It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming for Friday, February 13th. I’m Mac Watson.
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All 59 Wyoming representatives who were on the House floor on Thursday afternoon voted to convene a special committee to investigate the checks given to lawmakers on the House floor on Monday. Cowboy State daily’s Clair McFarland reports that the committee will investigate if it was an act of bribery or legislative misconduct.
“So, a few of us saw Rebecca Bextel on the House floor Monday, but RepresentativeKarlee Provenza that had the close advantage and took photographs of Bextel handing checks to House members. Now this erupted Wednesday, when Representative Mike Yin was like, ‘Do not vote yes on a bill that Bextel has championed after accepting checks from her on the House floor.’ And he said, ‘We don't want to, it's a bad optics. We don't want the image of bribery.’ And that exploded again Thursday, when Representative Karlee Provenza, who originally shot the photographs of this incident, brought a provision to convene a seven-representative investigative panel to determine whether this was bribery and misconduct. And there was extensive debate, like three hours of debates, attempts to amend discussions, people, origin, other people, not to be biased. At the end, all 59 members who were on the House floor available to vote at that time voted in favor of convening this committee…The House Speaker is now tasked with forming the committee, and he promised to form a fair committee, and he urged everyone to give it Grace during this very rushed, very frantic budget session.”
Rebecca Bextel is not a state legislator or a registered lobbyist. She is a political activist, and after starting her outlet the Open Range Record, she was registered to attend this year’s session as a member of the media.
Read the full story HERE.
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Senate Pres. Bo Biteman told colleagues on Thursday that Wyoming needs to stop waiting and start leading as demand for electricity is expected to spike. Cowboy State Daily’s David Madison reports that Biteman spelled out a vision that would put Wyoming in front of Trump’s push for American energy supremacy.
“There's a trio of bills now working their way through the Wyoming Legislature, and one of them kind of defines what they're all about. It's about energy dominance. So one bill that was voted into introduction on Thursday directs the Wyoming Energy Authority to study the transmission opportunities. What is the best way for Wyoming to approach the energy market? Senate President Bo Biteman stood on the floor today and told his fellow senators that he wants Wyoming to be the tip of the spear, meaning that as the Trump administration urges the entire country to create more energy as fast as possible, Biteman envisions Wyoming leading the pack.”
Introducing Senate File 123, the Wyoming Energy Dominance Fund, Biteman spelled out a vision for the state to position itself at the front of the Trump administration’s push for American energy supremacy — backed by roughly $105 million in redirected severance tax revenues.
Read the full story HERE.
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Wyoming officials are universally cheering the Trump administration’s Thursday repeal of an Obama-era rule that was the linchpin for EPA climate regulations. Meanwhile, environmental groups say the move ignores science and invites legal challenges.
“What they say is that it was a giant overreach on government's part to then just be able to use this rule to say it affects the Clean Air Act. Everybody I talked to within Wyoming said that this is way past due. Now there are detractors. Environmental groups say that they're going to keep fighting it. I think they were just ready to sue whatever this came down. So that's going to face lawsuits.”
By eliminating the rule, President Donald Trump and EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin say they are doing away with “the single largest deregulatory action in U.S. history,” according to an EPA statement announcing the move.
Read the full story HERE.
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A Wyoming House committee advanced a bill Thursday that would provide funding for a study on how data centers, carbon capture, or other large-scale industrial projects might sap or impact the state's water supply.
“It would be a half million to investigate the things that take water out of our water cycle, that SAP William and water data centers were implicated in that bill. And one of the you know, an environmental group that actually said, We don't want you to pass this bill right now. Said that's because it wasn't big enough, it didn't give enough money, it didn't have enough scope of investigation. And they want to go bigger.”
Rep. Karlee Provenza, D-Laramie, said data centers pose a consequential problem in Wyoming.
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 parent of a kindergartner is angry after a teacher at Sage Elementary School in Rock Springs read a book about non-binary gender ideology to her son’s class. Cowboy State Daily’s Kate Meadows reports that the principal said the teacher stopped reading the book when she realized what it was about.
“The parents say the book was read in its entirety…They want the school to teach kindergartners how to read and not push an agenda. Now the school will say, ‘we're not trying to push an agenda.’ The parents want to know, how did the book get in this kindergarten classroom in the first place? The principal said that it was part of a book box that arrived at the school from Scholastic as a sort of promotional, kind of like a sample package, and they were not immediately aware that this particular book was a part of that box.”
“My Shadow is Purple,” is a rhyming picture book by Scott Stuart about a child whose “shadow” is neither the traditional boy color of blue nor pink, but purple, representing a mix of both but also something new.
Read the full story HERE.
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In an effort to fix Wyoming's physician shortage, a bill to create a new pathway for foreign-trained doctors has advanced in the House. Cowboy State Daily’s David Madison reports that Rep. Jacob Wasserburger said Wyoming is headed for a health care crisis.
“Wyoming is projected to lose around 335 physicians by 2030 which is just around the corner. And currently 18 of Wyoming's 23 counties have a health professional shortage, and so this is lawmakers working with medical administrators and professionals around the state trying to get ahead of the problem. What it does is it creates a regulatory framework, a management of foreign trained doctors, where they come in and they are essentially preceptored by existing physicians in the state. So it's trying to cut through, you know, some of it's trying to establish a path. It's trying to establish a regulatory path for foreign trained doctors to come to Wyoming, to work under the supervision of an existing physician here, and then ultimately end up with a Wyoming medical license.”
The bill passed its introduction vote 60-0, with two members excused, and was assigned to the House Labor Committee. No members spoke in opposition.
Read the full story HERE.
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The two men killed Sunday when their semitrailer exploded on impact with another semi on I-80 near Green River were identified Wednesday. Cowboy State Daily’s Greg Johnson reports that a father-son driving duo was from Citrus Heights, California.
“Sad follow up to the fatal truck explosion that happened Sunday near Green River on I-80. Basically got confirmation on who was in the truck. And it was a father-son driving duo out of California. The son was driving at the time the truck veered over through an extra lane and hit this other truck that was illegally parked on the side of the highway, and as in a movie, their truck exploded on impact. Their family put out a post on a GoFundMe, nobody could see it coming…Now the other truck was parked illegally. You're only supposed to be able to park on the highway if you have an emergency, and apparently the other driver did not have an emergency. He has been summoned into court. He's supposed to be in court next month, so whether there's any other charges added to it right now. All he's been cited for is illegal parking. ”
According to the Wyoming Highway Patrol, 36-year-old Aleksey Fedun was driving their Volvo semitrailer along with his father, 76-year-old Volodymr Fedun, before 5:30AM Sunday when the truck drifted from the far left lane, through the right lane and collided with the parked semi.
Read the full story HERE.
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Cheyenne LEADS CEO Betsey Hale says she has a solution for the Hynds Building, which has been empty for 40+ years, and the burnt-out area next to it known as "The Hole." Cowboy State Daily’s Renee Jean reports that Hale says she has the funding to turn the area into 69 units of workforce housing.
“People have, you know, said, why don't you just tear it down and start over, if it's so hard to renovate, but it's also expensive to knock a building like that down. You can't just, you know, it's steel, it's concrete. It's going to cost a lot to knock it down. You couldn't renovate it. Changing that has involved, you know, kind of layering a whole bunch of different things together, different financial packages, plus a pledge from Cheyenne, leads to put in a million dollars to this project. There's a $6 million grant from the WCDA that's the Wyoming Community Development Authority. These are going to be the houses that are going in here. Are going to be income restricted. It's not section eight housing. It's a different federal program, but they will be income restricted to 30 to 60% of the median, average, median incomes.”
Carved out by a fire that destroyed Mary’s Bake Shoppe in 2004, the gaping Hynds Hole, as it’s often called, has become a symbolic void right in the middle of Cheyenne’s downtown.
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.
