It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming, for Wednesday, March 12th. I’m Wendy Corr, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom - Brought to you by the Cowboy State Daily Morning Show With Jake! From 6 to 10 a.m., Monday through Friday, host Jake Nichols brings you news, weather, sports AND in-depth interviews with news-makers from across Wyoming - presented with Jake’s unique humor and lively commentary. Just click on the Cowboy State Daily homepage and join the live broadcast!
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The college sports landscape has changed significantly over the last couple of years, mostly due to the emergence of paid name, image and likeness, or NIL, opportunities for college athletes, and the elimination of limits on how many times an athlete can transfer schools throughout their playing careers.
On Tuesday, U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman weighed in on the matter during a House Judiciary Committee meeting, saying that former University of Wyoming football star Josh Allen could have been lured away from the Pokes had the current transfer rules and NIL opportunities been available. Cowboy State Daily’s Leo Wolfson has the story.
“The groups that are working on behalf of the schools are using lucrative NIL deals to lure athletes to new athletic opportunities. And Hageman was bringing up the example that she doubted Josh Allen might have stayed had these opportunities been given to him and having the ability to transfer out of UW. Allen came to University of Wyoming and had two very successful seasons there after coming from the junior college ranks. And she was making the argument that one of UW’s, you know, most well known athletes from recent history wouldn't have probably stayed, or may not have stayed at the university had this existed, which would have been definitely to the detriment of the school.”
UW’s men’s basketball and football teams have lost some of their top players in recent years after they transferred out to other schools.
Read the full story HERE.
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The state of Wyoming has enough evidence to keep prosecuting two Big Piney men for their alleged involvement in a February impalement murder.
That’s what a judge ruled Tuesday in the case of 19-year-old Rowan Littauer and 18-year-old Orion Schlesinger. Littauer is charged with first-degree murder and Schlesinger is charged with conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, responsible for the death of 23-year-old Big Piney man Dakota Farley by bow and arrow.
Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that the two face life in prison or the death penalty if convicted.
“So we have just a tiny bit of finger pointing to where Schlesinger is saying, oh, you know, like he threatened me, he pushed me into this. He said that in a letter that he sent to the judge… And then Littauer on the other hand, his attorney kept pointing to Littauer when he confessed essentially to killing this man with a bow and arrow, said he was peer pressured. And you know that that argument also pointed out that it was Schlesinger's girlfriend that was offended by Farley's alleged actions toward her. Basically, he creeped her out, in her words. There's also some dispute about whether he was otherwise inappropriate to her, but investigators don't believe that he touched her in any way.”
Pinedale Circuit Court Judge John LaBuda’s finding establishes probable cause for the charges applied to each of the defendants, but doesn’t form a conviction of guilt.
Read the full story HERE.
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During public testimony Tuesday, Rocky Mountain Power officials said they are already seeing a lot of interest in what they called “very large customers,” as the power company fielded public input on its latest, double-digit rate increase proposal.
That’s why it is proposing to require ratepayers who reserve 200 Megawatts (MW) or more to forge a special contract with the company, so the costs these data centers and other power users ring up won’t be forced upon regular residential ratepayers. Cowboy State Daily’s Renee Jean spoke to a representative for AARP Wyoming, who said that seniors are already feeling the pain of higher costs of living, so adding on a higher electric bill is concerning.
“Figuring out how you're going to handle someone who wants 200 megawatts of power is a big deal, and doing it in a way that doesn't clobber residential and small business customers who feel like they've already seen enough as far as a rate increase goes, that's a big concern for like the Wyoming AARP director that I talked to, you know, he's worried about how they're going to handle that in the future. Because, as we know, every time Rocky Mountain Power has to build more infrastructure, it costs everybody on the system.”
According to the terms of the agreement Rocky Mountain Power has struck, very large new load customers that require a special contract will have to take some steps showing they have sufficient credit or collateral to cover their minimum on-peak power charges for at least five years, along with other details that will keep the higher costs with the incoming businesses, and not passed on to other rate payers.
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The annual bison harvest is happening just outside Yellowstone National Park’s north entrance. But this yearly event is fraught with controversy.
Cowboy State Daily’s David Madison reports that the process of trapping, shipping and slaughtering hundreds of wild bison at the Stephen’s Creek facility near Gardiner, Montana, is viewed by some tribal members and park biologists as a triumph in wildlife management, while bison advocacy groups decry the annual culling as a “disservice.”
“From a 600 pound bull you might get 300 pounds of meat, and that processed meat is going up to the Salish Kootenai Tribe up near Flathead Lake in in northwest Montana, and it's a food program for the members of that tribe… the hard part, especially for park officials, is no one seems to agree what the right course going forward is. The park has established this 2024, bison management plan, and everybody seems to be upset about it. The state of Montana suing for one reason, conservation groups are serving for another reason. And then you have these field observers, you know, watching their every move.”
The 2024 Yellowstone National Park Bison Management Plan, which sets the ideal population level for buffalo migrating in and out of the park at 3,500-6,000 animals, currently faces lawsuits from the state of Montana and conservation groups.
Read the full story HERE.
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Accused of helping an 18-year-old suspected shooter hide from the law, two Gillette people each face up to three years in prison on accessory charges.
18-year-old Terry Harrell and 20-year-old Odessa Maughan were charged Monday with accessory after the fact to attempted second-degree murder in Gillette Circuit Court. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that early in the course of the investigation into the whereabouts of Kamren Crousore, the two had been interviewed by law enforcement officers - but they denied knowing where Crousore was hiding out.
“Campbell County Sheriff's investigators have an anonymous caller on the line Saturday, like there's a gold colored Ford Taurus outside Crousore’s mother's home, and four people just got out and went to the home. And so deputies go to the neighborhood, and… They count three people, two adults and a child, come out of the home. So then they go and later, they stop the car as it's driving away, like, Hey, do you guys know where Crousore is? He's accused of shooting someone and hospitalizing him… according to the court documents, they're like, we have not talked to him. We don't know where he is. Maybe he's at this friend's garage. We don't know. And so the deputies say, Hey, if you're hiding him, if you're helping him hide, that's a felony. And they say, Okay. And then they go… So there were two deputies still in the neighborhood this whole time who didn't take their eyes off the house… they get permission from Crousore’s mother, to search the home and pretty easily unearth him behind some clothing in a closet.”
Crousore is the suspect in a March 4 shooting that left 19-year-old Preston Hedlund with an abdominal wound and at least one surgery.
Read the full story HERE.
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The nutritionist at the Laramie County Senior Center plays a little game of eggonomics every week, balancing the nutritional value of eggs versus the Center’s budget. Carol Duran said overall egg costs have lately doubled at the senior center over what they were before the avian bird flu epidemic.
Cowboy State Daily’s Renee Jean reports that those high prices have attracted a lot of questions from Americans and, more recently, a federal investigation from the Department of Justice, examining whether large producers are conspiring to raise prices or hold back supply.
“I talked with some of the seniors while I was there too. And, you know, it just kind of touches your heart a little when they tell you that they skip breakfast because things are so expensive anymore… some of them are reaching the point where it's a choice between medication and groceries… And, like, all of them were like, yes, definitely the federal government needs to investigate the price of eggs, because if you look at it, the production rate of eggs hasn't dropped that much. It's it's dropped 4% it hasn't dropped below per capita consumption. So, yeah, the supply is dwindled, but there are still enough eggs, right? So if the cost to produce a dozen eggs is only in the 70 cent range, why are we paying $8 a dozen?”
A dozen Great Value eggs from Walmart were going for $5.97 at Walmart in Cheyenne on Tuesday, or around 50 cents per egg. At King Soopers in Cheyenne, a dozen ranged from $6.39 to $11.49 a dozen, with the more expensive eggs labeled “organic.” That’s a range of about 53 cents to 96 cents an egg.
Read the full story HERE.
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U.S. Sen. Cynthia Lummis’ team confirmed to Cowboy State Daily on Tuesday she’s gearing up for reelection, which means there could be an even more crowded field for other statewide Wyoming races in 2026.
A senior communications adviser for Lummis told Cowboy State Daily’s Leo Wolfson that plans are underway for her 2026 bid for reelection to a second term.
“The announcement is not necessarily, maybe shocking to some, but it is a very important announcement when considering what it does to the landscape for the elections of the 2026, races. Specifically, what impact this will have on the US House and governor's race that year?... She's had a pretty, pretty high favorability rating among voters… and it's probably safe to say that all the very legitimate candidates are probably going to all shift to either the House or the governor's race… Some of them include. Including Secretary of State, Chuck Gray, superintendent of public instruction, Megan Degenfelder, a few state legislators like Senator Cheri Steinmetz and Senator Eric Barlow.”
Lummis was elected to the Senate in 2020. Prior to that, she served four terms in the U.S. House from 2009-2017 and was Wyoming’s treasurer from 1999-2007.
Despite a few rankles with the Wyoming Republican Party, Lummis has enjoyed a relatively high level of popularity during her time in office.
Read the full story HERE.
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Spalding the cat has seen better days. Suffering from an infected wound, he might have died or been euthanized, but animal advocates across northern Wyoming are doing whatever they can to ensure he survives, recovers, and finds a loving home again.
The executive director of the Second Chance Sheridan Cat Rescue organization told Cowboy State Daily’s Andrew Rossi that Spalding saved himself when he walked into a Gillette home through a dog door.
“The people who found him took him to the Gillette animal shelter, and they might have put him down, but he won the hearts of everybody there, so they reached out to Second Chance Sheridan cat rescue, and said, nobody in Gillette wants to put this cat down. He's a fighter, and we want to give him a fighting chance… They're guarded in their optimism, but they think that there's a good potential… then in a month from now, he could be He healed to an enough of an extent that he could be adopted into a forever home, and that's what everybody wants… because he's clearly determined to survive despite suffering a pretty extensive injury, and that easily could have killed him a long time ago.”
Spalding is an excellent example of the ongoing dynamic between the Second Chance Sheridan Cat Rescue and the Gillette Animal Shelter. Second Chance director Rachel Kristiansen said if he continues to recover, Kristiansen believes Spalding will look like a new cat once he’s fully recovered.
Read the full story HERE.
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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 Cowboy State Daily Dot Com - and you can watch this newscast every day by clicking Subscribe on our YouTube channel, or listen to us on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for tuning in - I’m Wendy Corr, for Cowboy State Daily.
