It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming for Friday, January 23rd. I’m Mac Watson.
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Moments after reportedly shooting his estranged wife early Wednesday at their home near the Wyoming-Idaho border, 43-year-old Christopher Moon texted his mother-in-law. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that the chilling text offered an explanation as to why he shot Cassandra Clinger.
“So according to a screenshot I received, Christopher texted his mother-in-law, ‘Satan got a hold of me…I'm so sorry. I love her so much.’ The oldest daughter, Alexa Edwards, just said, ‘Yeah, we've seen red flags all along.’ And so the youngest daughter, Jessica, also said, ‘It was this cycle of honeymooning and huge explosions, and then more honeymooning and huge explosions, until Cassie finally, aged 23, got kind of the wherewithal to leave and file for divorce. And then this happened on a road near her mother's home.
After Moon called authorities, telling them what he did, deputies quickly arrived to find Christopher’s vehicle and Cassandra’s vehicle, each parked on the side of the road. They spoke with Chrisopher briefly by phone, urging him to surrender peacefully. Moments later, law enforcement witnessed Moon shoot and kill himself.
Read the full story HERE.
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Jonah Energy’s vice president says a Tuesday ruling that blocks a 3,500-well expansion threatens the company’s future in Wyoming. Cowboy State Daily’s David Madison reports that Jonah Energy’s Vice President says the federal ruling earlier this week that threw out approval for the future of the Jonah Field is damaging the future of oil and gas in Wyoming.
“Jonah energy feels as though they were blindsided that they had been doing their best to comply and go above and beyond, even incentivizing employees to follow the Clean Air Act to the letter. But these two judges saw something in the case brought by the Wild Earth guardians, and they basically said, ‘It doesn't add up, you're not following the letter of the law when it comes to the Clean Air Act.’”
The Interior Board of Land Appeals on Tuesday vacated the Bureau of Land Management's 2018 approval of the Normally Pressured Lance Project, which would have authorized up to 3,500 wells on 141,000 acres west and south of the existing Jonah Field.
Read the full story HERE.
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Meteorologists are warning that an incoming subzero cold snap comes with an increased risk of "exploding trees." Cowboy State Daily’s Andrew Rossi reports that arborists say it's a real thing that sounds like a gunshot when trees pop.
“What happens is, it's a combination of two things, the water and the sap in the tree can freeze and rapidly expand, or when it gets really cold, the outside of the tree shrinks before the inside of the tree shrinks faster than the outside of the tree. When these things happen, that creates a lot of energy, and when that energy is released, it can cause the tree to burst. The technical term is frost cracking, and that's just when impurities in the wood are cracked open…So there have been warnings about exploding trees everywhere from west of Ohio to Eastern Wyoming. So it's a very real possibility. Are trees going to explode into toothpicks? Not likely, but it's possible that a giant branch could snap and pop and explode and land on your house or vehicle.”
Experts tell Cowboy State Daily that Wyoming’s unusually dry winter might have some benefit. Snow water equivalents across eastern Wyoming are still very low, between 6% and 70%, so the deciduous trees will have less water in them to explode.
Read the full story HERE.
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A board tasked with ensuring Wyoming’s property tax assessments are fair and lawful planned to challenge the state’s 4% growth cap on residential property taxes. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that Gov. Mark Gordon put a halt to the lawsuit Thursday.
“So the Board of Equalization was gearing up to challenge a property tax cap that keeps your property taxes from skyrocketing too quickly, saying, ‘Hey, if we cap this for people whose home values are rising and people whose home values are stagnating, aren't we doing unfair, not uniform assessment, as the Constitution mandates, and so they challenged it as violation of the state constitution, or they were gearing up to do so?’ But then on Thursday, Gordon, at the last minute, consulted with the Assessors Association, and they were like, ‘We don't like you're gonna whiplash us. We're gearing up for this.’”
The legal complaint had sought to urge the Laramie County District Court to block the 4% growth cap as unconstitutional, or allegedly risk making the board members violate the oaths they took to defend the state Constitution.
Read the full story HERE.
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I’ll be back with more news from Cowboy State Daily right after this.
Cowboy State Daily news continues now…
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A Wyoming bill that would have required voter approval to impose stormwater fees died in committee Wednesday on a tie vote despite lawsuits over “tax-like” charges. Cowboy State Daily’s Zak Sonntag reports that the lawmakers debated tax-fee laws and flood risks, leaving infrastructure funding in limbo.
“This is all happening in the context of a bill that was brought to the Select Water Committee, and even though the bill failed, what really came out of the discussion is just how big of a quagmire this issue is and how much is at stake with things like storm water drain infrastructure. And what people don't realize is you've got all kinds of infrastructural expenses related to managing rain and stormwater runoff, and so if you don't take care of that, you can be looking at pretty dramatic consequences…And in the midst of these lawsuits, the legislature is saying, let's get to the bottom of this and solve this, and let's not give cities the ability to charge these fees on entities like, in this case, the University of Wyoming, who is suing the city of Laramie because they say that the fee is not a fee, it's a tax. And it's an eternal debate.”
The bill’s demise is a reprieve for municipal leaders, but it also leaves cities and other stakeholders in a state of limbo as pressure builds to address stormwater infrastructure.
Read the full story HERE.
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The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals is considering whether a Rock Springs school district’s transgender “privacy” policy violates parents’ rights. Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland reports that a local couple says behind the policy, teachers called their daughter by a boy name without telling them.
“So Sean and Ashley Willey, their counsel, Ernie Trakes, down in Denver, in the 10th Circuit appeals court, on Wednesday, he was like, this is, this is a sinister movement to not reveal the kids alternate identity to the parents, especially when the kid has health concerns. And the school district, meanwhile, was like, you know, you can, you can say that the parental right stops a school from overtly attacking your family, but it doesn't create a duty for you to inform the family of everything that's going on…and the 10th Circuit has taken it under advisement now. So what would happen is the 10th Circuit will either say, Oh no, we think the judge got it right to dismiss it, and then trick is, can drop it or appeal it, or the 10th Circuit will say, the judge got it wrong and bat it back down to the lower court for more litigation.”
At stake is whether the higher court is going to reverse or uphold the April 2025 order of Wyoming-based U.S. District Court Judge Scott Skavdahl, who dismissed the Willeys’ civil rights case against the school district.
Read the full story HERE.
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Wyoming isn’t immune to a rat invasion like the infestation taking place in Boise that one exterminator called “a nuclear bomb of rats.” Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz reports that spikes in rat populations can result from favorable conditions, such as mild winters, a Wyoming zoology professor said.
“The two exterminators I talked to said, ‘We can't keep up with it, there's no way. It's gotten to the point where there's no way we're ever going to kill these rats off. The best we can do is kind of hold the line.’ And I also talked to a rodent expert, a zoologist at the University of Wyoming, and the big question is, ‘could it happen here?’ He said, ‘Absolutely!’ You know, if we get one of these invasive species of rats, like Norway rats or whatever, and they're able to hit that magic spot where they can start reproducing rapidly in a particular area, and they have a food source, it could happen here too.”
John Koprowski, dean of the UW’s Haub School of Environment & Natural Resources tells Cowboy State Daily that “The fact that the non-native species have been successful for centuries here in the US because of their association with people tells us that they are likely to be disappearing anytime soon.”
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 watching - I’m Mac Watson, for Cowboy State Daily.
