Wyoming
Davis County girl's playground design comes to life
CLEARFIELD, Utah — One young Clearfield City resident’s vision has come to life, and it’s something her whole community can enjoy.
“It’s even better than I imagined, and it’s so beautiful,” said Rosili Olson.
Rosili is 12 years old, and she designed a new playground in Clearfield.
Earlier this year, Rosili saw a post on Facebook about a new playground being installed at Thornock Park. But she thought the equipment was for older children and was worried that she wouldn’t be able to play there with her little sisters. So, she decided to sketch what her ideal playground would look like.
“I love them, and we’re all four years apart and they’re both unique and different, and I wanted them to have fun in a park,” explained Rosili.
So Rosili’s mom took her to city hall to meet officials and show them her work.
“I’m the fortunate one who got the chance to talk to her, and we sat down with her and went through every one of those drawings,” said Eric Howes, the city’s community services director. “There are labels. She has details of what everything is and what it’s supposed to do, and she put a ton of time into that and a lot of thought, and she showed it from four different angles.”
From there, the city developed concepts with its playground equipment vendor, and Rosili was involved every step of the way. It was too late to change the playground at Thornock Park, but the city was planning to install a new playground at Bicentennial Park anyway, so they went with Rosili’s designs.
“Every day that I would have to go there for another meeting, I would tell my friends and be like, ‘Ah, I get to go again, woohoo!’” said Rosili.
“This has been a fun process, and I kind of hate to see it end,” said Howes.
On Tuesday, the playground was officially opened. Rosili and her family cut the ribbon at the park.
“I really thought that it was similar to what Rosili thought, which was they would say, ‘Thank you so much for your efforts’ and things like that,” said her mom, Annie Olson. “Really my purpose was to show her kind of how it works, and wanted her to really understand the full process of it, so for it to go this far was really awesome.”
And now, there’s a park for kids of all ages to enjoy — something families say they are thrilled about.
“It’s so nice to be able to come to one park and everybody be entertained,” said Michelle Fish, who brought her little ones there.
From her pages to the park, Rosili made her dreams come true.
“It’s amazing. So, so fun,” she said.
CASPER, Wyo. — High school athletics in Wyoming could see some drastic changes in the coming years following legislative changes to the state’s education budget, the Wyoming High School Activities Association recently announced in a statement.
According to the WHSAA, Wyoming school districts are facing a projected $3.9 million shortfall in activities funding, forcing officials to consider significant cuts to high school sports and extracurricular programs.
The WHSAA shared details regarding a new “silo” funding model implemented by the Legislature, stating that the recalibrated block grant model reduced funding for student activities and extra-duty responsibilities from $46.3 million to $42.4 million, an approximately 8.4% decrease statewide.
WHSAA Commissioner Trevor Wilson said the restructuring also restricts district access to an additional $76.2 million in previously flexible funding.
“A significant portion of the [April 28 WHSAA Board of Directors] meeting was dedicated to discussing the projected funding shortfall,” Wilson wrote.
The WHSAA is weighing several strategies to address rising costs with fewer resources. Proposed changes include eliminating regional tournaments and reducing the number of teams qualifying for state events from eight to four; limiting wrestling to two classes and restricting track and field state participants to the top 16 marks; making cuts to soccer, indoor track and field, Nordic and Alpine skiing, swimming and diving, spring golf and tennis; and reducing in-person speech and debate events by half and centrally locating All-State Music events to minimize travel. The board also recommended increasing gate admission or implementing student participation fees to offset costs.
While the WHSAA release states that no plans have been finalized and the various changes are currently just possibilities, Natrona County School District 1 Board of Trustees member Mary Schmidt criticized the WHSAA’s handling of the news at Monday’s board meeting.
“I take some issues with this, [including] the sheer fact that we as Board of Trustees members have not talked about that at all,” Schmidt said. “It is not our intent and it has not been brought to us to cut our athletics or activities budget for the upcoming school year. … I take issue with them picking sports and getting the community upset and ginning them up to be upset that this is all going to be cut when that hasn’t been discussed.”
Later in the meeting, Superintendent Angela Hensley clarified that Natrona County School District 1’s athletics and activities budget saw a reduction of roughly $550,000 in the coming year’s budget, but said the local school district does not plan to cut any sports.
“Thank you, Trustee Schmidt, for saying this, because I think people are wondering — we are not planning to cut athletics and activities for next year,” Hensley said. “We do have to take a look at our entire budget as we have talked about, as we learn more about these new rules that come in.”
Related
Republished with permission from Wyoming News Now, a TV news outlet covering the Cheyenne and Casper areas.
Cheyenne City Council has introduced a temporary moratorium, or pause, on new data center construction.
“The end goal is to actually have regulations in place, to have really heavy public involvement with this with data centers,” said Councilman Mark Moody.
The proposed ordinance is not a permanent ban on data centers and would not affect data centers currently under construction.
Councilman Moody says this is a bipartisan issue.
“I just want to make this clear, I’m not against data centers. We do need them from a national security perspective,” he said.
He said there needs to be more public input and regulations regarding data centers in Cheyenne.
The ordinance would require city staff to study data center impacts such as electricity usage, electricity tariffs, closed-loop cooling systems, groundwater impacts, agricultural impacts, and land value.
Cheyenne LEADS, the economic development corporation for Cheyenne and Laramie County, reported in November 2025 that there are 12 operational data centers in Wyoming, five under construction and plans for 43 data centers announced across the state.
“There needs to be more public input with this, and also to see how many we can sustain here in this community, cause there are talks of 43, and then another day 70. How many can we sustain here?” said Councilman Moody.
The proposed moratorium will now go to the Public Services Committee on Monday, May 18 at noon in the Municipal Building.
Sheridan will play in the North Regional Tournament at Gillette, while the South Regional Tournament will be played at Rock Springs.
North Regional Tournament at Gillette:
Checking record vs. highest team in the quadrant not involved in the tie, Thunder Basin gets the #1 Northeast seed over Campbell County, because the Lady Bolts went 3-1 vs. Sheridan, whereas the Lady Camels went 2-2.
Friday, May 15th:
(#1 NE) Thunder Basin vs. (#4 NW) Jackson – 11am
(#2 NW) Natrona County vs. (#3 NE) Sheridan – 11am
(#2 NE) Campbell County vs. (#3 NW) Kelly Walsh – 1pm
(#1 NW) Cody vs. (#4 NE) Worland – 1pm
Semi-Finals:
Thunder Basin/Jackson winner vs. Natrona County/Sheridan winner – 3pm Winner qualifies for the state tournament.
Campbell County/Kelly Walsh winner vs. Cody/Worland winner – 5pm Winner qualifies for the state tournament.
Consolation Round:
Thunder Basin/Jackson loser vs. Natrona County/Sheridan loser – 3pm LOSER OUT!
Campbell County/Kelly Walsh loser vs. Cody/Worland loser – 5pm LOSER OUT!
Saturday, May 16th:
TBA vs. TBA – 10am LOSER OUT! Winner qualifies for the state tournament.
TBA vs. TBA – 10am LOSER OUT! Winner qualifies for the state tournament.
2 10am winners vs. each other – 1pm 3rd Place
TBA vs. TBA – 1pm 1st Place
South Regional Tournament at Rock Springs:
Friday, May 15th:
(#1 SW) Laramie vs. (#4 SE) Torrington – 11am
(#2 SE) Cheyenne East vs. (#3 SW) Green River – 11am
(#2 SW) Rock Springs vs. (#3 SE) Wheatland – 1pm
(#1 SE) Cheyenne Central vs. (#4 SW) Cheyenne South – 1pm
Semi-Finals:
Laramie/Torrington winner vs. Cheyenne East/Green River winner – 3pm Winner qualifies for the state tournament.
Rock Springs/Wheatland winner vs. Cheyenne Central/Cheyenne South winner – 5pm Winner qualifies for the state tournament.
Consolation Round:
Laramie/Torrington loser vs. Cheyenne East/Green River loser – 3pm LOSER OUT!
Rock Springs/Wheatland loser vs. Cheyenne Central/Cheyenne South loser – 5pm LOSER OUT!
Saturday, May 16th:
TBA vs. TBA – 10am LOSER OUT! Winner qualifies for the state tournament.
TBA vs. TBA – 10am LOSER OUT! Winner qualifies for the state tournament.
2 10am winners vs. each other – 1pm 3rd Place
TBA vs. TBA – 1pm 1st Place
-
San Diego, CA1 minute agoSix concerts to fill your musical soul this week in San Diego County
-
Milwaukee, WI7 minutes agoFive teenagers arrested following police pursuit in Milwaukee
-
Atlanta, GA13 minutes ago2 Giant Pandas Are Headed to This US Zoo. Meet Ping Ping and Fu Shuang
-
Minneapolis, MN19 minutes agoBauhaus Brew Labs in northeast Minneapolis set to close next month
-
Indianapolis, IN25 minutes agoIndy 500 qualifying format, schedule, entries, how to watch this weekend
-
Pittsburg, PA31 minutes agoHere are all the free movies you can watch outside this summer in Pittsburgh
-
Augusta, GA37 minutes ago25-year-old woman killed in shooting on Cameron Drive
-
Cleveland, OH49 minutes ago
U.S. Navy warship to be commissioned in Ohio
