In 2007, Portland Shellfish President Jeff Holden and Export Sales and Marketing Manager Emily Lane made the finals at the Brussels Seafood Show in the Prix d’Elite competition for two new products: Lobster Cocktail Claws, which have the cap of the shell removed, and Triple-scored Lobster Claws, which are made easy to snap off in three place. A year later, when another Maine lobster processor sold whole lobster claws to Hannaford’s, the products were unexpectedly withdrawn from the market when it was discovered that the product was technically against the law in Maine.

Col. Joseph Fessenden, of Maine’s Department of Marine Resources (DMR) Marine Patrol said former Deputy Chief John Fetterman brought to his attention an advertisement from Hannaford about the product, which was in violation of Maine’s lobster mutilation laws.

“We were a little ahead of ourselves,” Lane said. ” Our interpretation of the mutilation laws differed from the DMR’s.” But she made clear that processors did not want to change those laws for harvesters because, she said, “The mutilation laws are there to protect the lobster.”

Canadian lobster processors could sell lobster parts, but Maine processors could not. Frustrated, the processors started lobbying legislators for a new law and met with House Speaker Hannah Pingree.

Pingree sponsored a new bill in 2009, LD 1593, which was drafted by the DMR’s Deputy Commissioner David Etnier and Special Assistant Deirdre Gilbert. The resulting law, Lane said, “Was a joint, collaborative effort on the part of the Maine lobster processors and the Department of Marine Resources.”

According to Gilbert, the legislation was spurred both by the Hannaford incident as well as by the Governor’s Task Force on the Economic Sustainability of Maine’s Lobster Industry, which convened in 2009 in order to “develop a comprehensive strategic plan for improved marketing of Maine lobster in order to ensure the economic prosperity and long-term sustainability of the Maine lobster industry,” according to the executive order. The resulting report indicated the need for this legislation “as something that would help processors diversify their offerings and compete better.”

“Working with those processors and working with the Marine Patrol, we crafted the statutory changes that were necessary that would enable the processors to do what they needed to do and that would be sufficient for the Marine Patrol to protect the resource.” Gilbert recalled. The resulting law was introduced in January 2010

According to Fessenden the work by the processors and the DMR paid off, because the new law, he said, “sailed through committee.” Present at the public hearings and the work session, he noted, “It was all positive. Nobody was challenging anything, and it went through pretty easy.”

The biggest safeguard in the new law is that processing is limited to legal size lobsters. “That’s a big thing for us,” Fessenden said. Marine Patrol officers go through processing facilities regularly. Strict record-keeping rules and requirements for labeling and product identification make it possible for the Marine Patrol to trace an item back to where it was processed.

Processors will have to request permission to process specialty lobster products on a case-by-case basis, and the DMR will have to authorize it in writing. Fessenden said, “We just did the first one this week for Portland Shellfish. Emily proposed to process a certain product. That was our first waiver.”

Both Gilbert and Fessenden gave Lane credit for taking the lead in voicing what the processors needed from this new law. In fact, Fessenden said of Lane, “She was a pleasure to work with. She made it easy for me.”

Looking back, Portland Shellfish president Holden said, “We had taken the lobster claws over [to Belgium] as a new and introductory product: ‘Here’s a new item that we can make for you,’ and then realized after that, that we couldn’t make it. We got the thunder, but then we couldn’t do anything about it. We can now; so we’ve got to fire up those customers and tell them now that it’s legal, we can do it.”

Sandra Dinsmore is a freelance writer who lives in Penobscot. She writes the Lobster Market Report for Commercial Fisheries News.