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The Wyoming Public Services Commission is hosting a hearing today to receive public comment regarding Rocky Mountain Power’s plan to retire two of the four Jim Bridger Power Plant Units in the next decade. While it’s easy for us to focus on how plant closures will impact this area for years to come, another question about the area’s economy is this: What will we do if coal goes away? While the trona industry continues to thrive, with Ciner and Genesis Alkali poised for expansions in the coming years, reducing the role natural gas and coal...
Dear Editor: I am writing to let the community know of an important meeting to be held in Rock Springs Jan. 29 with the Wyoming Public Service Commission. They are investigating PacifiCorp’s Integrated Resource Plan, the one that has forecast the shutdown of Bridger power. That the shut down will cause all kinds of changes is a given. The PSC is charged with ensuring that utility ratepayers have affordable, reliable, and safe energy. Their investigation ought to be thorough and transparent. All stakeholders – workers, communities and ratepayers...
Rocky Mountain Power’s 2019 Integrated Resource Plan outlines how we plan to meet the electricity needs of our Wyoming customers safely, affordably and reliably over the next 20 years. As I visit with customers and community leaders around the state, they have questions about what this means for Wyoming jobs, tax revenue, electricity bills and reliability of service. These questions are reasonable, and while the answers are sometimes difficult to hear, I think it’s helpful to share how we arrived at our conclusions. The decision to retire som...
What is a reasonable fee? This is the question that’s at the heart of the ongoing complaints about the Sweetwater County Clerk’s decision to charge for access to a database of records maintained by a separate company. This is also a question that local and state governments have contended with since Wyoming’s public documents laws allowed for the charge of a reasonable fee. The unfortunate answer to the question is this: there is no such thing as a reasonable fee. This is because what’s reasonable for one person is unreasonable for another...
In less than three years, President Donald Trump’s administration — aided and abetted by Wyoming’s congressional delegation and state leaders — has rolled back 58 environmental rules and regulations and has another 37 such changes on the drawing board. That tally is according to a New York Times analysis. These “gifts” to the fossil fuels industry and other polluters, according to a report by the New York University Law School, could significantly increase greenhouse gas emissions and cause thousands of deaths from poor air quality every year....
Well, this is exciting, isn’t it? Green River will get a new store later this year as Bomgaars will establish a branch at the old Shopko building. This is an amazing development. When a store closes, it seems to take a long time before someone comes along to use the vacated space. Look to Rock Springs and Harbor Freight for example. What used to be a Hastings and sat vacant for a couple of years before that was turned around. There’s still the massive vacant building K-Mart used to occupy and it’s been several years since the last blue light...
This is a story about Wyoming’s near future, though it takes place in Arizona. Entering Page, Ariz., the plan was to ask one question of ten people, “With the closing of the coal-fired Navajo Generating Station (NGS), on Nov. 18, 2019, is the view less hazy?” If I were not understood, I would ask something like, “Can you now see the mountains over there more clearly?” Or, I could ask, “Has the air quality gotten a little better?” Nine out of the 10 answered in the affirmative. Their answers ranged from, “Much more clear and better,” to a t...
While a recent change in federal regulation has risen the age required to buy tobacco and electronic vaping products to 21, the change also raises some questions about when a person can make adult choices. The regulation change was heralded as a means to help protect young adults from addiction to vaping products. While we can agree that the regulation will have that outcome with some people, it also means 18-year-olds have an adult choice taken from them. Someone who is 18 years old can legally made decisions such as determining if they want...
Welcome to 2020! I realize I’m a bit late on that take, but when the first publication of the new year doesn’t come out until Jan. 8, sometimes things have to wait. I realize I could have written that for the Dec. 31 issue, but then it would have been too soon. It just wouldn’t have felt right. The year has started with a bang for the newspaper. The Sweetwater County commissioners named the Star it’s publication of record for 2020, meaning the county’s public notices will start appearing...
Mrs. B came into the emergency room one night, years ago, with some stress related issue. After taking her history, I began to suspect there was something else bothering her. As I was beginning her physical exam she blurted out, “I know there is a breast mass but you’re not going to send me to any breast cancer doctor!” She had already decided to avoid standard treatment and her next comment explained why, “My aunt suffered because of awful unnecessary surgery and chemotherapy,” she said. I sensed there was no changing her mind and that mean...
Comprising over half a million acres in southwestern Wyoming’s Sweetwater County, the Greater Little Mountain Area is one of the West’s hidden gems and home to some of the most sensitive fish and wildlife habitat in the state. As an avid sportsman myself, this landscape has served as the backdrop to countless hunting, fishing, and camping trips I’ve taken over the years and is a key destination to many others who travel and support our local economy by coming to recreate within this pristine landscape. The fate of Greater Little Mountain Area...
The story of our country is often told by the decades that define it. With the end of this decade so close at hand, it can often be tempting to imagine what the last ten years will be remembered for. Or for that matter, the last year alone. For me, 2019 will be remembered by the people I had the pleasure to meet, businesses I had the opportunity to visit and the projects I have had the privilege to work on. Between spending time in our nation’s capital and back home in Wyoming, I’ve been able to meet with hundreds of workers and families fro...
A special purpose tax is a great tool for communities wanting to make improvements that all residents can benefit from. Road replacement, water and sewer upgrades, even construction of needed facilities can be accomplished through this tax, commonly known as the sixth penny tax because it’s implementation creates a 6 percent sales tax within Sweetwater County. For Green River and other towns within the county, the tax has become a needed source of funding to pay for construction they otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford. This isn’t the fault...
I try to run to work ALMOST every day. I run in the hot weather and in the cold weather, the snow, the wind, the heat…I enjoy running although I don’t run all that fast. I would run every day but sometimes I need a car in the middle of the day, if I need to run an errand or if it’s my turn to pick up the little kiddos after school. On days where I don’t get to run to and or from home, I try to run during a break at work. I am fortunate to work at Western where I can utilize the Wellness Center or run outside on the Running/Walking Trail o...
My sixth and final child is in kindergarten this year. My older three were in elementary school quite some time ago. I was in kindergarten in the dark ages. Many things have changed throughout the years but one thing I has not and I hope it never does. For as long as I can remember, when an elementary student, especially a kindergartener or first-grader, brings home “done work” in their folders and backpacks, it is pretty much a guarantee that every paper will have either a smiley face, a gold star or celebration word sticker/comment (“Wow”, “G...
Access to the internet is critical for life in the 21st century, not just something that is simply nice to have. To ensure our rural communities have quality health care, college-level math classes at the county high school, or precision ag technology at the local farm, high-speed broadband internet connectivity is necessary. When I first took office, President Donald J. Trump directed me to lead the Task Force on Agriculture and Rural Prosperity, a team of federal, state and local leaders...
If things continue as they’re going, we’re likely to see more solar development in Sweetwater County in the coming years. Along with the current Sweetwater Solar facility west of Green River, a second facility is being proposed in the same area. As most residents are aware now, Rocky Mountain Power’s Integrated Resource Plan calls for the early retirement of two units at the Jim Bridger Power Plant. It also lists potential solar projects that would replace energy lost from the plant’s retirement. It isn’t a stretch of the imagination to think...
Years ago, a family brought a 25-year-old farmer into the emergency room with a gunshot hole over his heart and with no pulse or breathing for more than ten minutes. It was a self-inflicted wound and this young farmer would farm no more. The family was besides themselves with loud and sorrowful wailing that wrenched my soul. They told me that the impending harvest looked poor, the loan was coming due, and he had been isolating himself, drinking more and getting angry at every little thing. They had no clue he was at risk of suicide. Sure, he...
Make no mistake, the state of Wyoming is experiencing an epic crisis of magnificent proportion that must end. We hear it time and time again that our young people are leaving Wyoming in search of better jobs and careers. Certainly, this is true, but there is more to it than just economic prosperity. I refuse to believe that our young buckaroos that were raised in Wyoming, see the dollar as their primary basis in life. Young people today want to live, thrive, and foster their families in communities that support their values, hopes, and dreams....
No one would argue the fact that coal has been the lifeblood of Sweetwater County and Wyoming for much of the state’s history. Without coal, Rock Springs wouldn’t exist. The state as a whole would be much different without the economic benefits coal has provided us. That’s why it isn’t surprising to see how people are reacting to Rocky Mountain Power’s plan to retire portions of the Jim Bridger Power Plant. Sweetwater County Commissioner Wally Johnson isn’t out of line in fearing the retirement of the two units would lead to them being disma...
If you’re buying health insurance on your own this year, the marketplace is more complicated – and dangerous – than ever. Dangerous? How can that be? This is health insurance we’re talking about, not some sketchy Internet site. But the reality is that the scam artists are out in full force, and anyone buying a policy by shopping online had better watch out. There’s a high likelihood you could buy something that won’t provide much coverage but will shortchange you mightily when you get sick. Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey, a Democrat, w...
With Thanksgiving coming up tomorrow, the Christmas season is set to rear its head with the annual Black Friday shopping circus. While Black Friday itself is a name more than anything else, as many big box stores have pushed their sales into Thanksgiving to get that all-important competitive edge, we would like to remind our readers to remember Green River’s local businesses. The city’s small businesses have a lot to offer. Mike Frink at Sweetwater Trophies has a number of interesting things available at his shop, including framed artwork and...
We’ve all heard the expression, “you don’t get a second chance to make a first impression.” It’s so true, and kids are super impressionable. We need to be mindful every time we open ours mouths TO and AROUND our children. I know with my own children, they were/are always trying to copy the big people in their lives. My little ones are constantly saying things like, “I am wearing my hair just like Sister,” or “Mom, my shoes are just like yours.” We never know what they are going to remember and copy. My parents and grandparents woul...
Of the 40 million people with hearing loss in the U.S., 25 percent of those, or 10 million, have lost their hearing as a result of exposure to excessive noise. But how much noise is too much? Measured as decibels (dB), the acceptable manufacturing noise standard is to allow a daily exposure up to but not over 85 dB in an eight-hour period. More than that can cause permanent injury to our hearing. This is likely due to wear and tear on the tiny hairs that vibrate when sound is introduced. It’s like a line of kids walking across one path on the g...
Ambulance service once again was a major topic of discussion this week with the Sweetwater County Commissioners. This time, the discussion focused on a rate increase Sweetwater Medics of Rock Springs plans to initiate. Providing a cost-effective ambulance service in Sweetwater County is a conundrum for everyone involved. When Sweetwater Medics was first established, the company’s representatives proudly boasted they would not need government subsidizing to support their business. In the years that followed, the company would be forced to take b...
