Justification for change

JUSTIFICATION FOR CHANGE

MARINE RECREATIONAL INFORMATION PROGRAM FISHING EFFORT SURVEY

OMB CONTROL NO. 0648-0652

The Marine Recreational Information Program (MRIP) Fishing Effort Survey (FES), OMB Control no. 0648-0652 was designed to be a more accurate and cost effective alternative to the Coastal Household Telephone Survey (CHTS), the methodology historically used to collect recreational fishing effort data. The FES, which has been implemented in all states bordering the Atlantic coast and the Gulf of Mexico, is being conducted concurrently with the CHTS through 2017 to benchmark survey results against the CHTS and ensure a smooth transition from the historical methodology to the new approach. We propose expanding administration of the FES to include Hawaii and Puerto Rico, two regions which still rely upon the CHTS for estimates of marine recreational fishing effort. This request will result in more accurate fishing effort estimates for Hawaii and Puerto Rico and will provide a one-year benchmarking period between the CHTS and FES before the FES is discontinued in 2018. The FES design in Hawaii and Puerto Rico will be identical to the design that has been implemented in other states. One notable exception is that the Puerto Rico survey will include both English and Spanish versions of survey materials.

The anticipated burden for this request is approximately 7,560 respondents, 7,560 responses and 1,260 hours¹. We will accommodate this additional burden by uniformly reducing FES sampling levels among all states such that there will be no net increase in overall burden (Table 1).

Table 1. Estimated annual response burden by state.

State/Territory	Target ABS Sample Size	Estimated Completed Interviews
AL	12,933	4,437
CT	16,950	6,163
DE	12,907	4,928
FL	5,366	1,971
GA	27,793	9,868
LA	8,668	2,868
ME	6,889	3,239
MD	20,238	8,077
MA	13,344	5,415
MS	18,732	6,167
NH	6,564	2,841
NJ	13,054	4,713
NY	24,196	7,682
NC	15,204	5,792
RI	12,920	5,080
SC	14,394	5,819
VA	25,633	10,028
TX	20,924	7,352
HI	10,800	3,780
PR	10,800	3,780
Total	298,311	110,000

1 The estimated time per response for the FES is approximately 10 minutes.

3