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

<title>Daily Smile: Saturday, October 5, 2024 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Dog's reaction to arrival of new puppy...

Daily Smile: Saturday, October 5, 2024

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Mac Watson

Daily Video News

It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming for Tuesday, July 7th.  I’m Mac Watson

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A man blew the fingers off his hand and injured four other people outside a Gillette bar around midnight Saturday. Cowboy State Daily’s Kolby Fedore reports that the man has made a public apology.

“Just before midnight, Matthew Raymond Lynch headed outside to the Other Side Bar and Grill. He made it as far as the entrance, the outside part, when he decided to light a firecracker. Lynch said that when he tried to light the firework, it blew up immediately. He also said that he lost all of the fingers on his right hand. He said he had partial blindness and a loss of hearing. He was taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital and then airlifted to Billings.”

The bar was hosting a Fourth of July fundraiser concert and the music ended, patrons were beginning to head home. That’s when Lynch lit a firework which exploded outside the entrance, blowing all the fingers off his hand and injuring four other people. He apologized on social media.

After decades of chasing diversification, Wyoming is finally landing on data centers. Cowboy State Daily’s Renee Jean reports that the boom is forcing the state to confront a familiar boom-and-bust tension.

“Talking with Tyler Lindholm. He's a Crook County rancher, former state legislator, and he works for American Prosperity. And so he kind of sees both ends of the spectrum, right? He wants to see the opportunity come with data centers, but the questions about water and power use are absolutely fair. Talking with Senator Kail Case, he wonders ‘Does this represent an overbuild?’ Analysts are estimating upwards of 3000 facilities on top of an existing 4000 but those 3000 new facilities, they aren't anywhere near the size of the old ones. They are gargantuan, they are exponentially bigger, and so is it over building?” 

Now that data centers are finally racing toward the state’s wide-open prairies and cheap power, the rush is forcing a choice. How much growth is Wyoming willing to accept, and at what cost to power bills, water supplies, and its wide-open spaces? 

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Wyoming's most famous diesel “delete" mechanic Troy Lake, who was pardoned by Trump after a prison stint, advocated for the president to pardon at least six more. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports on Friday, Trump pardoned those six, plus three others.

“What Troy Lake has done is actually looked for people that are like him, and he's building a coalition, the Diesel Freedom Coalition. The Diesel Freedom Coalition has been working on the science and the policy and the pardon lobby side, so they're pushing for pardons for people they feel are good candidates. They are also, Troy Lake especially, and his son TJ, you're trying to build the science to show better means of reducing emissions without putting people out of business and sending them into limp mode on the interstate, and they're also talking to lawmakers about those better ways forward.”

Besides pardon-related advocacy, Lake said his group is working to provide sound emissions evidence and mechanical strategies to policymakers, to persuade them to pivot toward emissions regulations that don’t crush small-time trucking businesses and other fleets.

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A Casper man accused of holding a toddler “like a shield” in front of him during an armed standoff said Monday he intends to change his plea. Cowboy State Daily’s Dale Killingbeck reports that police say that Brayden Randolph “told officers he had a gun and officers had guns and challenged officers to get him.”

“The call to police said that there had been a gunshot fired, and after they got there, he appeared at a door at one point, had a toddler in his arm and a gun in his belt with his hand on the gun, challenging police to come get him, so that standoff ended with the child being rescued by police, and then breaking through a door, arresting him, and he since then has been out of court on $7,000 bond, was in court today at what's called a ‘docket appearance’ and his attorney said he's going to change his plea.”

Charges against Randolph include reckless endangerment, child endangerment, being a minor in possession of alcohol and interference with a peace officer. 

I’ll have more news from Cowboy State Daily right after this.

Cowboy State Daily News continues now….

After spending about $200,000 in goat grazing for flood mitigation since 2025, the town of Rock Springs is putting an end to it for now. Cowboy State Daily’s Kate Meadows reports that one council member said residents say it’s too expensive.

“The goats provided an efficient way to mitigate this risk, so you're not having to bring in all this heavy equipment or have you know manpower down there in the really thick, thick vegetation, the goats just did it all. The problem, or the controversy with it, is that it came at what people thought was a pretty high price tag. So, it went from $50,000 the first go around, to $58K the second go around, to $92K the third go around.”

According to Mayor Max Mickelson, during the latest grazing session, which began April 1st and ended June 30th, the goats removed roughly 35 tons of vegetation.

Conservationist Rich Guenzel understands why many people, including Wyoming Game and Fish, wrongly call one of the state's signature animals “antelope.” But Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz reports that it bugs Guenzel so much, he’s started a “pronghorn swear jar” and makes people pay $1.

“It irritates him when they get their called antelope, because this is that same discussion as buffalo or bison, you know that sort of thing, moose or elk. Well, you know what is what the animal is actually called? Because just, as an aside, in Europe,  some people call what we call moose, they call an elk. According to the research he's looked into, especially with the latest technology, genetic mapping, they've been able to determine that the nearest, the only very distant living relative of the pronghorn is, and a lot of people will be surprised by this, actually giraffes.”

Guenzel tells Cowboy State Daily that all the money he collects from his swear jar goes to pronghorn conservation groups.

It’s been fourteen months after a man was found shot in the head in an abandoned truck on the Wind River Indian Reservation. But, Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports prosecutors have no ongoing, public murder case in the December 2024 death of Riverton man Rex Lofts, even though Jose A. Gonzales was arrested.

“Gonzales was charged in Fremont County on the state level in last October, and he is the only one that the prosecutor had jurisdiction over the other suspects, the way Fremont County Chief Deputy Attorney Tim Hancock put it to me. The Feds have jurisdiction over those other suspects. Well, this all is alleged to have happened in the same remote place on the reservation. So, what that says to me is okay, probably Gonzalez is not a tribal member, and the others are, because the feds take jurisdiction for tribal members implicated in crimes on the reservation, whereas your local elected prosecutor would handle crimes just involving non-tribal members.”

The 72-year-old Lofts died of what the autopsy report called a homicide with two gunshots in his head around Dec. 2, 2024. According to the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation, his body 

Everyone has a dream. A Powell man has built a "Dumb And Dumber" Mutt Cutts van replica with his best friend. Cowboy State Daily’s Kolby Fedore reports that so far, the two haven’t been able to recreate one of the more memorable scenes from the 1994 film starring Jeff Daniels and Jim Carrey. 

“20-year-old Parker Williams wanted to make a YouTube video that would gain attention from his peers, and so he decided to draw inspiration from one of his favorite movies, Dumb and Dumber, and recreate the Mutt Cuts van. Williams, with the help of his friend Seth Siebert, found an old van and decided to fix it up. It took him about three or four days. A lot of people want to stop and take pictures with him. He said he has not been pulled over yet, but he is looking forward to that. One of the movie's most iconic scenes is when Lloyd and Harry are pulled over by a trooper who thinks that they're drinking alcohol, and Lloyd hands him a bottle of his own urine.”

Williams tells Cowboy State Daily that building the van was more complicated than he expected. He and his buddy spent hours wiring custom headlights and blinkers so it could legally travel Wyoming roads.

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And that’s today’s news. Get your free digital subscription to Wyoming's only statewide newspaper by hitting the Daily Newsletter button on 

 - and you can watch this newscast every day by clicking Subscribe on our 

 channel, or listen to us on your favorite podcast app.  Thanks for watching - I’m Mac Watson, for Cowboy State Daily.

News image 7 7 26

<title>Cowboy State Daily Video Newscast: Tuesday, July 7, 2026 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Tuesday's headlines include:
* Gillette Man Loses Fingers To Fireworks
* Wyoming At Critical Crossroads With Data Centers 
* Wyoming Diesel Mechanic Gets More Pardons From Trump

Cowboy State Daily Video Newscast: Tuesday, July 7, 2026

Coy Knobel

Don Day Weather

Chance of afternoon rain in much of Wyoming on Tuesday, otherwise mostly sunny. Partly to mostly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain in some areas. Highs mainly in the 80s and 90s. Lows from the mid 40s to low 60s.

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Slight chance of rain after noon, otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 94 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain mainly before 10 p.m. and a low near 57.

Slight chance of rain after noon, increasing clouds today with a high near 89 and partly cloudy overnight with a low near 57.

 Slight chance of rain after 3 p.m., increasing clouds and breezy today with a high near 88 and wind gusts as high as 29 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a slight chance of rain before 7 p.m., a low near 52 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph.

 Slight chance of rain after noon, otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 84 and partly cloudy overnight with a low near 47.

  Slight chance of rain after 2 p.m., otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 88 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a low near 52 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph.

Slight chance of rain after 2 p.m., increasing clouds and breezy today with a high near 81 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph. Partly cloudy and breezy overnight with a low near 52 and wind gusts as high as 28 mph.

Slight chance of rain, otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 79 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a low near 46.

 Slight chance of rain after noon, otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 83 and partly cloudy overnight with a low near 49.

  Slight chance of rain after noon, increasing clouds today with a high near 82 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a low near 47.

 Sunny and breezy today with a high near 79 and wind gusts as high as 28 mph. Partly cloudy and breezy overnight with a low near 48 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph.

  Mostly sunny today with a high near 85 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Gradually becoming mostly clear overnight with a low near 50.

Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park

:  Sunny today with a high near 77 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph. Gradually becoming mostly clear overnight a low near 44.

Chance of rain mainly after 3 p.m., otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 93 and mostly clear overnight with a low near 59.

:  Slight chance of rain after noon, otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 88 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph. Partly cloudy and breezy overnight with a slight chance of rain before 8 p.m., a low near 59 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph.

  Slight chance of rain after 2 p.m., otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 92 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a slight chance of rain before 7 p.m., a low near 59 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph.

  Chance of rain mainly after 2 p.m., gradually clearing today with a high near 86 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain mainly before 11 p.m., a low near 59 and wind gusts as high as 21 mph.

  Chance of rain mainly after 4 p.m., gradually becoming sunny today with a high near 88 and partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain before midnight and a low near 56.

:  Chance of rain mainly after 3 p.m., gradually becoming sunny today with a high near 86 and partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain before midnight and a low near 56.

Chance of rain after 3 p.m. (some storms could be severe), otherwise partly sunny today with a high near 92 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph. Mostly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain mainly before midnight (some storms could be severe), a low near 60 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph.

  Chance of rain after 3 p.m. (some storms could be severe), otherwise partly sunny today with a high near 91 and wind gusts as high as 20 mph. Mostly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain mainly before midnight (some storms could be severe), a low near 63 and wind gusts as high as 18 mph.

:  Chance of rain after 3 p.m. (some storms could be severe), otherwise partly sunny today with a high near 85 and wind gusts as high as 17 mph. Mostly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain mainly before midnight (some storms could be severe), a low near 58 and wind gusts as high as 17 mph.

  Chance of rain mainly after 3 p.m., otherwise mostly sunny and hot today with a high near 97 and partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain mainly before 9 p.m. and a low near 62.

  Slight chance of rain after noon, otherwise partly sunny and hot today with a high near 93 and partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain and a low near 60.

  Chance of rain after 3 p.m. (some storms could be severe), otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 92 and wind gusts as high as 24 mph. Partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain mainly before midnight (some storms could be severe), a low near 58 and wind gusts as high as 22 mph.

  Slight chance of rain after noon, otherwise partly sunny and hot today with a high near 90 and partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain and a low near 58.

  Chance of rain mainly after 3 p.m., otherwise partly sunny today with a high near 84 and partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain and a low near 53.

  Chance of rain after noon, increasing clouds and hot today with a high near 95 and partly cloudy overnight with a slight chance of rain before 9 p.m. and a low near 58.

  Slight chance of rain after noon, otherwise sunny and breezy today with a high near 87 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph. Partly cloudy and breezy overnight with a slight chance of rain, a low near 54 and wind gusts as high as 30 mph.

  Slight chance of rain after noon, otherwise mostly sunny today with a high near 86 and partly cloudy overnight with a chance of rain and a low near 51.

  Sunny and hot today with a high near 91 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph. Mostly clear overnight with a slight chance of rain before midnight, a low near 48 and wind gusts as high as 25 mph.

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<title>Don Day's Wyoming Weather Forecast: Tuesday, July 7, 2026 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Don Day's Wyoming Weather Forecast: Tuesday, July 7, 2026

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's business and tourism reporter, Renée Jean

Renée Jean

Energy

Economic developers have spent decades trying to diversify Wyoming’s economy away from the volatile boom-and-bust cycles of its coal, oil and gas industries. Tech infrastructure — data centers — seemed like the answer, and is something the state’s been pursuing for the last 20-plus years. 

Now that data centers are finally racing toward the state’s wide-open prairies and cheap power, however, the rush is forcing a choice. How much growth is Wyoming will to accept, and at what cost to power bills, water supplies, and its wide-open spaces? 

Wyoming wants high-paying jobs and more housing so it has a future for its children. It loses 70% of its youths by the time they’re 30, according to state officials. 

But, at the same time, it also wants quiet prairie, low power bills, and tight control over scarce water supplies. Each new data center is a tug on all those resources.

To longtime Cheyenne attorney and Councilman Larry Wolfe, this tension is actually nothing new. Wyoming has long been a place where its residents understand that boom almost always precedes bust and broken promises. Many have thus learned to be skeptical of promises and promise makers. 

In fact, the bigger the promise is, the higher the skepticism goes.

“This is exactly the discussion that went on all over the state as we’ve seen all of our energy booms and busts that we’ve endured,” Wolfe told Cowboy State Daily in a previous interview. “And I think people are a bit schizophrenic about this, because they live in Wyoming for a reason.”

Sometimes those reasons are fairly simple. It falls somewhere between knowing your neighbors and having a short drive to get away from them all to a place where the night sky is clean and clear and the Milky Way can be seen.

Holding onto that is about preserving a quality of life that has not only drawn people to the state but kept them here. And it’s about making sure the price paid for such treasure doesn’t come too cheaply. 

“This is just another long cycle of that over the years,” Wolfe said. “It’s just the way Wyoming is. We’ve always had this sense that we want to maintain the Wyoming that we have. But we also realize that it’s not sustainable without all of these things coming in, making these huge investments, and putting our people to work, and then building the housing that will, in fact, accommodate that.”

For Wolfe, data centers are just the latest boom-time bargain, promising investment and jobs while testing how much Wyoming is willing to change. 

Today’s push-pull on data centers has an element of deja vu for economic developers, too. 

Wyoming Business Alliance President Renny MacKay agreed with Wolfe that the conversation is really nothing new. The best illustration of that is found in former Gov. Dave Freudenthal’s book, “Wyoming: The Paradox of Plenty."

“He explains it well,” MacKay told Cowboy State Daily. “The tension between that and diving into when the coal industry came to Wyoming. There was a lot of concern about that.”

That happened around the same time as the cattle bust of the 1980s, MacKay said, and has led to an iconic bumper sticker often referenced in Wyoming.

“Dear God give me one more boom,” the bumper sticker goes. “And I promise not to piss it all away next time.”

Skepticism when it comes to economic development is not necessarily bad, MacKay added, particularly if an effort isn’t private-sector led.

“Sometimes you’ve got to take some bets,” he said. “But what we’re seeing now that I think is so positive is the private sector is trying to lead this. Data centers aren’t coming here and asking for any sort of land donation or incentive to come at this point. The conditions, the economic conditions, are in a great place for us to attract some new industries.”

That doesn’t have to just be data centers, MacKay added. Done right, it could also lead to other developments as well. The new nuclear power plant in Kemmerer is an example, as is the nuclear fuel production plant that’s coming to Gillette.

“They’re not coming here and saying, ‘If you invest in our company, then we can grow in Wyoming',” MacKay said. “That’s why I think the business industry sees so much opportunity right now in Wyoming’s future.”

Growth, MacKay added, is key to Wyoming’s future, even if there might be challenges.

“To some degree, you have to take a step back and look at the forest,” he said. “There are so many people who are excited about this moment. They see that their livelihoods are being improved. They’ve got jobs, they’ve got family members who’ve got jobs. So when we’re talking about building Wyoming and attracting people who want to invest in Wyoming as individuals and families, they’re wealth generators and they want to help make this state and our communities more prosperous.”

Making life great for the next generation is the bedrock of MacKay’s own personal motivation. 

“I look out at my own kids, right,” he said. “Or even my neighbor’s, too, and my peers. They’re starting to see more opportunity in Wyoming, where they don’t have to leave to find a great job. So let’s stay focused on the positive, because I think more people do truly want job creation in Wyoming and want higher-paying jobs that we’re starting to see happen.”

Crook County rancher and former state legislator Tyler Lindholm with Americans For Prosperity gets both ends of the spectrum. He absolutely wants to see Wyoming hang onto what makes it the Cowboy State.

It’s fair, he added, to question the guardrails around important issues like power consumption and water use.

“Wyoming is fantastic at producing energy,” Lindholm told Cowboy State Daily. “Clearly, these data centers recognize that. So, I think it’s fair to bring up certain scenarios. I mean, when people talk about their rates being affected because of a new, large industrial load coming in, I think it’s fair to bring up that concern and let the company address that. Let the local utility address that, and if they won’t address that, by golly, let’s pass a law ensuring that you are only going to pay for what you get. Those types of scenarios are completely fair.”

But “screaming and shrieking to hear themselves scream and shriek” in an election year isn’t coming from a “principled standpoint,” Lindholm said. 

There’s a distinction between policy-focused criticism and what he sees as election-year theatrics, he added.

“We need to let the economy work,” he said. “And I think we can have our cake and eat it, too. We can do responsible development and see the economic growth and be a beneficiary of it.”

Not through moratoriums to shut down business, or aggressive zoning crafted to choke business out — both proposals that have surprised Lindholm in a deeply conservative state. 

That kind of approach, he added, is not what Wyoming is best known for. The state is better known for everybody putting “heads together” and coming up with a plan that preserves what’s important while allowing economic prosperity. 

That’s what the state did when it was developing its bedrock energy industries. That’s what Lindholm hopes to see happen with data centers, which want to rely on and help bolster the state’s legacy energy industries.

“Maybe I’m too optimistic that we have the capability to do big things and make big plans, but I think if they — and outfits like Microsoft have been outspoken that they’ve got those situations handled,” he said. "I think it’s also fair to say, 'OK, well let’s make that part of the deal'. Let’s put it in law and make it so that it covers every data center that’s even already in place.”

At the same time, lawmakers could also handle other issues, Lindholm added, such as making it illegal for elected officials to sign NDAs with private companies.

That kind of secrecy isn’t the right approach, Lindholm added. 

“This is 2026, the age of information, where anybody can look up anything at the drop of a hat,” Lindholm said. “So maybe this is a lesson to big business, big industrial loads, is to get out in front of this, talk about it publicly, and talk about how you’re not going to raise electricity rates.”

Lindholm’s bottom line is that Wyoming should write clear rules on rates, transparency and water use, so new projects can enter the state smoothly.

Lindholm wasn’t the only voice across the state suggesting it’s important to strike the right balance for incoming data centers.

Business owners, too, are largely supportive, but also want to see that thought has been put into appropriate guardrails.

“I’m pro data center, but I’m not pro reckless development,” Frog Creek Partners owner Brian Deurloo told Cowboy State Daily. “I’m not blind to the impact of data centers, but I’m saying Wyoming should lead solutions. Water, power, heat, workforce, land impacts need to be engineered and negotiated upfront.”

Cheyenne business owner Tighe Fagan, who leads an enterprise software and IT consulting company called Gannett Peak Technical Services, told Cowboy State Daily data centers probably wouldn’t be his first pick, so he understands everyone’s pain with a lot of boxy-looking warehouses taking up space.

“It’s not the way they exactly want it,” he said. “But to me it’s like, well, we want diversification, and this is a vector into that.”

The plus side to multiple data centers, though, is more career flexibility for that sector, which can help businesses like his with recruitment and retention of Wyoming youths.

“I’m trying to recruit people out of the university to come work at my company, so I want an ecosystem where they can come and there’s agglomeration,” he said. “That’s where you have options. Like, OK, if we get a bunch of data centers, well then the people working at Google can jump over to Microsoft.”

For Fagan, a certain level of “agglomeration” means graduates will be more likely to build careers in Wyoming instead of leaving.”

Are Data Centers Paying Their Fair Share?

One of the central questions some lawmakers are asking is whether Wyoming is taxing data centers appropriately.

State Sen. Cale Case has been among the most outspoken voices on that front.

Wyoming’s tax structure was crafted when the state didn’t have much experience with data centers. 

“We had no idea how much money it was actually going to cost us,” Case said. “And we didn’t think through that very well.”

The employment stats from a data center, once built, are small, Case said, while its demands on resources are potentially outsized when it comes to power consumption. 

Even if data centers adopt a “bring your own power” mentality, they’ll still be using substantial resources from one or another commodity market. That means they’ll still have impacts on the overall marketplace even if they build their own power generation. 

That has Case questioning just how good they are for economic development, which was the original rationale for the state’s sales-tax break.

In his view, Wyoming is giving up significant tax revenue in exchange for relatively few permanent jobs, and a potentially heavy load for power and other systems. 

“I’m not sure that we’re being negative when we say, ‘This is not living up to what we thought it would',” Case said. “I’m not sure that’s what we mean when we say, ‘We’re open for business'.”

The economic development Wyoming wants is more related to having kids in schools and vibrant communities, Case said. And vibrant communities mean having data centers pay for the impact of their presence. 

“What is the value of the servers?” he said. “You could find that out by the property tax, and then you could multiply them by the sales tax that’s been foregone, which is 8%, and then just ask yourself if that’s worth it.”

Thirty-five other states have data-center tax breaks like Wyoming’s, he added, which has contributed to a race to the bottom, with each state vying to outdo the other to lure data centers.

“My gut tells me that these guys just want to build these things,” Case said. “They don’t really care about the cost. They don’t care if they have to completely go to a closed-loop cooling system. They don’t care if they have to build their own electricity. They want it so bad, and I just don’t think that they need our sales tax break.”

What Case wants to do is work on eliminating the break across the country. 

“Then data centers will be even better for our communities, because they’ll be contributing to community infrastructure,” Case said. 

And if the state’s data center boom ultimately goes bust, it will also mean the state is on stronger footing to deal with any fallout.

Analysts, Case added, are estimating new data center construction of upwards of 3,000 facilities on top of an existing 4,000. Those new builds will be exponentially larger than anything previous. 

But does that match the real need? Or does it represent overbuilding, as some analysts think?

“There’s got to be a market for data processing, right?” Case said. “I mean, there’s implicit price in there. There are companies that are searching for it. There’s demand that’s growing. There’s supply factors. so the question is, could we get overextended? Could we have overbuild? And actually this is what happens with virtually anything else. You have rampant people trying to enter a market, whether it’s planting corn or the big boom in whatever we’re talking about. It always ends. It never goes on forever.”

The question then becomes, who is left holding the bag, and what will that mean for the communities involved.

“That’s another reason to not have soft tax breaks that exacerbate (the situation),” Case said. “We need to try to steady things out. We really ought to be talking to other states about joint policies, instead of pursuing this zero-sum game of you put in a tax break, so I got to put in a tax break. Everybody puts in a tax break. Then we all end up getting nothing when they’re willing to pay, and they’re not impactless.”

Case is not arguing against data centers but against subsidies that, in his view, magnify risk if the boom ultimately goes bust. 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"An Important Crossroads"}]

Wyoming, Gov. Mark Gordon told Cowboy State Daily during a recent data center tour in Cheyenne, stands at a crossroads, one that will define its future. 

He’s advocating that Wyoming embrace the opportunity, and work on the challenges together.

“I remember when the saying was, ‘Please God, give me another boom. I promise not to waste it this time',” Gordon told Cowboy State Daily. “And you think back to the end of the 1990s, early 2000s, and the state was broke. We didn’t have much money. And so here we are, we have this opportunity.”

Water and power concerns are legitimate questions, Gordon said.

“These are things we can work to,” he said. “What I think is really frustrating, and your schizophrenia question is really clear, because we want to teach more CTE, we want our kids to have better jobs and all of this, but we won’t build housing they can move into. So we’re doing a great job of training Colorado, Nebraska, Utah, Idaho and Montana’s workforce … and that’s a problem.”

Done right, data centers are a chance to provide the right kind of opportunities for Wyoming’s youths, to help keep more of them in the state, and build in some diversity, while also helping to bolster legacy industries like oil and gas, as well as build new energy sectors like nuclear, he said.

“Construction will come and go,” Gordon said. “And that’s what it is with the oil field, that’s the way it is with opening a mine, and that’s the way it is with a lot of certain jobs. But the jobs that are going to be here for the long-term are steady, good-paying jobs, and ones that our kids can aspire to.”

Whether Wyoming misses this boom, or finally breaks into a cycle less dependent on the booms and busts of commodity-based industries might depend less on data centers themselves, and more on the guardrails it chooses now for water, power, and tax policy. 

It will also depend on how much change it’s willing to accept to keep its children home, and its night skies clear.

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<title>Data Centers Test Wyoming’s Promise Not To ‘Piss Away’ The Next Boom | Cowboy State Daily</title>

The old Wyoming bumper sticker reads, “Dear God give me one more boom and I promise not to piss it all away next time.” Data centers may just be that next boom. So, how far to go in courting prosperity without losing the things that make Wyoming, Wyoming?

Data Centers Test Wyoming’s Promise Not To ‘Piss Away’ The Next Boom

Employee kate meadows cropped

Kate Meadows

Government & Politics

A controversial flood mitigation effort that brought 150-200 goats to graze along Bitter Creek in Rock Springs is on hold, at least for now.

After spending about $200,000 over three grazing sessions since the spring of 2025, the Rock Springs City Council chose not to budget additional money for the project in the coming fiscal year, instead directing funding toward cemetery lighting.

"This will be the last we see goats, at least for the next fiscal year of operations," Councilman Dan Pedri told Cowboy State Daily.

The decision at least temporarily halts a program that has generated equal parts criticism and curiosity.

Some residents questioned whether taxpayers should spend tens of thousands of dollars to have goats eat weeds. Others regularly stopped to watch the herd quietly graze along Bitter Creek.

[{"type":"text","text":"\"It's a little source of entertainment,\" Pedri said."}]

During the latest grazing session, which began April 1 and ended June 30, the goats removed roughly 35 tons of vegetation, according to mayor Max Mickelson.

“This does not meet the creeks are ‘fixed',” he said. “It means one more piece of the long-term flood mitigation work was completed.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"A Different Approach"}]

Rock Springs has struggled with periodic flooding for decades, Mickelson said, dating to alterations made to the creek channel by the former Union Pacific Coal Company.

"The goal was simple," Mickelson said of the Bitter Creek project. "Reduce noxious weeds, brush and fuel load along the creek corridors so water can flow more freely, fire risk is reduced, and our intermittent creek system is in better condition before the next major storm event.

"Our broader work is about protecting homes, businesses, infrastructure and development opportunities from recurring floodplain impacts."

The city brought in goats in the spring of 2025 on a trial basis, paying a Cheyenne operation $50,000. Mickelson said the goats “performed better than expected.”

Council member Randy Hanson had asked the council to look into goats, pointing to other Wyoming communities such as Cheyenne and Gillette that were using them successfully for targeted grazing.

[{"type":"text","text":"“We aren’t pioneers of this process by any means,” Pedri said."}]

Farson land and livestock owner Josh Skorcz caught wind of the project “through the Rock Springs grapevine” and pitched himself as a local solution to the flood-risk problem.

[{"type":"text","text":"Skorcz was the only person who bid."}]

“I provide a service,” he told Cowboy State Daily. “I saw an opportunity where we could supply a service to a local entity that needed it.”

In the fall of 2025, the city paid $58,000 to Skorcz’s LS 5 Livestock for eight weeks.

Then, in April, the Rock Springs City Council voted 6-2 to use goats for a third year for $92,000 – a 59% cost increase.

The increase was largely due to more acreage and longer duration, Skorcz said.

"The city did not pay $34,000 more for the same amount of work," Mickelson said. "The scope, timing, staffing and logistical burden increased in relation to the scope of the project."

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Why Goats?"}]

Skorcz said goats can reach steep, brush-choked areas where heavy equipment struggles to operate, reducing vegetation that can create debris dams during high-water events.

[{"type":"text","text":"The work, however, is labor intensive."}]

Under the city's contract, the herd had to be supervised around the clock. Workers also installed and repeatedly moved roughly 10,000 feet of portable electric fencing by hand.

After spending about $200,000 in goat grazing for flood mitigation since 2025, the town of Rock Springs is putting an end to it for now. One council member said residents say it’s too expensive. "This will be the last we see goats,” he said.

Daily Smile: Saturday, October 5, 2024

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