John Drouin, a lobsterman in Cutler, put his first few wooden traps out from a skiff with his stepfather as a 13-year-old in the spring of 1979.
A month later, Drouin was setting traps on his own like other young teenagers in his small Down East town.
As an adult, he took all five children in his blended family out fishing, along with other local kids and their friends; two of his sons are lobstermen today.
In remote coastal communities like Cutler, the work is a focus of local life and identity, Drouin said.
“We’re so cut off from everything … our life does revolve around fishing,” he said. “It’s not just something we do, it’s who we are.”
Drouin is one of the Maine lobstermen frustrated by a child labor law violation case against Rep. Billy Bob Faulkingham, R-Winter Harbor, Maine’s House Minority Leader.
The Maine Department of Labor fined him several thousand dollars for employing a child “in a hazardous occupation” temporarily on his lobster boat, which was dropped after an appeal, and for not keeping records of the child’s hours and payment.
The case has raised questions about how state and federal laws define which jobs are off limits for kids, and could lead to future guidance from Maine agencies about how children can work on the water.
It’s also apparently run counter to an engrained tradition in Maine’s fishing industries, getting strong objections from fishermen who have brought young family members out to work for generations. For decades, fishermen have pushed back on government restrictions on the volume of fish they catch and how they catch it, but many are interpreting this case as a more direct attack on their culture and family traditions.
“Since everybody’s gone fishing, every young person has gone on a boat and done it the same way,” Drouin said. “For the way the industry has traditionally operated, [the case] just doesn’t seem right.”
Young people in Maine don’t need a license to go out on boats in Maine, but can get student licenses starting at age 8 and complete apprenticeships to work toward a commercial license. That can save them time on waitlists for licenses as adults.
The Faulkingham case centers on his employment of a 14-year-old family friend on his lobster boat for four days, roughly five hours each, in the summer of 2024. The teen hauled and baited traps and banded claws, which the representative paid him between $80 and $140 for daily.
Independent journalist Crash Barry said he sent a tip about it that summer to the state Department of Labor, which investigated and fined Faulkingham. The representative fought the findings for more than a year, recently challenging them in court, and accused the state of “political weaponization” when the fines grabbed headlines last week.
A bureau within the Maine Department of Labor cited federal law that calls being on a boat a “hazardous occupation” for 14- and 15-year-olds, according to a February hearing report from Faulkingham’s appeal.
Occupations connected to transporting “persons or property” by water “constitute oppressive child labor” under the Fair Labor Standards Act, and federal labor standards also prohibit jobs performed on a boat, according to law cited by state hearing officer Allan Toubman.
Faulkingham argued that doesn’t apply to fishing boats, and in 1953 a federal court did distinguish between water transportation and fishing, the report said.
State law lets children work on lobster boats and set their own traps, and allows lobster license holders to have unlicensed crew members help them under direct supervision.
The hazardous occupation charge against Faulkingham was dropped based on those conflicting interpretations.
Virginia Olsen, a fifth-generation lobsterman from Stonington, thinks the case will result in fewer opportunities and less water access for Maine kids as fishermen second-guess bringing them out.
Some lobstermen she knows already don’t participate in the state’s apprenticeship program because of the paperwork involved, which she said takes valuable time on top of other demands and more regulations than the industry had in the past.
Olsen first worked on a boat baiting pockets when she was five. Her adult son started working full time on his grandfather’s boat during the summer at age eight; she also took him, his friends from non-fishing families and extended family members out on the water.
Kids typically work as the “third man,” baiting traps and measuring and banding lobsters, according to Olsen. They stay away from dangerous equipment and learn how to work safely when they’re young, she said.
It’s a source of pride and empowerment for children, she said, and learning from experienced fishermen is the traditional way knowledge is passed down.
“We rely on these fishermen for their hands-on learning, their mentorship,” she said. “It’s our heritage. It’s our way of life.”
That tradition is one the Department of Marine Resources works to sustain, according to Commissioner Carl Wilson, most directly through the apprenticeship and student license programs. The Department of Labor also said it supports safe and legal youth lobstering.
Toubman concluded there’s an opportunity to investigate whether the state needs revised rulemaking to address if fishing is a hazardous occupation for minors. Both departments said they recognize the importance of mentoring in the industry and will work together to clarify guidance about youth participation.
“I recognize that the current situation with Representative Faulkingham has caused confusion and anger among lobstermen, their families, and our coastal communities and we are working closely with the Department of Labor to provide additional clarification on questions we are hearing directly from industry,” Wilson said.
The DOL is confident in its interpretation of federal law, according to spokesperson Jessica Rivers. The department also pointed to established DMR programs as a way for youth to enter the industry, and said kids with lobster licenses are independent contractors rather than employees. That means they aren’t covered by the federal youth employment laws the department is required to enforce.
Xander Amuso, a 21-year-old lobsterman on Islesford, hadn’t heard much about the case’s details — he feels desensitized to news about challenges facing the industry, he said. But he spoke to a reporter because he feels experienced fishermen being able to teach younger ones is an important resource for coastal communities.
Amuso sees himself as an example of that. He doesn’t come from a fishing family and started asking a local lobsterman to let him on the boat at age six or seven. He began working as an eight-year-old — without pay, at his mother’s request — and started hauling his own traps by hand on the side.
He’s now fishing on his own, hauling 600 traps with plans to work up to 800.
“I think it’s imperative that the tradition of fishing stays the same in many ways,” Amuso said. “It really is just a core part of the community, around the entire community of the state of Maine.”
Richard Howland, another first-generation lobsterman on Islesford who once employed Amuso, started at 14. He struggled in school but found working on a boat brought him decent pay and a path to be respected in his community.
By his early 20s, Howland was well-established lobstering with a crew and boat of his own. Now 42, he makes a point to mentor others and help them get started fishing.
“It’s all tied together,” he said of lobstering and local culture. “It’s everything. It’s the fabric of the community, especially living on the island I live on.”
Howland didn’t want to get into the specifics of the Faulkingham case, but feels it points to a larger disconnect between the reality of fishing and how state policy is applied. He believes it likely met with such a strong response because many in the industry already feel challenged.
“We’re always under tremendous threat, and we have to be very defensive and protect ourselves,” he said, naming issues including offshore wind, right whale regulations and high costs.
Drouin, the lobsterman from Cutler, said he thinks outrage stems from a feeling that the state is interfering with how things have traditionally been done in the industry. He does think safety complaints need to be investigated, he said, but younger people have helped out on boats for generations.
“We need to be able to do this,” he said.
