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A Comparative Analysis of Maryland's Public Participation Framework in Commercial Shellfish Aquaculture Leasing: Standing to Present Protests
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2021
Source: Sea Grant Law & Policy Journal 11(1): 102-133
[PDF-702.82 KB]
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Journal Title:Sea Grant Law & Policy Journal
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Description:People have harvested and consumed oysters in the Chesapeake Bay region for thousands of years.2 When early European settlers arrived in the Chesapeake Bay, they eventually created an oyster commercial harvest industry in Maryland.3 However, after the Civil War, the use of new technology that permitted the harvesting of oysters in a shorter time caused a depletion of local oyster beds, which, in turn, caused a shortage of oysters in the market and led to the enactment of Maryland’s first aquaculture law in 1830. The “One-Acre Planting Law” allowed “Maryland citizens to use one acre of [submerged] ground for planting and growing oysters and other shellfish.”4 Since the enactment of that first aquaculture leasing law, the Court of Appeals of Maryland—the State’s highest court—has consistently interpreted an oyster lease “not [as] a grant binding the State, but [instead as] a conditional license, revocable at the pleasure of the Legislature.”5 Accordingly, an aquaculture lease issued by the State of Maryland does not grant an exclusive property right to the leaseholder. Rather, the state confers a permission or privilege to the leaseholder to “use portions of state lands covered by navigable water as places of deposit, where the title and possession of the property thus acquired may continue to be protected.
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Source:Sea Grant Law & Policy Journal 11(1): 102-133
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Rights Information:CC BY
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Compliance:Submitted
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