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(Publisher's note: the following column was written for our annual 'Things We Love' section.) It's hard to believe one of the best art collections in the Western United States actually exists in our backyard. Yet, it's true and is easily viewable at its home in Rock Springs. The Community Fine Arts Center in Rock Springs displays hundreds of pieces owned by Sweetwater County School District No. 1. Both the collection and the CFAC itself owe their existence to a man and his desire to share his...
(Publisher's note: the following column was written for our annual 'Things We Love' section.) The Green River Fire Department is a service that has done a lot in the community. While the same can be said of any fire department anywhere, the firefighters in Green River have shown they're committed to the community and Green River is better from it. More importantly, they're deserving of our trust. The last year hasn't been kind to the department. It's unfortunate the department was rocked by an...
This is perhaps an interesting thing I find myself doing in a time that seems to be marked with never ending problems and few answers in sight. My name is Ryan Desmond for those who have been in the community for quite some time, My grandparents owned the Desmond Motel In Green River. I grew up in Green River and after my enlistment with the Marines ended, I came back home. I enrolled at Western Wyoming Community College in 2018, setting out to start my education on the right foot. The truth is I struggled in school as a kid (I graduated in 200...
Some favorite places around Laramie to access public lands have become, for a few, places of trauma and danger. Since mid-November six dogs became entangled in neck snares or held in terror by foot-hold traps. That is, six cases in an eight-week period. If we broaden the time frame to include February of 2020, less than 12 months ago, we can add another. Except for one, all were on public land and at least half set illegally. The one case on private land occurred early December 2020 and involved a foot-hold trap that lacked an identification...
Dear Editor, It must be difficult to call a press conference and suggest that President Biden’s ban on gas and oil permits is a “crushing blow” to Wyoming, when not so long ago, Mark Gordon was aligned with some of the most radical environmental groups in the country whose mission was to destroy fossil fuels. Now that he is largely responsible for balancing Wyoming’s budget, I wonder if he has started to realize how important fossil fuels are to Wyoming and its people. It is hard for me to discern if he is regretful of his past allianc...
Dear Editor, I am writing this letter in response to the article headlined, “WWCC leaders to select 15 to layoff” published in the January 27, 2021 edition of the Green River Star. I was misrepresented regarding my concerns about the upcoming layoffs at Western and would like to clarify what I brought up at the board meeting. I am a former employee of more than 12 years at Western Wyoming Community College. I resigned from my position in December 2020. I had a wonderful career and loved the work we did. However, after assessing some things I re...
Wyoming’s public schools have long been a subject of derision for many Republican state lawmakers who claim they underperform. If such scrutiny leads to the constant improvement of our K-12 system, then I’m all for it. But that’s not the solution the Legislature is considering. Instead, a committee charged with determining how much the state spends on education wants to cut funding by an estimated $250 million over the next three years. That’s like complaining of a headache and then “solving” the problem by cutting off your head. If the topi...
Wyoming has a revenue problem. That’s something we can all agree on. The continued reliance on the mineral extraction has put several state services at risk as legislators scramble to find ways to cut costs without increased taxation or other “revenue enhancers” that would bring more funding into the state coffers. We’re certain their efforts won’t be enough, even if they go as far as cutting $100 million from education spending and bait the state’s school districts into a lawsuit in the process. A reader sent us a rough outline creating wh...
President Trump now has the dubious distinction of being the only President to have been impeached twice, this time for “incitement of insurrection. There was no due process or presenting of facts, just representatives stating opinions. This was a personality contest — and he lost. The U.S. Supreme Court’s unsigned opinion, handed down in 1969, stated advocacy could be punished only “where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action.” Did President Trump’s speech meet that high bar? Apparently, it is OK for Vice...
By now, even casual observers recognize that Wyoming’s near single-minded reliance on mineral revenues leaves the state vulnerable to wild swings of boom-and-bust volatility and makes funding the basic functions of government a dicey proposition in bust times like these. What readers may not realize, however, is that other states with similar economies and political environments have figured out how to avoid putting all their eggs in one basket. Take West Virginia for example. Wyoming and West Virginia each have claimed coal as one of their m...
The 2020 COVID-19 pandemic led to a lot of event postponements or changes worldwide and our little corner of it in Sweetwater County was no exception. Flaming Gorge Days, International Day, high school graduations, River Festival; the summer was quieter for sure. Initially, our belief was that this summer would take place in a vastly different environment where everything would largely be back to normal. We could enjoy the summertime events we missed out on last year would return and we could generally have a good time celebrating the end of...
I have probably made the jog from my house to the work at the college and/or back home, legitimately 500 times over the last couple years. I have run Grant Street so many times, I might actually have every crack in the sidewalk memorized. However, every time I run up, or down, it’s not only different, but it’s always still hard. Some days when I run, the wind is blowing (as it does often in Rock Springs). Some days it’s cold. Some days there is snow and it is slick. In the summer, some days are pretty warm. Some days my body is feeling prett...
"Hey, I am going to the lake, what about you," says seven-year-old Bella, a black lab mix, as she pokes her head out of a car window at a stop light on a warm sunny day in Rock Springs. "What's a lake? Maybe I am going to the lake too," replies six-month-old Charlie, a pig who struggles to reach his snout out through a small opening in an overcrowded transport truck. The truck carries two hundred pigs en route to slaughter. My heart was filled with joy when I read the press release in the...
CHEYENNE – The Wyoming Republican Party issued a statement highlighting an outpouring of opposition from its members in response to U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., voting to impeach President Donald Trump on Wednesday for his role in the U.S. Capitol riot that occurred a week earlier. The party issued the statement late Wednesday night, a few hours after Cheney joined nine other Republican representatives in voting to impeach Trump for his role in inciting the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, making him the first president to be impeached t...
For the past several years, the waterline on Flaming Gorge Way has broken, resulting in the city spending time and money closing a section of the street, digging up the line and replacing it. Nearby residents and businesses are inconvenienced because their access to water is shut off while city workers fix the problem and It’s no secret that section of line is old, being made from cast iron. The fact that the line is only 4 inches in diameter is a problem in itself, as the city admits the amount of water it provides isn’t suitable to provide ad...
The response of two Wyoming officials to President Donald Trump inciting a riot at the Capitol last Wednesday is delusional, dishonest and disturbing. As security escorted her out after violent Trump backers stormed the building, Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) questioned who was responsible for the attack. “I hope it’s not Trump supporters that are involved in the mayhem,” she reportedly told a Capitol Hill reporter. “In my previous experience with these Trump supporters, they have been peaceful demonstrators, happy people, very patriot...
In the past, we’ve published pieces in this space supporting coal and wishing for it to return to prominence as an economic generator in Southwest Wyoming. As the years roll on, that’s looking less and less likely. While many local leaders continue to work on making the Middle Baxter Road industrial complex dream a reality, there’s a saying of not putting all of one’s eggs into a single basket. While mineral extraction, specifically trona extraction, will likely be a big economic generator in Sweetwater Count for the foreseeable future,...
Well-considered comments and e-mails following the discussion of Wyoming’s excess tax capacity, and the one-page legislative document that measured it, differed widely and reflected all of the various political positions one might expect. But a number of astute readers raised the same valid concern: Our discussion omitted the issue of ability to pay. In other words, unless Wyoming residents can actually afford to bridge the gap between what we pay in taxes and what our neighbors pay on average, then tax capacity as measured is just a bunch o...
It’s an understatement to say the last year was unprecedented for those of us who didn’t live during the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic. With so many activities canceled or postponed a year to limit COVID-19’s spread, a lot of the regular avenues for entertainment were unavailable for much of the year. Some people binge watched new and favorite television programs on their favorite streaming apps while others took to enjoying activities they could do while socially distancing. For me, I ended up pl...
We’re thankful to see the Green River Fire Department healing from the trial disgraced former fire chief Mike Nomis put it through. Part of that healing process involved firefighters, some of whom had known Nomis for decades, talking about how his actions impacted them on a professional and personal level. Each victim impact statement, either read to the court by Sweetwater County Attorney Daniel Erramouspe or given by firefighters themselves, told a larger story of how Nomis’ actions publicly alienated a group of men and women committed to ser...
(Editor’s note: Since Friday is Christmas Day, we thought we’d share what has become the most republished newspaper editorial in history which proves Santa Claus is real. The unsigned editorial, published Sept. 21, 1897 in New York’s Sun newspaper, was the work of Francis Pharcellus Church. According to the Newseum, the editorial has been republished countless times over the years in multiple languages and excerpts have appeared in books, plays, stamps, posters and other editorials.) Dear Editor, I am 8 years old. Some of my little frien...
The legislature’s budget and fiscal staff recently prepared a very novel one-page document that merits the attention of every Wyoming lawmaker and citizen. “Wyoming Estimated Tax Capacity” asks and answers a seemingly simple question: How much additional revenue could Wyoming raise if its tax rates equalled, on average, those of adjoining states? The question may be straightforward enough, but calculating an answer required an extensive review of tax policies in neighboring states and an equally rigorous comparison with Wyoming’s. Sales a...
Depending on where you live, it looks like we may not have a “picture perfect” white Christmas this year. It seems fitting given the many things about 2020 which were not what we imagined, let alone “perfect.” While the holidays can be a season of happiness and joy, for many they are accompanied by anger and sorrow. Missing loved ones from the past, remembering relationships that soured, thinking of hopes and dreams that never materialized can make customarily joyous Christmas carols sound like fingernails on a chalkboard. It can be hard to...
There is a lot of criticism that can be laid to Gov. Mark Gordon’s management of the COVID-19 pandemic, the largest of which was his steadfast refusal to tighten statewide restrictions in the face of a huge spike in COVID-19 infections. Last week, finally, he reversed course and issued a statewide mask and facial covering mandate. In Sweetwater County, more than 2,400 residents have contracted COVID-19, with a large percentage of that number being as recent as last month. So far, 16 people have died as a result of complications from the d...
For most of us in Wyoming, 2020 brought many challenges. As we head into 2021, we can celebrate a new year with some much-needed encouraging news: We have multiple effective vaccines for COVID-19. During the past year, the federal government has focused on Operation Warp Speed. This is a true private-public partnership, involving America’s best scientists, business, military and health care leaders. The goal was to create and distribute a safe, potent and effective vaccine for COVID-19. That goal was achieved in record time. This is a h...
