It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming, for Wednesday, September 11th. I’m Wendy Corr, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom - brought to you by ServeWyoming - Wyoming's center for volunteerism and AmeriCorps service for the last 30 years! For volunteer opportunities, visit ServeWyoming dot org"
--
A Thermopolis man was killed in an officer- and deputy-involved shooting in town Monday evening, while a police officer and sheriff’s deputy have been placed on paid leave.
41-year-old Jared Gottula became the subject of a police welfare check Monday evening when a neighbor saw him thrashing his home and surroundings with a baseball bat while yelling and screaming. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland spoke to that neighbor the night of the shooting.
“Kerry Wilson… her backyard abuts the subject's backyard, and she said, it's been, it's been years of apparent mental outbursts, and you know, him fighting, screaming, yelling with his dad… she was very emotional Monday night. So she was struggling with guilt for calling in the welfare check because it ended so tragically. But she also just said, you know, she was reminding herself why she called in the first place and and the, you know, all of the other people that could have been affected.”
Neither the officer nor the deputy were hurt. They’re now on paid administrative leave during an investigation into the incident by the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation.
Read the full story HERE.
--
A man is facing 18 wildlife-related charges based on allegations that he went on a killing spree with a bow in Cody, leaving nine dead mule deer scattered around town.
Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz reports that Joshua Wielhouwer was arraigned early Tuesday on nine counts of taking a big game animal without a license and nine counts of wanton destruction of a big game animal.
“Game Wardens just started finding deer, dead mule deer that had been killed, apparently by a broadhead, lying around. One was even found floating in a pond. I think the the final tally was nine deer, I think two bucks, and then one fawn, and then the rest were does. These deer had just apparently been shot with a compound bow and left to die and left to lay around Cody.”
Cody has a robust urban mule deer herd. It is technically legal to hunt deer with a bow within town limits in Wyoming. But only under special conditions, usually established by local municipal authorities.
Read the full story HERE.
--
A grass fire sparked by an intense afternoon thunderstorm Monday afternoon continues to grow and burn about 5 miles southeast of town in Hot Springs County.
The fire grew overnight to more than 1,600 acres, and is considered 0% contained. Cowboy State Daily’s Jackie Dorothy reports that the Bureau of Land Management has launched an aerial attack on the fire.
“The Warm Springs Fire is just five miles outside of Thermopolis, and firefighters are working, especially during the day to suppress this, but at this point, it is 0% containment. The planes that are going into the rugged terrain are dropping the retardant, and we're just keeping an eye on it. The landowners I've talked to are very confident in the abilities of the firefighters and keeping it away from all the structures and even from the fences that are out in the area, we do have a lot of dry conditions that are occurring out there, so the fire is spreading fast through dry Juniper sagebrush and even cheatgrass.”
The Wyoming State Forestry Division reports that so far, about $1 million has been spent fighting what’s been named the Warm Springs Fire.
Read the full story HERE.
--
Construction on Wyoming’s largest trona mining project is scheduled to begin in mid-2025, with a projected cost of more than $5 billion dollars.
The Dry Creek Trona Project proposed by Pacific Soda LLC in Sweetwater County will employ 2,100 construction workers annually before becoming operational in early 2029, according to energy reporter Pat Maio.
“Kind of on an average annual basis, it'll be about… like 2200 jobs annually. 2100 I think, so that's a lot of jobs on a permanent basis. When this mine opens up in a couple years, 2029, it'll have over 530 jobs, permanent. So that's a lot of jobs for Wyoming… there's data there that shows that employments going down, mining productions going down. Well, here's an industry that's growing, 530 permanent jobs.”
Pacific Soda wants to begin construction of the project in the third quarter of 2025. The DEQ announced plans Monday to hold a public hearing Dec. 3 to consider the merits of the project.
Read the full story HERE.
--
The group of Republican lawmakers known as the Wyoming Freedom Caucus will have new leadership entering next year’s legislative session.
The biggest change is the chairman position, which will be filled by state Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams of Cody. Politics reporter Leo Wolfson says Rep. John Bear of Gillette, is stepping down from the role, which he held for four years.
“He had been chairman since 2020 and during that time, the Freedom Caucus grew with leaps and bounds, going from about 14 or 15 members a few years back up to 26 for the last legislative session. And now it appears they have poised to gain as many as 37 to 38 seats in the House, giving them a majority in that chamber. So it's an interesting shake up to see.”
Rodriguez-Williams was first elected to the Legislature in 2020. She won her primary election for a third term in August and is facing no challengers in the November election. Rodriguez-Williams has been one of the leading pro-life voices in the state.
Read the full story HERE.
--
Colorado’s wolf reintroduction program has so far been a disaster, but some believe there’s a chance it could still work if Wyoming’s southern neighbor would follow the Cowboy State’s lead.
Outdoors reporter Mark Heinz spoke to Jerry Whited, an experienced outdoorsman who’s lived in Wyoming and in Colorado, who has watched the process in both states closely.
“He said in Wyoming, they were way more open. They were way more open and transparent to the public, a lot of times at their expense… Then there's this perception that Colorado, they're not doing that. They're kind of being a little bit too secretive… And also, he said that, you know, at some point they're going to have to face the fact that they might have to let ranchers in Colorado do what, what ranchers in Wyoming are allowed to do, which is - wolves are attacking their livestock. They should just be able to have that option to just shoot the wolves.”
Colorado’s wolf reintroduction barely squeaked by voters in November of 2020, and their presence has been controversial from the start. Some Centennial State residents hailed it as a restoration of nature’s balance. But others, especially ranchers, say that the wolves have been nothing but trouble.
Read the full story HERE.
--
A local real estate broker’s poking fun at the presidential race has been getting a lot of laughs, led to a couple of sales and generated a lot of politically charged text messages.
It’s a simple joke, over the smiling faces of the Republican and Democratic front-runners, the sign asks, “Moving to CANADA!?” in giant letters. Underneath that in smaller letters is, “We Can Sell Your Home!”
Chad Lummus, who leads Casper’s Coldwell Banker The Legacy Group franchise and The Lummus Real Estate Team, told Cowboy State Daily’s Dale Killingbeck that he believes there could be a new wave of response after Tuesday’s debate between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris.
“A real estate broker in Casper who was getting kind of bored with his billboard messaging earlier this year, so in April, he decided to get out of the box and do a little bit of political satire. So we had a picture of of President Trump and President Biden side by side… so after after President Biden dropped out of the race, that billboard continued for a couple weeks, but he just changed it to have Kamala Harris as the photo beside President Trump…. he said he he's got actually sold two houses because of the billboard.”
Lummus believes everyone who sees the billboard understands it’s political satire and is “very neutral.” It doesn’t take sides and assumes that no matter the outcome, some people are going to be so fed up they just want out of America.
Read the full story HERE.
--
When it comes to U.S. Senate races this year, there are none more pivotal than the matchup between Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Tester and Republican challenger Tim Sheehy in Montana.
Politics reporter Leo Wolfson says that in Wyoming, this close battle being waged by its northern neighbors has major implications.
“Especially northern Wyoming communities like Sheridan… A lot of these people I spoke to travel up to Montana quite frequently to do business, and they pay attention to what the politics are. One gentleman pointed out to me that the all the TV stations are based out of the Billings market, so anyone who watches local news is kind of naturally paying attention to what the news is in Montana.”
The biggest impact of all for people in Wyoming are some of the national implications of the Tester-Sheehy race. Republicans are likely to gain a seat in West Virginia with former Democrat Sen. Joe Manchin stepping down, which puts the Senate at a 50/50 deadlock.
Read the full story HERE.
--
And 23 years ago today, the foundation for all Americans was shaken. The World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania are all forever marked by the tragedy that took place on September 11th, 2001.
On that date, at that time, Cowboy State Daily editor Jimmy Orr was serving as Director of Digital Strategy and a spokesperson for President George W. Bush. That means he was in the White House when the world as we knew it changed forever. He wrote about it in a column published today.
“Sirens go off in the White House, Secret Service agents are running up and down the halls, bashing on the doors telling us to evacuate. And so, you know, we all got up and we're running out onto the White House lawn. I remember very well the North Lawn of the White House running out. All of us are just running as fast as we could, the Secret Service agents are yelling at us, ‘There's a plane headed for the White House,’ and so just seeing the herd of people running out of the White House to Lafayette Park is where we ended up… the whole experience was surreal and tragic, and I don't know else how to explain it… that's a memory you'll never forget, and it's a memory that nobody wants to forget. Nobody wanted to be a part of it, but I think it's really important that we remember it.”
Read Jimmy's column HERE.
--
Radio Stations
The following radio stations are airing Cowboy State Daily Radio on weekday mornings, afternoons and evenings.
KYDT 103.1 FM – Sundance
KBFS 1450 AM — Sundance
KYCN 1340 AM / 92.7 FM — Wheatland
KZEW 101.7 FM — Wheatland
KANT 104.1 FM — Guernsey
KZQL 105.5 FM — Casper
KMXW 92.5 FM — Casper
KJAX 93.5 FM — Jackson
KROE 930 AM / 103.9 FM — Sheridan
KWYO 1410 AM / 106.9 FM — Sheridan
KYOY 92.3 FM Hillsdale-Cheyenne / 106.9 FM Cheyenne
KRAE 1480 AM — Cheyenne
KDLY 97.5 FM — Lander
KOVE 1330 AM — Lander
KZMQ 100.3/102.3 FM — Cody, Powell, Medicine Wheel, Greybull, Basin, Meeteetse
KKLX 96.1 FM — Worland, Thermopolis, Ten Sleep, Greybull
KCGL 104.1 FM — Cody, Powell, Basin, Lovell, Clark, Red Lodge, MT
KTAG 97.9 FM — Cody, Powell, Basin
KCWB 92.1 FM — Cody, Powell, Basin
KVGL 105.7 FM — Worland, Thermopolis, Basin, Ten Sleep
KODI 1400 AM / 96.7 FM — Cody, Powell, Lovell, Basin, Clark, Red Lodge
KWOR 1340 AM / 104.7 FM — Worland, Thermopolis, Ten Sleep
KREO 93.5 FM — Sweetwater and Sublette Counties
KERM 98.3 FM — Goshen County
Check with individual radio stations for airtime of the newscasts.
