The four-year war over a tipi retreat campground in Hot Springs County has escalated to the state’s highest office as seven county residents asked Gov. Mark Gordon to remove two-thirds of the Hot Springs County Commission from office, the governor announced Tuesday.
Seven qualified electors filed a verified complaint with the governor’s office accusing Hot Springs County Commissioner Bob Aguiar and Commissioner Paul Galovich of misconduct or malfeasance, Gordon’s office announced in a Tuesday statement.
One of those was Mayor Adam Estenson, who signed one of the seven attached affidavits in his individual, not mayoral, capacity, he confirmed Wednesday to Cowboy State Daily.
Gordon visited Thermopolis on Friday to interview people involved and start his investigation, his statement says.
The complaint stems from the four-and-a-half-year battle between the Tipi Retreat camping operation in rural Hot Springs County and a prior version of the Commission, people on both sides of the controversy confirmed Wednesday to Cowboy State Daily.
Shurie Scheel, wife of former Commissioner Phillip Scheel, told Cowboy State Daily she was one of the seven signers of affidavits accusing Aguiar and Galovich of misconduct.
Dozens more people signed the accompanying complaint, she said.
That’s because, said Shurie Scheel, the commissioners essentially disregarded a court’s order early this year and tried to reverse the denial of the commercial operations permit for the Tipi Retreat — a business belonging to Michael and Michelle Stevens.
District Court Judge Bill Simpson declared Aguiar and Galovich’s maneuver illegitimate, in a July 30 order.
The controversy now falls into an argument about whether the prior commission mistreated the Stevenses by applying county regulations in a vague and elusive manner to thwart their business; or whether the prior commission obeyed the law and the new, more Stevens-family-friendly commission majority has taken the law into its own hands.
“So what we’re asking is for the governor’s office to look at whether those guys acted outside the bounds of the office, in a way that was willfully negligent,” Shurie Scheel told Cowboy State Daily in a Wednesday phone interview — “(and) if they knew what they were doing was against the law and against the land use plan, and why did they do it?”
The signers seek to prove that Aguiar and Galovich knew their conduct was illegal and did it anyway, said Shurie Scheel.
Aguiar and Galovich did not return separate, Tuesday-afternoon voicemail requests for comment by publication time.
The Tipi Retreat has the the focal point of a yearslong battle with the Hot Springs County Commission. (Courtesy Michael Stevens) 
The Tipi Retreat has the the focal point of a yearslong battle with the Hot Springs County Commission. (Courtesy Michael Stevens)
Backing Up…
Michael and Michelle Stevens sought for years to gain a county permit to host paying guests at their business the Tipi Retreat, which sits on their family’s property in rural Hot Springs County.
The county commission of 2021 denied their request, and the Stevenses challenged that denial in 2022.
District Court Judge Bill Simpson ordered the county to produce reasons for its denial, and the county commissioners of the time — Tom Ryan, Jack Baird, and Phillip Scheel — gave several reasons, in 2023.
One of those withstood legal scrutiny, Simpson ruled.
Simpson upheld the board’s denial, rendering the campground unlawful. A trial followed, and the Stevens couple was ordered to pay $40,250 within 18 months of November 2024, court documents say.
Michael Stevens told Cowboy State Daily the fine was a penalty for the Tipi retreat staying open during the court case; adding that they chose to keep operating because the county was vague and ambiguous about its reasons for denying them the authority to operate.
The Stevenses appealed to the Wyoming Supreme Court.
Then Came Elections
Galovich and Aguiar were elected in 2022 and 2024, respectively.
By January and February 2025, the new commissioners were arranging a “rehearing” for the Stevens couple, which culminated in the county settling with the Tipi retreat.
The last remaining commissioner from the prior administration, Ryan, warned them that that would be illegal – and it would be better for the Tipi Retreat’s owners to restart the permit application process from its beginning, court documents say.
The rehearing happened in February anyway. As a result, the county settled with the Tipi Retreat: the Stevenses would no longer have to pay the fine, and the tipi retreat could run a commercial operation. Both the county and the Stevenses would withdraw their claims before the Wyoming Supreme Court.
The retreat’s neighbors, Marty Oravec and Gary Frazier, asked Simpson to overturn the settlement and its underpinning maneuvers – and Simpson did, in a July 30 order.
“The board’s decision is reversed,” wrote the judge. “The court’s previous injunction preventing Tipi Retreat from renting tipis on the subject property on a commercial basis for the public, and the $40,250 fine remain in full force and effect.”
So Much For Peace
To Michael Stevens, the new complaint looks gratuitous, he said in a Wednesday phone interview.
“I find it ironic that those that are filing the complaint are the ones, at the same time, screaming for, ‘Let’s bring this to an end and harmony in our community,’ yet they continue to (press the issue),” he said, referencing the Scheels.
Simpson’s July order left Michael Stevens and his wife still bound to pay the fine, but it didn’t undo their decision to withdraw their appeal when they settled with the county.
“So now we’re sitting in limbo and wondering, did we give up our right to go the (Wyoming) Supreme Court, and still have to pay a fine we feel the high court would have corrected?” he said, adding that he believes the Wyoming Supreme Court ultimately would have found the prior commission violated his constitutional due process rights, had the Stevenses and new commission majority not withdrawn the appeal.
This Kind Of Peace
Shurie Scheel countered, saying for this county, true peace means righting violations of law and restoring public trust in the Commission.
“I do think that the end of this will bring peace and unity, but also (in) the community – we need to be able to trust that our elected officials have everyone’s best interests at heart. That they’re acting with integrity and honor,” she said. “And I think this is the path to community cohesiveness. We can’t just let people break the law and get their friends elected to office and do whatever they want to once they’re in there.”
The “friends" comment was a reference to the friendship between Galovich and the Stevens family.
Michael Stevens said Galovich "is very much a man of principle." Stevens confirmed in a text message that Galovich is a friend, but said he doesn't believe that swayed "the 3 man board to give my wife and I the opportunity to settle."
Aguiar is also an honorable man, said Stevens.
He said the camping business's purpose is to serve others, including by hosting veterans help programs, and theorized that the recent maneuvers in Hot Springs County will erode individual and property rights in the long run.
"As a family that served (in the military) we are deeply saddened by the treatment we have received at the hands of TomRyan, Phil Scheel, Jack Baird and (Hot Springs County Attorney) Jill Logan," Michael Stevens wrote.
Estenson confirmed that his submission to the governor's office stems from the Tipi Retreat controversy. Estenson was the chair of the planning commission when the battle started in 2021, and throughout much of it, he said.
"At the end of the day, to me, this matter was about the law; and someone outside of this community needed to weigh in and determine what is the law," said Estenson. "That's really what it was all about for me."
Clarification - an earlier version of this story attributed the judge's ruling to an issue with the road itself, when the issue was with the failure to secure an engineer's report regarding the road.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
