Fish that inhabit our US coastal and Great Lakes regions eat, migrate, and reproduce wherever they please without regard to geographic jurisdictions. This situation creates a complex framework for resource managers, forcing a need for strong coordination to ensure our Nation’s fish are sustainably operated. 

Over the past 80 years, neutral-party regional fisheries commissions have been formed for the Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific coasts and the Great Lakes to facilitate cooperation. These commissions drive data sharing, coordinate and implement research, monitor fishing, and promote and support policies that align management across state, Tribal, and even international boundaries. They also provide a bridge between state and Tribal resource management partners and federal science, management, and funding agencies such as NOAA Fisheries, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the U.S. Geological Survey’s Ecosystem Mission Area.

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Several decades ago, the USGS Great Lakes Science Center established a strong partnership with the Great Lakes Fishery Commission. This relationship provided deliberate coordination between the Center’s science and the highest priority fisheries management needs for the Great Lakes region. It also demonstrated how USGS-fisheries commission partnerships ensure that USGS—a federal entity with no management authority—can leverage its independence, criticality, objectivity, and scientific credibility; provide a reliable foundation for science-based fishery management decisions across diverse jurisdictions; and continuously inform management actions in a dynamic environment.

Smaller instances of relationships between USGS and fisheries commissions have also existed on the landscape. Notably, USGS and the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission have coordinated work and data management through the Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Program and National Fish Habitat Partnership for over 20 years. However, momentum picked up in 2019 when USGS began investing in growing partnerships between their primary fisheries science centers and respective interstate fisheries commission, starting with the USGS Eastern Ecological Science Center and Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission on the Atlantic Coast, then the USGS Western Fisheries Research Center and Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission on the Pacific Coast, and finally the USGS Wetland and Aquatic Research Center and Gulf States Marine Fisheries Commission on the Gulf Coast. 

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The USGS Western Fisheries Research Center has found a great deal of common ground with our Pacific State Marine Fisheries Commission counterpart. We’ve discovered shared science interests such as improving early detection and control of invasive species; collecting, managing, and sharing Klamath Basin fish behavior and survival data; and investigating ways to improve fish passage and access to habitat. These shared interests have led to joint projects and a cooperative agreement where our staff work hand-in-hand with Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission staff to accomplish critical science.

In September 2024, after years of work building USGS-fisheries commission relationships in each region and among the four regions, all parties decided to convene in-person to explore our common ground. A symposium, held at the American Fisheries Society annual meeting, revealed several common science priorities, and served to deepen understanding of the challenges faced in each region and the value of these regional partnerships. Executives from the four commissions, four science centers, and the USGS Ecosystem Mission Area then met after the American Fisheries Society meeting to begin forging inter-regional objectives and science priorities shared across all four regions (Great Lakes, Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific) and define a path forward. This initiative will build a foundation for a long-term fisheries science partnership to ensure actionable science outcomes and support for USGS science across the coastal and Great Lakes regions of the Nation. 

Thank you to Joshua Miller for his help in writing this article.