It's a tired old routine that everyone should be onto by now.

Government starts charging a new fee and makes promises to spend that money on improving whatever the fee is being charged for. Before long, a whole new bureaucracy grows out of it, and somehow those goals of making "improvements" get lost in the shuffle.

There's plenty of little fees and taxes that were sold to the public under the promise of providing a better service, yet in reality they simply pay for expansion of bureaucracy at the expense of our pocketbooks.

A few examples: Hundreds of millions in cigarette taxes were diverted from their stated mission of reducing smoking; a rural phone tax all of us pay that takes millions from Massachusetts consumers and provides almost no local benefit; tollbooth fees that are used to pay for government agencies that have no ties whatsoever to the highways the fees are collected on.

The newest victim of the scheme is a much-cherished New England tradition: saltwater fishing.

A new saltwater fishing tax will be foisted on recreational fishermen next year, as part of a federal law passed a few years ago that was meant to manage commercial fisheries. Adults who pick up a pole and cast a line will have to get a $10 annual license that will go toward paying the cost of enforcing/collecting the new license fee, and toward unspecified improvements in water access and fisheries management.

Sound familiar?

In this case, state lawmakers had been caught hook, line and sinker by a law pushed on all the states by the federal government. States had two choices — either create a saltwater license fee or the federal government would force a $15 to $25 fee down their throats.

So our lawmakers, somewhat to their credit, set a more palatable fee of $10. They also mandated that fishermen report all the fish they catch. Most fishing associations in the state begrudgingly went along with it, because they could clearly see there was a gun being held to the Legislature's head.

Other states with seagoing traditions have not yet given in to the feds' demands. Maine and New Hampshire have yet to pass a saltwater license fee, and one can imagine that the independent-minded Mainers will do their best to fight this one until there's no more line left on the reel.

Good for them.

This is nothing more than a scheme to fatten bureaucracy and to discourage the occasional fisherman who might head down to Plum Island beach a couple times a year after a long day at work. Dedicated fishermen will grumble, and will probably pay. And they'll rightly wonder what it is they are paying for.

Enforcing this will be difficult at best. Worse, this will take maritime patrols away from the more important tasks assigned to them — enforcing maritime law, conducting boat safety checks and enforcing fishing laws that actually protect fisheries, such as undersized fish regulations and maximum catch limits.

Saltwater fishing is an enormously popular sport along our local coastline, drawing thousands of anglers each year. European fishermen first started angling in these waters over 400 years ago, and it has been an important part of the region's lifestyle and economy ever since.

Never, in those more than 400 years, has there been a fee for the common man or woman to go down to the seashore and cast out a line.