Wyoming
Cowboy State Daily Video News: Friday, August 9, 2024
It’s time to take a look at what’s happening around Wyoming, for Friday, August 9th. I’m Wendy Corr, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom – brought to you by the Wyoming State Fair! Beginning August 13th in Douglas, the Wyoming State Fair has something for everyone. For more info visit WY-STATE-FAIR dot com”
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A Cody newspaper reporter resigned Friday after a reporter at a nearby newspaper exposed his apparent use of artificial intelligence in his reporting.
Aaron Pelczar resigned his position at the Cody Enterprise on August 2nd, after CJ Baker, a veteran reporter at the Powell Tribune, pointed out the fabricated quotes in a number of Pelczar’s articles.
An artificial intelligence ethics expert told Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland that the scandal has turned Wyoming into “ground zero” for AI ethics discussions in journalism.
“County 10 has been using AI, and what they basically do is they’ll plug a recording into the AI system. It spits out a transcript of the recording and a summary pointing out what it believes are building blocks for stories… I pointed that out to the AI expert Alex Mahadevan… He called county 10s method ethical and a reflection of something AI actually can do. And the Cody enterprise reporter Aaron Pels method, he said it’s not ethical and it also reflects an AI weakness.”
Chris Bacon, editor of the Cody Enterprise, said he is still trying to figure out how many of the quotes were fabricated in Pelzcar’s stories. He said he’s traced fabricated quotes as far back as July 8 so far, but is still searching.
Read the full story HERE.
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The campaign arm of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus has returned a $25,000 donation made to it by the Crook County Republican Party.
Cowboy State Daily’s Leo Wolfson reports that the move comes after Ogden Driskill filed a complaint and requested a state investigation into it.
“Wyoming law states that political parties cannot give to candidates during the primary election. The Freedom Caucus pack has not endorsed any one specific candidate, but it has endorsed a slate of candidates that are all participating in contested Republican primary races.”
Driskill told Cowboy State Daily on Thursday that the Freedom PAC made a “great” decision by returning the money and that he applauds the move. He considers the donation “unethical at best.”
Read the full story HERE.
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The parent group of several rural electricity cooperatives operating in Wyoming has reached a major milestone in a complex energy transition plan that it hopes will hold the line on wholesale power rates with a boost coming from a growing supply of green power.
Cowboy State Daily’s Pat Maio reports that Colorado-based Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, a supplier of electricity to cooperatives across the Western United States, has launched a new power buying program to help keep the lid on rates.
“The concept is that, you know, it’s the program called Bring your own resources. Is, the concept is to keep a lid, keep keep it, keep it. You know, be able to tamp down on some of the rising power costs for in rural Wyoming. Rural Wyoming, like Torrington, Big Horn, where else? Just a lot of rural communities here in in Wyoming, and you’re looking at, you know, a couple 1000s of members, you know, who buy, who get the power rolled to them over the transmission lines.”
Tri-State is optimistic that its new power buying program that relies on green power will keep wholesale rates in check.
Read the full story HERE.
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A Laramie City Council candidate is facing a felony charge after allegedly disabling Wyoming Public Radio’s transmitters, and remote access to them, when he worked there in 2022.
Paul Montoya, who is running for one of the two open council seats for Ward 1 in Laramie, is facing one felony charge of committing crimes against computer users, according to Cowboy State Daily’s Leo Wolfson.
“I spoke to Laramie vice mayor and city council member Sharon Cumbie, who is also running against Montoya… She said that in this instance, Montoya sought revenge and was very concerning in his actions, especially when considering that it knocked the station off the air and that the station airs emergency alerts such as Amber Alerts and weather weather notices as well.”
Based on the dates of the candidate filing period, Montoya would have had to file his campaign on the day of his arrest, or in the days immediately afterward.
Read the full story HERE.
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Elk hunters in Wyoming, as well as Montana, Idaho and Oregon, are finding themselves in a frustrating quandary. In many places, there’s more elk now than at any time in living memory – but getting to them can seem impossible, reports Cowboy State Daily’s Mark Heinz.
“People are starting to come up with some innovative solutions… Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, Montana started a pretty, I think, interesting program that Wyoming might want to see if they can replicate. They have a master’s hunting program where, basically, they take elk hunters and maybe people that do a little bit of elk hunting but aren’t really good at it, and they just get them to hone their skills, hone their marksmanship, hone their tracking and things like that. So they can, you know, act, act as a go between, between them and the ranchers.”
In some areas, the Wyoming Game and Fish Department will compensate ranchers for forage lost to elk, with the stipulation that they allow “reasonable access” to hunters.
Read the full story HERE.
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In 1877, Gen. Philip Sheridan marched from Fort Brown to the site of Gen. George Armstrong Custer’s fateful downfall at the Little Bighorn.
The herds of buffalo and fields of larkspur were recorded by Major George Forsyth in a small diary he kept as part of Sherman’s company – a diary that today is hidden away in a bank vault at the Hot Springs County Museum and Cultural Center in Thermopolis. Cowboy State Daily’s Jackie Dorothy actually transcribed Major Forsyth’s diary for the museum.
“Not only did it detail all of the beauty that he saw – the 4000 buffalo, but also. the fact that it’s preserved here in Wyoming, and it’s an amazing story in itself. This journal survived a fire. The museum was actually burned down shortly after they obtained the diary. And I don’t know if it’s my imagination or if I want it to be, but when you pick up that diary, you can actually see little soot marks around the edges, and so it is a miracle that we still have it.”
The plain brown journal detailing the trip was on its way to the Smithsonian in 1960 when Charlotte Lance of Pennsylvania, who had inherited the journal from her husband, decided it belonged in Wyoming instead.
Read the full story HERE.
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On paper, the Clearwater fire burning in rugged terrain in northwest Wyoming about 11 miles west of Wapiti may not seem a major incident at less than 2,000 acres with slow growth.
But there are nearly 160 firefighting personnel working the fire that was sparked by lightning June 19. Cowboy State Daily’s Jackie Dorothy went on-location with the fire crews this week.
“Even though the fire is remote and in almost inaccessible places, you can still see the smoke from the highway and you could see burn areas… and the historic UXU is in danger, and so they have put in perimeters. They’ve got sprinklers everywhere. They have trenches dug. They’ve cleaned off the roofs, cleaned out the gutters, and just did everything possible to protect the ranch, and at the ranch, it’s business as usual. You wouldn’t even know that there was a fire just over the ridge.”
The Clearwater fire hasn’t grown much in the past week, but remains only 10% contained.
Read the full story HERE.
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A 36-year-old contract employee working in Grand Teton National Park is accused of choking out his girlfriend after an argument about breaking her necklace.
Jose Benitez faces up to 10 years in prison on the charge of assault by strangulation – an assault that his girlfriend caught on video.
But in a larger context, Cowboy State Daily’s Clair McFarland spoke to Greg Jackson, former deputy chief of the NPS division of law enforcement, security and emergency services, about the number of high-profile crimes committed just this summer by national park service contract employees.
“He said, Look, you can’t just broad brush concessionaire workers, even though it seems like we’re having a lot of violent incidents among them this year, to include a fatal shootout. He said there are other factors, like they are stuck with their coworkers day and night. They sometimes are without normal comforts like Wi Fi, depending on where they land, and it’s always a mixed bag, depending on how easy it is for the concessionaire to hire that year.”
Jackson discouraged broad-brushing concessionaire workers for the crimes of a few.
Read the full story HERE.
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Nearly 100 times a year, members of the Natrona County United Veterans Council Honor Guard prepare for another “brother’s” passing.
Honor guard members are mostly Vietnam era veterans from the Marines, U.S. Army, Navy and Air Force. Cowboy State Daily’s Dale Killingbeck reports that the Guard members devote whatever time it takes to giving their fallen military brothers and sisters a proper, honorable last salute.
“These guys are really dedicated, most of them are Vietnam veterans. And they spend at least sometimes four times a week, maybe five times a week, couple of hours at each session making sure that they say they want to give honor to the veterans that are passing away in Wyoming.”
Members say the team’s goal is to communicate the appreciation of a nation and help the family come to closure on a loved one’s loss.
Read the full story HERE.
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And that’s today’s news! For a deeper dive into the people and issues that affect Wyoming, check out The Roundup, conversations with the most interesting people in the Cowboy State. A new episode drops tomorrow, when I have a conversation with longtime Wyoming Cowboys broadcaster, Kevin McKinney. You can find the link on our website, on our YouTube Channel, and wherever you get your podcasts. And of course, you’ll find it in our FREE daily email newsletter!
Thanks for tuning in – I’m Wendy Corr, for Cowboy State Daily.
If the Wyoming House and Senate approve its budget changes, then the chambers’ Joint Conference Committee will have helped the University of Wyoming dodge a $40 million cut, while also limiting the Wyoming Business Council to one year’s funding instead of the standard two.
The Joint Conference Committee adopted numerous changes to the state’s two-year budget draft, but didn’t formally advance the document to the House and Senate chambers. The committee meets again Monday and may do so at that time.
Then, the House and Senate can vote on whether to adopt that draft by a simple majority.
First, UW
Starting in January, the Joint Appropriations Committee majority had sought to deny around $20 million in exception requests the University of Wyoming made, while imposing a $40 million cut to the university’s block grant.
That’s about 10% of the state’s grant to UW but a lesser proportion of the school’s overall operating budget.
The Senate sought to restore the $60 million.
The House sought to keep the denials and cuts, ultimately settling on a bargain to cut $20 million, and hinge UW’s retention of the remaining $20 million on its finding and reporting $5 million in savings.
The Joint Conference Committee the House and Senate sent into a Friday meeting to negotiate those two stances chose to fund UW “fully,” Senate Majority Floor Leader Tara Nethercott, R-Cheyenne, told Cowboy State Daily in the state Capitol after the meeting.
But, $10 million of UW’s $40 million block grant won’t reach it until the school charts a “road map” of how it could save $5 million, and reports that to the Joint Appropriations Committee, she added.
“A healthy exercise, I think, for them to participate in, while the Legislature still allows them to receive full grant funding,” Nethercott said.
“I’m hopeful people feel confident the University is fully funded,” she continued, as it’s “on the brink of receiving a new president, having the resources he or she may need to continue to steer the leadership of the University, our state’s flagship school into the future.”
Hours earlier in a press conference, House Speaker Chip Neiman, R-Hulett, said the Legislature has been clear that UW should avoid “diversity, equity, and inclusion” or DEI programming, and that it’s the position of the House majority that the school should tailor its programming to Wyoming’s true business needs – so UW graduates will stay in the state.
Within an earlier draft of the budget sat a footnote blocking money for Wyoming Public Media — a publicly funded media and radio entity funded through UW’s budget.
That footnote is gone from the JCC’s draft, said Nethercott.
Wyoming Business Council
The Wyoming Business Council is set to receive roughly $14 million, confined to one year, for its internal operations, said Nethercott.
“Both chambers have decided to only fund the operations,” Nethercott said, “not all the grant programs.”
She said that’s to compel the Legislature to revisit the concerns it has with the agency, then return in the 2027 legislative session with a vision for its future.
The Business Ready Communities program is “eliminated,” she said.
JCC member Rep. Ken Pendergraft, R-Sheridan, elaborated further.
Of the appropriation, $12 million is from the state’s checking account, plus the state is authorizing WBC to use $157,787 in federal funds and nearly $1 million from other sources.
“We’re going to take it up as an interim topic in appropriations (committee) and how to rebuild it and make it work the way we think it should work,” said Pendergraft. But the JCC opted to fund the Small Business Development Center for two years, along with Economic Diversification Division for Manufacturing Works, and the Wyoming Women’s Business Center, Pendergraft noted, pointing to that language on his draft budget sheet.
Pendergraft made headlines last year by saying he wanted to eliminate the Wyoming Business Council altogether.
But Nethercott told the Senate earlier this month, legislators have complained of that agency her entire nine-year tenure.
She attributed this to what she called communications shortfalls that may not be intentional. She cosponsored a now-stalled bill this year that had sought to adopt a task force to evaluate WBC.
The Wyoming Business Council’s functions range from less controversial, like helping communities build infrastructure, to more controversial, like awarding tax-funded grants to certain businesses on a competitive application process.
Wyoming Public Television
Wyoming Public Television, which is not the same as Wyoming Public Media, is slated to receive the $3 million it lost when Congress defunded the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Nethercott said.
It will also receive its usual $3 million from Wyoming.
The entity will not receive another $3 million it had sought to upgrade its emergency-alert towers, said Nethercott, “because we received information from them… they have another source to pay for the replacement and maintenance of the towers.”
Like the Wyoming Business Council, the Wyoming Public TV’s functions range from less controversial to more controversial.
The entity operates, maintains and staffs emergency alert towers throughout Wyoming.
Wyoming Public TV also produces entertainment and informational movies. Its state grants run through the community colleges’ budget.
State Employees
Nethercott noted that the JCC advanced to both chambers an agreement to pay $111 million from the state’s checking account to give state employees raises.
Those raises would bring them to 2024 market values for their work, she noted.
Because that money is coming from the state’s checking account, or “general fund,” and not its severance tax pool as the House had envisioned, then $111 million won’t impact the $105 million investment another still-viable bill seeking to build an “energy dominance fund” envisions.
That bill, sponsored by Senate President Bo Biteman, R-Ranchester, seeks to lend to large energy-sector projects.
Biteman told Cowboy State Daily in an interview days before the session convened that its purpose is to counteract “green” compacts investors have adopted, and which have bottlenecked energy projects.
Wyoming’s executive branch is currently suing BlackRock and other investors on that same assertion.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
It’s Week 11 in the 2026 Wyoming prep girls’ basketball season. That means it’s the end of the regular season. 3A and 4A schools have their final game or games to determine seeding before the regional tournament, or if a team is locked into a position, one last chance to fine-tune before the postseason. Games are spread across four days.
WYOPREPS WEEK 11 GIRLS BASKETBALL SCHEDULE 2026
Every game on the slate is a conference matchup. Several rivalry contests are part of this week’s schedule, such as East against Central, Cody at Powell, Lyman hosting Mountain View, and Rock Springs at Green River, just to name a few. Here is the Week 11 schedule of varsity games WyoPreps has. All schedules are subject to change. If you see a game missing, please email david@wyopreps.com.
CLASS 4A
Final Score: Laramie 68 Cheyenne South 27 (conference game)
CLASS 3A
Final Score: Lyman 40 Mountain View 26 (conference game)
CLASS 4A
Final Score: Evanston 41 Riverton 39 (conference game)
Final Score: Natrona County 42 Kelly Walsh 38 (conference game) – Peach Basket Classic
Final Score: #4 Thunder Basin 64 Campbell County 32 (conference game)
CLASS 3A
Final Score: #1 Cody 77 Worland 33 (conference game) – 5 different Fillies with a 3, and Hays led the way with 34 points.
Final Score: #2 Lander 49 Lyman 34 (conference game)
Final Score: #4 Wheatland 51 Douglas 40 (conference game)
Final Score: #5 Powell 48 Lovell 42 (conference game)
Final Score: Burns 56 Torrington 43 (conference game)
Final Score: Glenrock 78 Newcastle 30 (conference game)
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CLASS 4A
Rock Springs at #2 Green River, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)
#4 Thunder Basin at #5 Sheridan, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)
#1 Cheyenne East at #3 Cheyenne Central, 6 p.m. (conference game)
Jackson at Star Valley, 6 p.m. (conference game)
CLASS 3A
#3 Pinedale at Mountain View, 4 p.m. (conference game)
#1 Cody at #5 Powell, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)
Buffalo at Glenrock, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)
CLASS 3A
Newcastle at Buffalo, 12:30 p.m. (conference game)
Glenrock at Rawlins, 3 p.m. (conference game)
Torrington at #4 Wheatland, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)
Wyoming Boys 4A Swimming & Diving State Championships 2026
4A Boys State Swim Meet for 2026 in Cheyenne
Gallery Credit: David Settle, WyoPreps.com
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