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[{"type":"text","text":"Practicing for the Olympics..."}]

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Cowboy State Daily is Wyoming’s largest newspaper with Wyoming’s most experienced journalists. 

<title>You Still Here? Tuesday, April 11, 2023 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Practicing for the Olympics...

You Still Here?  Tuesday, April 11, 2023

Kolby fedore

Kolby Fedore

Outdoors

American robins are such a common sight in Wyoming that most people barely notice them.

They bounce across lawns, tug worms from flower beds and chatter from fence posts all summer long. They're so familiar that they practically become part of the landscape.

But when a rare 1-in-30,000 albino robin showed up in the yard of a Cheyenne-area couple, they noticed this bird was something special.

Heather and Eric Wiseman said that they’ve been keeping tabs on a snow-white fledgling robin with pink-red eyes since it first appeared in their yard June 6.

"Look what I found," Eric Wiseman told his wife, showing her a cellphone photo of the unusual visitor.

That also was the day of a memorial service for one of their friends, Gail.

"If I was to call the bird anything, I'd call it Gail,” Heather Wiseman said.

Coincidence or not, the robin quickly became something the couple looked forward to seeing each day.

"It got me a little down when I didn't see him for a day,” she said. "Then last night, he came back.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Backyard Haven"}]

By day, Heather Wiseman works as an X-ray technician. By evening, she's become something of an amateur birdwatcher.

"I just have a pair of mini binoculars," she said. "I'm not a real birder, but I might join the Audubon Society after this experience."

The couple's property has become something of a sanctuary for small wildlife. They keep fresh water available, maintain two bird baths, and have a bird feeder that attracts a steady stream of visitors.

[{"type":"text","text":"\"Nothing special, but they love it,\" Wiseman said."}]

The albino robin seems particularly fond of several towering blue spruce trees she planted about 30 years ago.

The trees provide shade and shelter, and the young bird often disappears among the branches before reappearing on the lawn.

The unusual robin isn't the only surprise visitor the couple has hosted recently. A few weeks ago they spotted a Western tanager. Then came a red-headed woodpecker.

"Three birds in less than three months that we haven't seen before," Wiseman said. "We live in the county, and it's a haven for birds."

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Following Mom"}]

The white robin's appearance caught the attention of Zach Hutchinson, community science coordinator for Audubon Rockies.

After reviewing photographs of the Wiseman’s bird, Hutchinson confirmed the bird is a fledgling American robin and that it appears to be a rare albino.

[{"type":"text","text":"\"It's following its mother around and begging for food,\" he said."}]

[{"type":"text","text":"Several of Wiseman's photographs capture exactly that."}]

In one image, the young bird stands with its mouth open while an adult robin delivers food. In another, the pair forage together in the grass.

Despite its unusual appearance, the fledgling appears to be behaving like any other young robin.

[{"type":"text","text":"To its mother, there doesn't seem to be anything unusual about it at all."}]

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Rare, But Vulnerable"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"What makes the bird remarkable is its coloration."}]

The robin's white feathers and pink-red eyes are consistent with albinism, a genetic condition that prevents the body from producing melanin, the pigment responsible for color in feathers, skin and eyes.

The red eye visible in Wiseman's close-up photographs is one of the strongest indicators of true albinism, said Hutchinson.

While the condition creates a striking appearance, it can also create challenges.

"These animals are easily found by predators, and the albinism can have other effects on their physical health," Hutchinson added. 

[{"type":"text","text":"Birds rely on melanin for more than color."}]

"For instance, in birds, the lack of pigmentation of feathers leads to extreme feather wear and weakened feathers," he said.

That means albino birds often stand out in ways that can make survival more difficult.

Against the dark green branches of a blue spruce tree, the Wisemans' robin seems to glow. Perched on a fence post against a Wyoming-blue sky, it's almost impossible to miss.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Rooting For Gail"}]

Researchers have long noted that albino robins seem to appear disproportionately often among reports of albino birds, likely because robins live so closely alongside people.

Most unusual birds can disappear unnoticed into forests or grasslands. Robins, meanwhile, spend much of their lives in backyards, parks and neighborhoods where people are more likely to spot them.

For now, the Wisemans aren’t focused on scientific theories. Heather said she's​ simply enjoying the chance to watch an extraordinary bird grow up.

[{"type":"text","text":"The robin has become something of a celebrity among family and friends."}]

"I had some family over last night and I got to show them the bird," she said. "It was nice to share."

The photographs that sparked interest online weren't taken with expensive camera equipment or professional lenses.

"I just have a cellphone," Wiseman said. "I don't have a Canon or anything."

Yet those snapshots captured something many birdwatchers never see — a one in 30,000 albino robin. 

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<title>Rare 1-In-30,000 Albino Robin Hangs Out In Yard Of Cheyenne-Area Couple | Cowboy State Daily</title>

With its stark white feathers and red eyes, what Audubon Rockies says looks like a rare 1-in-30,000 albino robin has been hanging out in the yard of a Cheyenne-area couple. "It's following its mother around and begging for food,” said the homeowner.

Rare 1-In-30,000 Albino Robin Hangs Out In Yard Of Cheyenne-Area Couple

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's general assignment reporter, Clair McFarland.

Clair McFarland

Crime & Courts

Courts

In response to a Cheyenne-based attorney’s claims that the Wyoming attorney general must appoint special prosecutors to decide whether Secretary of State Chuck Gray violated any laws, the AG countered Tuesday that he has already appointed two special prosecutors, and neither wanted to charge Gray with a crime.

Upon a request by President Donald Trump’s administration, Gray sent sensitive voter data to the federal U.S. Department of Justice last year, public records show.

George Powers, a semi-retired attorney based in Cheyenne, who won a past public records case, started filing requests to learn about Gray’s actions.

 complaint with the AG’s office accusing Gray of violating a state election law that makes data like the kind Gray reportedly released – voters’ partial Social Security numbers or driver’s license numbers – confidential.

Wyoming also has an umbrella statute that allows prosecutors to charge election officials who violate election law with a felony, if merited.

But Gray told the public that the AG’s office approved the release of voter data to the federal government.

So Powers, in his complaint, urged Attorney General Keith Kautz to offload the investigation onto a special prosecutor, because the AG’s office reportedly counseled Gray in this controversy. Powers suggested having a judge appoint the special prosecutor.

Kautz answered in a May 4 letter that Powers’ complaint would be handled in accordance with the AG’s office rules and state professional conduct rules for attorneys.

[{"type":"text","text":"Four weeks passed."}]

Powers filed a petition June 2 with the Wyoming Supreme Court, accusing Kautz of neglecting a clear duty and asking the court to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Gray.

Kautz parried with a Tuesday filing, which says Powers doesn’t have standing to wage that battle, and it’s irrelevant anyway, 

 the AG’s office has arranged two different, independent evaluations. And neither special prosecutor wanted to charge Gray with a crime, says the filing.

“One of those independent evaluations was conducted by a division of the Attorney General’s office – separate from the civil division – by the construction of a ‘Chinese wall',” says the AG’s Tuesday answer. “The other independent evaluation was conducted by a private Wyoming law firm in conjunction with a Wyoming county and prosecuting attorney.”

A Chinese wall is an informational barrier with an entity designed to prevent ethical conflicts.

The independent attorneys submitted reports – one before Powers asked the high court to intervene and one after – and “each independent counsel declined to bring criminal charges,” says the AG’s response.

“Mr. Powers filed his petition in this matter before the Attorney General could announce that no prosecution would be forthcoming,” says the filing.

As to the AG’s reticence toward Powers, the filing says the person reporting a crime doesn’t have a right to hear the prosecutor’s decision on it, and that Powers hasn’t shown he’s a “victim” of a crime to enjoy some rights under the state Victims’ Bill of Rights.

The AG’s filing emphasizes that Kautz didn’t involve Powers in the investigation, “but told him that investigations and charging decisions were not conducted in the public square.”

n Wyoming, prosecutors generally do not discuss their thinking publicly while they’re deciding whether to charge a crime. Often, especially in matters of high public interest, a prosecutor who decides not to charge a crime will issue a decision letter on why he made that choice.

Kautz’s office defended the reticence he displayed while the special prosecutors’ investigations were reportedly ongoing as standard practice, pointing to DOJ guidelines for keeping ongoing investigations quiet to avoid infringing the rights of the accused.

“Mr. Powers assumes the Attorney General’s lack of comment means that he is doing nothing, at best, and violating the Rules of Professional Responsibility, at worst,” says the AG’s filing. “Mr. Powers invites this Court to make the same assumptions, what is sometimes referred to as an appeal to ignorance.”

Prosecutors are required to address complaints in a “timely” manner, the AG’s filing acknowledges. But there’s no concrete deadline associated with that adjective, it adds.

As to announcing his decision to the public at the end of an investigation, the AG’s filing calls that a discretionary decision, not a requirement.

“It is obvious that Mr. Powers wants to be informed of how the Attorney General has addressed his complaint, (yet) a prosecutor has no duty to communicate with a complainant,” the filing says. “Instead, a prosecutor has discretion in deciding on whether to communicate about an investigation with the complainant or the public.”

That decision hinges on ethical considerations, such as if talking about a case publicly or with the person who reported it would botch some “eventual prosecution, should the prosecutor decide to proceed.”

In a Tuesday text message, Gray said Powers' claims and filings have been "nothing more than lawfare and weaponization of the legal system by leftists and the insider media."

Gray claimed the media have ignored the states that have complied with the DOJ's request. 

Multiple courts have ruled that the DOJ's requests for sensitive voter data unsupported by federal law. 

"Powers (sic) false claims are an effort to undermine our work on election integrity," wrote Gray. "I have and will continue to stand for the truth, and I will continue to comply with the law and advance election integrity and voter list maintenance, which is pivotal to our elections." 

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<title>AG Says Prosecutors Declined To Charge Chuck Gray With A Crime   | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Wyoming's attorney general on Tuesday said he appointed two prosecutors to investigate whether Secretary of State Chuck Gray violated any laws by releasing sensitive voter data to the federal government, but neither decided to charge Gray with a crime.

AG Says Prosecutors Declined To Charge Chuck Gray With A Crime  

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily reporter, Dale Killingbeck

Dale Killingbeck

Wyoming Life

Around Wyoming

MILLS — Don’t underestimate the power of the paw or wet nose when it is attached to a friendly face with a tongue hanging out. 

Casper’s Carol Salveson knows that truth well, as does Vietnam veteran Larry Seems, who has experienced the power of a support dog to help with post-traumatic stress in his own life. 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"He also helps trains dogs."}]

Both volunteer their efforts at Project Kenny, a nonprofit started by a West Coast entrepreneur who wanted to see service dogs trained to support military veterans and prevent veteran suicides.

Since 2017, Salveson, a former career U.S. Air Force weather forecaster — and after retirement a teacher — has poured herself into her new mission with special motivation.

“At the time I lost my son I was a teacher in Natrona County,” she said. “So I retired from teaching so I could do this.”

Her son, Robert “Bobby” Doolan, served as a Green Beret in the U.S. Army and seemed to be doing well after his service career. 

He was about to graduate from college when he took his own life in March 2017.

Salveson, who has always been a dog person, said her son also loved dogs and even when deployed to Afghanistan would find a feral dog to adopt. Bobby Doolan even had one that he wanted to try and bring home.

“When I lost him, I knew I wanted to help, but I didn’t know how,” she said. “I’m not a counselor, and so it just led to service dogs as my way of helping and honoring him.”

Salveson went back to school and became an accredited dog trainer. She obtained a couple of dogs and was beginning her efforts when she learned of and connected with Project Kenny.

The West Coast-centered nonprofit kept its headquarters on the coast while the actual work of training dogs and connecting them with veterans transferred to Casper when Salveson joined. 

She began by training dogs in her home, but the nonprofit now has a facility in Mills where nine dogs are kept and training goes on year round.

Salveson volunteers all her time as do the majority who serve at the nonprofit.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"The Mission"}]

Project Kenny is named after a black Labrador retriever that Washington-based founder Matt Sauri, owned and wanted to honor after its passing. The nonprofit takes hand-picked dogs and dogs that veterans bring them and trains them to be a kind of suppressor for post traumatic stress.

“A dog can make a difference,” Salveson said. “It doesn’t cure the PTSD but it helps them get through it.”

Project Kenny’s programs involve training dogs to be given to a veteran — a process that takes about 18 months from start to finish. They also help veterans who bring their dogs to Mills to train their own animals to be service dogs.

Dogs chosen for the program have to be confident, trainable, non-aggressive and not a barker. Salveson personally likes the Labrador retrievers and golden doodle breeds, but there are veterans who bring her their own dogs and she has worked with many different breeds.

In addition to basic obedience training, the service dogs have to be comfortable in the public, and able to recognize when their master gets triggered into a traumatic stress moment.

“We train our dogs to recognize the signs of anxiety in our veterans, and so our dogs interrupt the anxiety,” Salveson said. “They interrupt nightmares, they do things like provide deep-pressure therapy. 

"We do a little mobility, but our primary focus is on post-traumatic stress, anxiety, traumatic brain injury as well as military sexual trauma.”

Dogs are trained to recognize when their veteran starts bouncing a leg or wringing hands or another anxious sign. 

Once the animal sees the sign, they jump on the veteran, put their nose on them and otherwise help the veteran recognize they are in that stress state and can use the dog to help calm them down.

Salveson said veterans call it “grounding.”

The use of service dogs as an antidote for post traumatic stress and other issues has been proven through evidence-based research, she said.

Dogs are trained specifically for the veteran they will serve. Typically, that means veterans who live in another part of the country will come to Mills and spend at least three days with the dog. 

There have been times with Salveson has gone across the country with a dog to deliver it to a veteran.

“One veteran was in multiple helicopter crashes and was afraid to fly,” she said. “So, I went to him.”

The nonprofit delivers about six dogs a year and since 2017 has trained about 45, Salveson said. She keeps about nine dogs on hand at all times and replaces a dog as it gets gifted to a veteran.

For Seems, 80, a Vietnam Air Force veteran whose role was to provide base security from Vietnamese attacks in the Mekong Delta, he learned late life the value of his service dog. He said he came back from the war with issues. 

He has had cancer from Agent Orange and a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress.

He met Salveson at an event at Casper College a few years ago and said he brought a kennel-rescued dog, “Aurora,” to Project Kenny to train. He describes her as a mix of Labrador retriever, pit bull, boxer, and other breeds.

He never realized he needed his own service dog until after getting involved.

“Getting my service dog has changed my whole life, really, my personality,” he said. “I don’t have the anger issues anymore; the dog will just sit and look at you. 

"You just have to melt and start loving on her and it will change your whole attitude.”

Seems now goes to the Project Kenny building on Saturdays to help Salveson and other veterans train their dogs.He said since volunteering at the nonprofit he sees the difference that it makes in veterans’ lives.

“You can always sit and talk to your dog,” Seems said. “They don’t judge no matter what you do. You can spill your heart out to them, and you feel better because of it. They are there to help.”

Project Kenney Vet With Dog 6 16 26

<title>Wyoming Group Trains Dogs To Interrupt Veterans’ PTSD Attacks | Cowboy State Daily</title>

A nonprofit in Mills, Wyoming, is training dogs to interrupt military veterans’ PTSD attacks, led by a woman who lost her Green Beret son to suicide. “When I lost him, I knew I wanted to help, but I didn’t know how,” she said.

Wyoming Group Trains Dogs To Interrupt Veterans’ PTSD Attacks

Kerry Drake

Cheyenne’s new vehicle noise ordinance was unanimously passed by the City Council to stop obnoxious motorists who drive their loud cars, trucks and motorcycles late at night, disrupting people’s sleep.

 soon after it went on the books in late September was auto mechanic Geno Stecks, who was driving a fairly unassuming 2006 Subaru with a modified muffler. 

It also wasn’t in the middle of the night or in a residential section of the capital city. Stecks said it was on a main thoroughfare at the intersection of East Lincolnway and Hugur Avenue at 2:45 in the afternoon.

“Communists. Control freaks!” is how Stecks responded when asked what he thought about the City Council members who approved the ordinance after many people opposed it during public testimony at three council meetings.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"He Wasn’t Speeding"}]

Stecks was on the job when he got busted, transporting auto parts for FM Automotive when he heard the police siren.

He told the officer that he didn’t think he’d been speeding, but was informed the stop was made because of excessive noise.

This how the encounter went, according to Stecks:

“I couldn’t hear my radio for your exhaust,” the officer told him.

“I said, ‘Turn your volume knob up,’” Stecks said he replied. "I couldn’t hear my exhaust because of my radio, because I’ve got a kick-ass stereo in it.”

In hindsight, Stecks said he’s since thought of some other creative responses.

“I wish I had told him, ‘What are you going to tell the Hells Angels if they come roaring through town? Are you going to pull them over and cite them for having too loud exhaust? You probably wouldn’t live through it,’” said the bearded Stecks, wearing a T-shirt that depicted a full mug with the word “Beer – It’s What’s for Dinner.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Too Few Tickets"}]

A spokesperson for the Cheyenne Police Department said that after Stecks broke the ice as the first to be ticketed for driving too loudly, 43 other motorists were given noise violation citations in 2025, and 33 more so far this year.

Even those are way too few, said a council member who supported the noise ordinance.

“They should be writing 300 or 400,” said City Council Vice President Pete Laybourn. “The problem is immense, and I’m very disappointed with how it’s being handled. The ordinance hasn’t been effective at all.”

Laybourn said residents are purposely modifying their mufflers and making noise in all parts of the city, at all hours day and night, and also deliberately speeding.

“They tried to disrupt Friday Night at the Plaza last week, driving up Capitol (Avenue) and backfiring,” he said. “It was really, really bad.”

City Council President Tom Segrave was one of several councilmen who brought up the issue last summer because ​he was getting so many complaints from Cheyenne residents about excessive noise from motorists.

“I live off Yellowstone Road, and I can tell you it’s quite a sight to see a pack of people riding these loud little motorcycles down Yellowstone at night, often up until 1 a.m., popping wheelies,” Segrave said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Too Early To Tell"}]

He said it’s too early to know if the ordinance is making a difference. 

Segrave said he hasn’t been receiving complaints, but figures that will change during the summer when more people have their windows open.

The main difference between the new ordinance and a previous one is that it allows a police officer to use his or her judgment about whether a vehicle is too loud. 

The former regulation required a meter to be used at least 25 feet away, which Segrave said made it unenforceable.

Stecks said he paid the $100 fine, which would be increased to $200 if he breaks the ordinance again within a year. 

Possible jail time is on the books for a third offense, plus a $500 fine, but City Attorney John Brodie told Cowboy State Daily when the ordinance was passed last year that it’s 

“If anything, jail is maybe an imposed part of the sentence that would then be suspended,” he said.

“People told me, ‘You could have fought this,’” Steck said. “I said I’d be in worse trouble because I would have ended up in jail after I told the judge and the court how crooked they are. 

"There would have been F-bombs involved. When you’re a mechanic, F-bombs are the terminology of the trade.”

The ordinance requires all vehicles driven within city limits to be equipped with a muffler. It prohibits vehicles that bypass or cut out their mufflers to be louder and those that create “excessive smoke.”

Stecks said he agrees with the idea that people who drive small motorcycles known as “crotch rockets” up and down the street after 10 p.m. need to be ticketed. 

But he emphasized, “Not drivers who are just doing their job in the middle of the day.”

He said it would have made more sense if he’d received a ticket for a machine that he knows is really noisy: a fast 1931 Model A rat rod named “Clyde” that he built several years ago. 

Several of Stecks’ co-workers smiled and nodded their heads as he said this, because they know exactly how loud Clyde can be cranked it up.

Stecks said his main problem with the ordinance is that it relies on a police officer to make a judgment call about how loud the noise is.

“They need to measure it,” he said. “That’s the only way they should ever do this.”

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<title>Meet The First Driver To Get A Ticket Under Cheyenne’s New Noise Ordinance | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Mechanic Geno Stecks got the first ticket under Cheyenne’s new noise ordinance while delivering a car part in the middle of the day. When the officer told him he couldn't hear his radio because of the exhaust, Stecks said, "Turn your volume knob up."

Meet The First Driver To Get A Ticket Under Cheyenne’s New Noise Ordinance

Government & Politics

Politics

Wyoming’s coal sector is startled at Republican political candidates who oppose the data center buildout.

Data centers are large warehouses full of servers that power parts of the internet and, increasingly, artificial intelligence (AI). Wyoming has between 20 and 30 operational data centers.

President Donald Trump has touted the sector’s expansion as part of a 

, and part of beating China in a technology advancement race.

Many Wyoming Republicans oppose data center construction due to the various unknowns associated with them, or doubts about the veracity of the companies’ promises, regarding water usage, pollution, noise, and the irreversible alteration of agricultural lands and vistas.

“It’s kind of frustrating from the coal side of things,” Travis Deti, executive director of the Wyoming Mining Association, told Cowboy State Daily on Monday. “The coal comeback right now is being – you know it’s being driven largely by the data center buildout nationally and the projected demand for energy.”

Yet, Deti added, “when you have politicians running around Wyoming, it’s easy for them to say, ‘We support coal, we support coal,’ but out of the other side of their mouths they want to stop the data centers.”

Deti attributed the anti-data center fad to a “wave of populism” by which politicians follow passing movements rather than concrete principles.

Wyoming's public revenues have depended significantly on coal mining over the years, even as the sector has suffered under pendulum politics from Washington, D.C. 

Coal production in Wyoming peaked in 2008, when the Powder River Basin produced nearly 450 million tons, and has trended unsteadily downward since. 

Wyoming surface coal production has fallen by 59.1% over the past 16 years. Thermal coal, which Wyoming produces, has seen lower demand in recent years.

That’s from coal-fired power plants either retiring or lowering their demand nationally as the market has shifted to both natural gas and renewable energy.

Calendar year 2024 marked the first time Wyoming coal production had fallen below 200 million tons since 1992.

The industry saw it as a dark year, as President Joe Biden’s U.S. Bureau of Land Management issued a 

Wyoming’s coal sector is startled at Republican candidates who oppose data centers. Industry leaders say the revival of coal is driven by demand for energy from data centers.  "It's frustrating," said Travis Deti, of the Wyoming Mining Association.

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