of the bay's food chain. That rhetoric makes it easier to overlook the people who would live with the economic consequences of additional restrictions."

Kenner also pointed to concerns previously raised by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

"The Southern Christian Leadership Conference has raised that concern directly. In a letter to Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, SCLC said the issue involves environmental responsibility, rural economic life, labor, wages, race and the dignity of work and warned that African American workers, union families and rural communities could be disproportionately affected. Those workers should not simply disappear from the discussion."

Kenner then delivered the central rebuke of Strickler's argument:

"It is difficult to comprehend a former senior official of a Democratic administration showing so little regard for blue-collar workers. Our workforce is comprised of predominantly minority, unionized working people whose livelihoods would be affected by the restrictions he advocates."

On the science, Kenner wrote:

"The scientific record also contains important facts missing from Strickler's account. The ASMFC's 2025 assessment states that Atlantic menhaden is not overfished and that overfishing is not occurring. The ASMFC also says its coastwide model cannot determine menhaden abundance solely within Chesapeake Bay or define a ‘sufficient' bay-specific level."

Strickler also portrayed the company as indifferent to Virginia and the Chesapeake Bay. That characterization ignores the harvesting and processing industry's financing of a Bay-specific research roadmap already underway through the Science Center for Marine Fisheries (SCEMFIS). The project is being developed by scientists from UMCES's Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, the Batten School & VIMS, and NOAA to identify the research needed to support a scientifically defensible and ecologically meaningful Bay harvest cap.

Kenner noted that Virginia itself has committed additional funding to address the same data gaps.

"That is why Virginia has funded more research. VIMS reports that the 2026-2028 state budget provides $2 million over two years for research needed to inform a scientifically defensible Chesapeake Bay harvest cap. VIMS also states plainly that scientists do not currently have the data necessary to determine menhaden survival or abundance in the bay."

On striped bass, Kenner wrote:

"Strickler points to low striped bass stocks as another warning sign. The ASMFC's own ecosystem model says that even if all menhaden fishing suddenly ended, that action alone would not rebuild striped bass to their biomass target. The commission identifies sustainable recreational and commercial striped bass fishing as the important management factor in rebuilding that stock."

On osprey, Kenner wrote:

"The osprey research deserves the same precision. A 2026 peer-reviewed study documented serious food stress and reproductive problems in high-salinity portions of Chesapeake Bay and suggested reduced menhaden availability as a primary driver. But the study also states that the impact of commercial harvest on adult menhaden abundance in the bay remains unresolved because the abundance data needed to evaluate that relationship is lacking."

Kenner also pointed to the documented economic stakes:

"The economic stakes are documented too. The ASMFC's Committee on Economics and Social Sciences reviewed historical modeling that estimated about 519 reduction-sector jobs in Maryland and Virginia, including 347 in Northumberland County. It warned that high fixed costs can make employment losses nonlinear if harvest falls below an economically viable threshold."

Kenner concluded by returning to the workers Strickler largely left out of his argument:

"Workers deserve to be visible in this debate. Behind his bloodless word ‘industry' are fishermen, plant workers, mechanics, families and communities. They are directly affected stakeholders whose jobs and communities are part of the economic record regulators themselves have examined. Any account of Chesapeake Bay menhaden policy that omits them omits a material part of the story."

Read Darawn Kenner's full guest column:
"Matt Strickler's menhaden argument leaves working Virginians out of the picture"

Read Matt Strickler's column:
"Virginia must lead again on menhaden conservation"

About Ocean Harvesters
Ocean Harvesters owns and operates a fleet of more than 30 fishing vessels in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of America. The company's purse-seine fishing operation is exclusively engaged in the harvest of menhaden, a small, nutrient-dense fish used to produce fish meal, fish oil, and fish solubles. Both its Atlantic and Gulf Menhaden fisheries are certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council. Committed to responsible fishing operations, Ocean Harvesters is proud to be heir to a fishing legacy that extends nearly 150 years.

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SOURCE: Ocean Harvesters