It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming, for Wednesday, April 2nd. I’m Wendy Corr, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom - Brought to you by the Cowboy State Daily Morning Show! From 6 to 10 a.m., Monday through Friday, we bring you news, weather, sports AND in-depth interviews with news-makers from across Wyoming - and this week we’ve got a fantastic guest host, Charene Herrera, who will keep the conversation lively! Just click on the Cowboy State Daily homepage to join in.
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Drought has been spreading across southeastern and central Wyoming, and that has farmers looking at the sky a little more often than usual.
And Cowboy State Daily’s Renee Jean reports that even the recent rain in southeast Wyoming didn’t do much to mitigate the dryness, as moisture is still about 50% behind normal in that region.
“I was looking at the Drought Monitor, and we have had significant drought for quite a while now. Headed into spring, we have the whole bottom southeast corner of the state is one big red dot bulls eye looking kind of thing on the state… So farmers are… doing their mental rain dances there. Whatever they do, you know, to bring on the rain, they're doing it right now… December, January and February are the driest months of the year in Wyoming. So these next month, March, it starts to rain a little more, and then April, May, June, those are the wettest months. So that really kind of determines what kind of season these guys are going to have.”
The drought that’s settled over Wyoming has become severe enough lately that the USDA has announced emergency loans for several Wyoming counties - although many farmers are hesitant to go that route.
Read the full story HERE.
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Now that a controversial Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Temple in Cody is a few months into construction, it appears that the quickly growing building has only hardened the resolve of people both supporting and opposing the building.
The large steeple emanating from the 101-foot temple has been a source of great controversy and contention. Cowboy State Daily’s Leo Wolfson spoke to several residents about the issue - some posited a live-and-let-live attitude, or supported the temple’s construction - but neighbors whose daily lives are being impacted by the construction of the temple had a different opinion.
“They're most frustrated about the view shed, for sure, and then just the way that the temple was approved. Those are the kind of the two big things that come up the most. I spoke to the Petit family that were basically saying that their view shed is dramatically affected by this temple. I mean, it takes up at least half the window space looking out on what used to be a beautiful view of Cedar and Rattlesnake mountains… Spoke to the neighbor across the street, Kelly Dingle. And Dingle is basically saying that her crux of her biggest frustration about this temple is strictly the way it was approved, and she just doesn't feel like it's the right location in Cody. Which is the dominating argument of those who oppose the temple… Kelly Dingle is adamant that they will be moving away sometime in the near future. They moved to their home that's across the street from the temple, just before the vote took place to approve the temple.”
A similarly-sized temple was built in Casper last summer, facing no opposition. That church was built in a commercial-type area with no residential housing anywhere nearby.
Read the full story HERE.
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Republicans in Congress - including the Wyoming delegation - are challenging the power of federal judges to issue far-reaching injunctions, as the number of orders halting actions by President Donald Trump’s administration continues to mount.
Cowboy State Daily’s Sean Barry reports that legislation to rein in judges’ power — including the No Rogue Rulings Act, or NORRA — appears to be at the forefront of the party’s efforts.
“Wendy, the Republicans in Congress are unhappy with US Federal Court judges for halting so many of the Trump administration's priorities… Rep Harriet Hageman of Wyoming is on the House Judiciary Committee. She and many Republicans in Congress think that judges are overstepping their proper roles by issuing injunctions that apply nationally… The problem is, if a judge issued a restraining order that only applied to plaintiffs in one area their jurisdiction, everything would be fine, but the Republicans strongly object on many grounds to judges, a judge in Kansas, a judge in Florida, a judge in Illinois, a judge anywhere, saying, My injunction against this Trump rule applies everywhere in the country. So it's the nationwide injunctions that is at the heart of the matter here, and Rep Hagaman is a part of this.”
Under NORRA, a U.S. district court injunction would benefit only the plaintiff or plaintiffs in the particular lawsuit brought before the court. It could not apply to anyone else similarly aggrieved, including those outside a court’s geographical jurisdiction. The bill allows rare exceptions such as certified class-action cases.
Read the full story HERE.
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A federal prosecutor is challenging a magistrate’s decision to release from jail a twice-deported Mexican immigrant accused of running 18,000 rounds of high-caliber ammunition through Wyoming.
35-year-old Ricardo Paez-Quinones was arrested in March after a Wyoming Highway Patrol Trooper pulled him over for speeding on Interstate 80 near Rawlins, then spotted several rounds of ammunition in Quinones’ vehicle. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that U.S. Chief Magistrate Judge Scott Klosterman set Paez-Quinones’ bond at $20,000, unsecured. But an Assistant U.S. Attorney filed a motion last week urging the case judge to overturn the magistrate’s permissive bond arrangement.
“He was let out on an unsecured bond, which means you don't have to put up the money up front. So pretty easy. Walk out of jail, stay in your Colorado Community, show up for court in May, a few other conditions, but the prosecutor was like, Absolutely not. He has family in Mexico. This whole case smells like a Mexican cartel. I consider him a flight risk. Let's get him back here. The judge to whom the prosecutor appealed, has not yet ruled on the magistrate's decision.”
Paez-Quinones could face up to 15 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, and/or deportation if convicted.
Read the full story HERE.
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Anyone who doesn’t like the look of the latest Wyoming license plate has more than 20 specialty plates to choose from, even if most of them look similar.
Wyomingites can show their support for veterans, wildlife, firefighters, radio amateurs and other causes with their specialty plates. But Cowboy State Daily’s Andrew Rossi reports that establishing a new specialty plate can be a lengthy process that isn’t always successful, and there might be a limit on how many will ever be available in the state.
“Maryland has close to 1000 specialty plates you can buy. Wyoming is at the bottom with its limit. I think in 2023 there were 36 different designs you could get of a select number of specialty plates… you can get a specialty plate for your branch of service. In the US military, there's one available for each of those. There's a wildlife conservation plate, which, in 2020 raised $300,000 for wildlife conservation building highway overpasses and underpasses in the state of Wyoming. There's a University of Wyoming plate, which is one of the most popular ones that benefits the Alumni Association at UW… WYDOT as of November 2024 has sold over 20,000 specialty plates, but that's a small fraction of Wyoming's already small population, and they have a threshold that these specialty plates need to reach. They need to sell 1000 plates in an eight year period to justify their existence into the next plate issuance.”
Buying a specialty plate costs more than the standard $150, but the extra cash goes to the organization benefiting from the plate.
Read the full story HERE.
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A Torrington woman accused of stealing around $62,000 from the local Little League Association told investigators she did so during her “manic” phases.
36-year-old Megan Jonas faces one count of felony theft, which is punishable by up to 10 years in prison and $10,000 in fines. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that Jonas, who was then the treasurer of the Torrington Little League Association, confessed to the president of the organization that she had taken money from the account.
“The treasurer of the Little League, treasurer of like, three, four years that is said to have come to the president, like, I did something bad. I stole money, and the President is kind of okay, let's figure out what you stole. And according to him, there was, there were, like, $60,000 worth of checks she wrote to herself. But he wasn't sure if that was the total haul, because he said that she's been handling cash for like, the concession stand. So he was he just approached police with a lot of confusion and some apparent frustration.”
Jonas’ case rose Thursday to the felony-level Goshen County District Court. She’s set for an April 23 arraignment.
Read the full story HERE.
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An 18-year-old charged in the fatal shooting of a 16-year-old while they were hanging out in a Casper home Feb. 12th, pleaded not guilty Tuesday to a charge of involuntary manslaughter in Natrona County District Court.
Luka Rasmussen is accused of handling a handgun when it went off and killed Riley Jacob Sears. Cowboy State Daily’s Dale Killingbeck reports that evidence introduced at the preliminary hearing included photos of Rasmussen acting carelessly with the pistol, including pointing the weapon at the victim.
“He allegedly was going to take a picture of his pistol, and then had did not take the picture, but was putting it down by his hip, and the gun went off and took the life of a 16 year old who was in the room with them. There were three young men in that room that were playing video games prior to that. ...he pleaded innocent, and the attorney for the young man asked the judge to lower the $500,000 cash for shorty bond, and she decided not to do that. The district attorney said that it was, you know, it was a serious charge in some of the guns involved at the shooting were illegal weapons. So the $500,000 cash for surety remains in place.”
The judge in the case ordered the matter be set for trial. The involuntary manslaughter charge carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.
Read the full story HERE.
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Rock Springs has a problem with foliage clogging up vital drainage channels running through the heart of town — city officials decided to hire an army of 300 goats to eat the problem away.
Lani Malmberg, of the Wyoming-based Goat Green LLC company, told Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz that her outfit can deploy up to 1,200 goats to gobble virtually everything in their paths.
“Rock Springs… had the same problem that a lot of towns and cities have. They have… drainage channels going through town creeks that run through town, that are vital to keeping the water flowing through town so they don't have flooding. Okay? Well, these things have become grossly overgrown with, you know, greasewood, sagebrush, dead grass, Russian olives, you name it… there's this company based in Wyoming that has goats, and I mean, a lot of goats, like up to 1200 goats at a time that they can deploy. So you just set these goats loose, and they literally eat the problem away. So they deployed a rather small contingent of the goat army, only 300 goats that they sent. They set them loose this weekend, and all the until this Friday, they're going to be eating their way down these drainage canals to free them up. So when runoff starts later this month, it will help mitigate that flooding risk for the city of Rock Springs.”
Malmberg said that the goats will happily scarf down just about every kind of plant, including poisonous weeds that would sicken other animals. They also “fertilize the ground” with their droppings as they pass through, and the trampling of hundreds of goats’ hooves stabilizes banks in the drainages, protecting them from erosion.
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.
