BOSTON, Mass. (SHNS)--As the Beacon Hill political crowd munched on ceviches and chowders in the Great Hall on Wednesday, they heard a message from the seafood industry aimed more at Washington, D.C. than the halls of the State House. Rep. Ann-Margaret Ferrante, the daughter of a fisherman and a 30-year advocate for the fishing industry, spoke at the annual Seafood Day in the state capitol about "what the federal government does to us." The Gloucester Democrat found fault with how the feds survey fishery resources and shrink local fishing quotas, saying that the industry will perish unless a new course is charted. Fishtales restaurant in Hatfield under new ownership She wasn't alone: Roger Berkowitz, formerly of Legal Sea Foods, told the crowd about NOAA's past use of "boats with broken gear" to formulate their stock assessments. And Rep. Antonio Cabral told the News Service about UMass-Dartmouth's ongoing study of groundfish -- including cod and haddock -- through its School for Marine Science & Technology (SMAST), which he said is aimed at potentially disproving NOAA's current groundfish assessments. "Like with the scallops, when they did that, they proved to NOAA that the NOAA numbers were wrong. And that's why the scallop industry actually flourished after that. It's because of the research work done at UMass-Dartmouth SMAST that actually turned those regulations around. So we are hoping that similar things can happen with groundfish, because the restrictions on groundfish today are even greater than with scallops," the New Bedford Democrat said. The event, hosted by the Mass. Fishermen's Partnership, Mass. Seafood Collaborative, and Fishing Partnership Support Services, featured a "Finest Kind Award" presentation honoring Ferrante for her three decades of advocacy for the industry. Addressing the crowded hall, she slammed federal regulators. "The federal government, for the last 30 years, they've gone out of their way to not give us the best available science, and to try to shut down the fishery. It's day after day after day. And it's been unrelenting," Ferrante said. The 15-year lawmaker spotlighted two members of the audience: the director of the state Division of Marine Fisheries, Daniel McKiernan, and the commissioner of the Department of Fish and Game, Thomas O'Shea. "And so I saw Dan McKiernan and Commissioner Tom O'Shea today. And I'm going to ask them publicly: you know, we're looking at quotas that are going to shut down all of this. It's going to shut down the fishing industry, it's going to shut down fishing communities, it's going to shut down the restaurants that are in your district that want to sell fresh seafood. It's going to shut down, shut down, shut down. So, Commissioner O'Shea, Dan McKiernan, we need you to step up. OK?  Thirty years is way too long to be banging our head against the wall without making progress," Ferrante said. She continued: "And every year, the science seems to get worse. And here's the reality of it -- this is what the federal government does to us. The federal government, when it doesn't complete a trawl survey, it doesn't say incomplete. In the work to justify how large a stock is, it says zero. Zero. There's a difference between, we didn't complete our survey, and giving us a zero for cod, for haddock, or yellowtail," she said as the crowd burst into applause. Ferrante also joked that she was going to instruct former Gloucester Mayor Sefatia Romeo Theken, a deputy commissioner at the Fish and Game Department, to poke her head into O'Shea's and McKiernan's offices every day and say, "We have to step it up." The News Service caught up with O'Shea afterwards and asked about Ferrante calling him out by name. "I think she's saying she wants us to help support and advocate for the fishing industry," O'Shea said, adding that he thought her comments were directed more at the federal government than at him. Asked about what sort of outreach his state agency is sending to federal overseers, O'Shea said: "We also continually talk with our federal partners about, hey, you know, this is the impact it's going to have on our fisheries. Let's find, you know, a different solution, a different way forward. So that's what we're working on right now to this day." Another lawmaker in attendance, Rep. Paul Schmid, surfaced the tension between the fishing sector and a relatively new participant in the offshore landscape. "There are things they have to deal with," the Westport Democrat said of the fishing fleets operating out of Massachusetts ports. "Climate change, regulations, and now living with offshore wind." "They all know that offshore wind is critical to our country's energy supply. But working with it means changing some of the ways we fish. And so they just ask that we up here at the State House not forget our fishing fleet while we address our energy needs," Schmid told the News Service. He added, "They need an awareness of their paths out to the fishing grounds, and when there's an issue that causes them financial harm, there really ought to be a way of addressing it." Cabral said that navigational issues and harvesting issues related to offshore wind farms are not limited to Massachusetts waters and offshore projects like Vineyard Wind. Some of the grounds used by local scallopers are near the New York border, he said, leading to concerns about New York offshore operations. In the end, Cabral said, there are always challenges "whenever you go to the sea, to harvest at the sea." Hordes of hungry State House aides and pols packed Great Hall and roamed the tables laid out with raw bars, crocks of chowder, and samples of swordfish-based sausage. "Let's never forget that fishing was really our initial way of feeding ourselves, and right now, only 10 percent of the fish we eat in Massachusetts is caught in Massachusetts," Schmid said as he surveyed the display, calling for greater consumption of local fish products. Rep. Kevin Honan, dean of the House and an enthusiast of its institutional history, recalled how the wooden Sacred Cod was given to the General Court by John Rowe, namesake of Rowe's Wharf and an agitator of the Boston Tea Party, to remind the representatives "of the significance and importance of the fishing industry." As for what the fishing industry is asking lawmakers for these days, Honan said, "Well, primarily the right to continue fishing."