Sorted by date Results 26 - 50 of 490
Washington, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senators John Barrasso and Cynthia Lummis (both R-WY) joined U.S. Senator Pete Ricketts (R-NE) in introducing the bipartisan Securing American Agriculture Act. This legislation would protect Wyoming food and agriculture supply chains from being taken over by foreign adversaries. "Protecting America's agricultural and food supply chains from Chinese Communist Party threats is a top priority," said Barrasso. "China's alarming influence on the global agricultural supp...
Rod and gun club got federal permits to eliminate 30 of the giant trout-eating birds, but daily efforts to kill them have struck a nerve with many residents. 9-MILE LAKE-Initially, Jay Benson was OK with the idea of taking out some white pelicans to protect the Alco Rod and Gun Club's pricy stock of put-and-take trout. Often during the summer, he said, a few dozen of the hefty native piscivorous birds rafted out on the club's exclusive 9-Mile Lake outside of Laramie to take advantage of the...
Concerns over street projects and costs for updating the city’s pavement management plan became a key point of discussion during this week’s Green River City Council meeting. At the October 1 meeting, one of the council action items included the Public Works Department’s recently issued request for quotes for updating the city’s pavement management plan. Responses were received from two firms, and the review committee recommended awarding the contract to preform the work to MDS Technologies Incorporated. Before a motion was brought to enter i...
As part of an ongoing conversation about mental health in Wyoming, and a wrap up for September's Suicide Prevention Month, Governor Mark Gordon took time last Thursday to visit Sweetwater County and sit down for an honest conversation about addressing suicide. "This is an area where Wyoming really has its work cut out for it," Governor Gordon said regarding the topic of suicide prevention. The event was hosted by Rock Springs Mayor Max Mickelson at the Broadway Theater in Rock Springs, and was...
The Green River High School Athletic Department recently announced the hiring of a new head coach for the Softball program. Mark Hyde has been selected as the new Green River High School Head Softball Coach. Mark has been an Assistant Softball Coach for Green River High School for the past four seasons, according to a district press release, and was instrumental in helping the program get up and running four years ago. "We are extremely excited to have Mark Hyde on board as our new Green River H...
Acting U.S. Attorney Eric Heimann announced Sept. 13 that the Cody man whose girlfriend disappeared while the couple and their two children were returning from Alabama in October of 2023 was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge Alan B. Johnson. Adam Shane Aviles, Jr., age 26, of Cody, Wyoming, was sentenced to 87 months in federal prison for being a felon in possession of ammunition. Based on evidence presented by the government at the sentencing hearing, Judge Johnson found that Aviles unlawfully possessed the ammunition in connection with t...
CASPER - Wyoming's oil and gas producers have won a reprieve with a federal court injunction against the Bureau of Land Management's methane regulation rule, stalling for now regulatory requirements that would have added millions of dollars in overhead for producers and threatened to force many of Wyoming's small operators out of business, industry representatives say. 'The left hand of the government does not know what the right hand of the government is doing' The court declared the BLM's...
Wyoming’s county commissioners and an alliance of Casper-area residents want to support Teton County in a lawsuit over local government authority to impose zoning and safety codes on private businesses leasing land from the state. The Casper Mountain Preservation Alliance joined a group of Teton County homeowners who filed an amicus brief in a long-running lawsuit over state-sanctioned development on a school trust section in Teton County. The Wyoming County Commissioners Association also filed an amicus brief, seeking to argue on behalf of T...
A federal judge has upheld the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's plans for managing black-footed ferrets in Wyoming, the state where the once-presumed-extinct species was rediscovered some four decades ago. The dispute over how the federal government managed the endangered weasel-like animal traces back nearly a decade to when federal wildlife managers officially designated the Wyoming population as "nonessential, experimental." That classification allows for more regulatory flexibility than...
CASPER — Wyoming’s senior senator is throwing his political and intellectual weight behind a big case before the U.S. Supreme Court, whose outcome could significantly diminish the reach of the National Environmental Policy Act. The law’s application has become overly rigorous and is bogging down economic development, Sen. John Barrasso argues in an Amicus Brief delivered to the court last week. The act requires federal agencies to vet policies and development proposals to ensure communities and public lands are protected from certain envir...
Steven Shobert, 49, of Worland, Wyoming, was sentenced on Aug. 28 to 18 months in prison for possession of machine guns in violation of federal law. According to court documents, on Aug. 29, 2023, Shobert was arrested for driving under the influence. He had a holstered firearm on his hip and surrendered it to the officers. A state judge imposed bond conditions requiring Shobert to relinquish his firearms pending the DUI case. Shobert consented to a search of his residence to gather his firearms. The search resulted in the discovery of one...
The House Draw Fire caused an estimated $25 million in economic damage when it consumed nearly 175,000 acres of mostly private land in Johnson County, a preliminary evaluation found. That figure will almost certainly rise as ranchers in the fire's path more fully assess their losses and livestock fall ill due to smoke exposure. While the massive and swift-moving fire did not destroy any homes, it caused extensive damage to local ranching operations including the loss of at least 590 miles of...
CASPER (Wyoming News Exchange) — Yellowstone National Park rangers arrested a Virginia man Saturday after he allegedly stole a heavy wrecker while intoxicated and told rangers he was a federal agent on a mission. The incident began just before 5 p.m., Saturday, when Alan Bowling, born in 1967, attempted to buy a beer at the Old Faithful Upper General Store and had his credit card declined. He then “left the general store, got into the heavy wrecker without permission of [the park] and drove the wrecker away,” according to an affidavit. Range...
WHITE MOUNTAIN-"That's a lot of horses," lamented Cheyenne resident Robyn Smith from a high-desert ridgeline. It wasn't her first exasperated exclamation. "Argh, oh crap," was her immediate reaction to learning a federal judge had given the Bureau of Land Management the OK to proceed with plans to fully remove two wild horse herds from the landscape in southwest Wyoming. A retired architect donning a "Return to Freedom" ball cap that featured a bucking mustang, Smith proudly described herself...
The crane operator who was killed on the job earlier this month at a wind-energy construction site in remote Natrona County was driving a crane that rolled into a pond, according to a Natrona County Sheriff’s Office’s incident report obtained by WyoFile. The victim, John William Hoffpauir, Jr., 55, of Houma, Louisiana, was driving a “large dual axle crane” at about 20 miles per hour on Twenty Mile Hill Road east of Interstate 25 about 20 miles north of Casper on Aug. 5 when it “slowly veered off the roadway,” the report states. The crane “roll...
A federal judge in Wyoming dismissed a lawsuit Thursday alleging the state’s ban on selling delta-8 and similar substances is unconstitutional. The substances are similar to marijuana and occur in tiny amounts in the cannabis plant, but anecdotally produce milder effects and, in some cases, can be synthesized using dangerous chemicals. Judge Kelly Rankin accepted the state’s motion to dismiss for many of the same reasons he dismissed the plaintiff’s request for a temporary restraining order or injunction, he stated. “Much of the analysi...
Albert Rueben Gaines, 31, of Casper, Wyoming, was sentenced to 200 months’ imprisonment for felon in possession of a firearm, possession with intent to distribute fentanyl, use of a firearm during and in relation to a drug trafficking crime, and possession of a machinegun. According to court documents, in January 2023, DCI agents began receiving information that Gaines was involved in the use and distribution of controlled substances throughout the state of Wyoming. In June of 2023, several incidents occurred that led to the arrest of Gaines a...
Yellowstone National Park has closed the Biscuit Basin area for the season after a hydrothermal explosion strewed boiling water and rocks skyward Tuesday morning, destroying a section of boardwalk and spurring frightened tourists to flee. No one was injured in the blast at Black Diamond Pool, which was caused by hydrothermal conditions and not volcanic activity, the park said Wednesday. Geologists are monitoring conditions, mapping the debris field and sampling water to assess any changes in the...
JACKSON — Scientists aren’t sure whether it’s possible to detect hydrothermal explosions like last Tuesday’s Biscuit Basin blow-up before they happen. Still, they want to try and learn what they can about the subterranean blasts. Yellowstone National Park Superintendent Cam Sholly is open to the idea. “We definitely had what I’d call a close call. I’m very happy no one was injured or worse,” Sholly said. “We’ll continue to work with the scientists to figure out if there’s any better ways to improve monitoring. Obviously, we want to make sure...
KEMMERER — “It’s not a matter of if, but a matter of when you’re going to see fraud. You’ve gotta get comfortable with being uncomfortable having these conversations,” said First Bank Vice President and Branch Manager David Benton. Benton, who has over 20 years of experience in the banking industry, is no stranger to monetary scams. “Our tellers are the first line of defense a lot of the time,” he said. “We train a couple of times a year to spot fraud, and we’re catching a lot of it. Most of the scams we’re seeing now involve something tha...
CASPER — Commercial livestock grazing across the West is a growing threat to the greater sage-grouse, according to an analysis by conservation groups Western Watersheds Project and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. The groups analyzed documents from the Bureau of Land Management and concluded the agency’s latest proposal for managing sage-grouse habitat fails to remedy damage caused by livestock grazing across millions of acres of sage-grouse habitat. Sage-grouse, a ground-dwelling bird and iconic western species, is con...
Wyoming Republicans and Democrats reacted Sunday to President Joe Biden’s decision not to seek reelection. “It has been the greatest honor of my life to serve as your President. And while it has been my intention to seek reelection, I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and to focus solely on fulfilling my duties as President for the remainder of my term,” Biden said in a social media post Sunday. He also endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee...
“It’s not a matter of if, but a matter of when you’re going to see fraud. You’ve gotta get comfortable with being uncomfortable having these conversations,” said First Bank Vice President and Branch Manager David Benton. Benton, who has over 20 years of experience in the banking industry, is no stranger to monetary scams. “Our tellers are the first line of defense a lot of the time,” he said. “We train a couple of times a year to spot fraud, and we’re catching a lot of it. Most of the scams we’re seeing now involve something that’s ju...
Before hitting the road for the weekend, the Wyoming Game and Fish Department and Wyoming State Parks remind all boaters - from motorized boaters to paddlers - to be prepared and be sure watercraft are outfitted with the required safety equipment. "We want all boaters to safely enjoy Wyoming's waters. We can't emphasize enough how important it is to have a life jacket for all of the passengers in your watercraft. It is the law and life jackets are proven to save lives," said Aaron Kerr, Game...
A group of hemp retailers and an agricultural organization are suing the state of Wyoming claiming that its recent ban on the marijuana-like substance delta-8 is unconstitutional. The Hemp Community of Wyoming wants an injunction or restraining order to stop the law from going into effect today. "We will fight to keep our small businesses open, keep food on the tables of our staff, and keep products coming to the hardworking people [of] Wyoming," Gillette's Mountain High Wellness store owners...
