Sen. Charles Scott (R-Casper) presides over the Bates Creek Cattle Company and Eagle Ridge Ranch, enterprises that do business with the state of Wyoming, at least in a roundabout way.
The tall, 77-year-old senator from Natrona County divulged that information in his annual financial disclosure form, even though he admittedly wasn’t sure if he needed to.
“Both the business entities listed in the previous page lease state land for grazing purposes, but this appears not to meet the ‘contract’ definition above,” Scott wrote.
The disclosures are required of Scott and his 92 counterparts in the Wyoming Legislature by Jan. 31 each year. As of Feb. 3, Rep. Dave Zwonitzer (R-Cheyenne) was the only member of the Legislature whose form was not conveyed to WyoFile by Joe Rubino, chief policy officer and general counsel for the Wyoming Secretary of State’s Office.
Financial disclosure forms enable the public to monitor for potential conflicts of interest. They are required by a state statute specifying that legislators and the five statewide elected officials must list businesses in which they hold a 10% or greater interest. They also must disclose contracts with the state for services and supplies valued at more than $5,000.
Most representatives and senators don’t have much to report.
Reporting requirements for elected officials in Wyoming’s executive branch differ. Those officials — the governor, secretary of state, state treasurer, state auditor and state superintendent — file an additional code of ethics form disclosing items or services received in excess of $250. Those are due Feb. 15.
All forms are submitted to and cataloged by the Office of Wyoming Secretary of State. They’re not posted automatically online, but WyoFile acquires them annually with a records request and shares them with the public to review.
Newly elected Secretary of State Chuck Gray, like the other statewide elected officeholders, must submit his own forms, too. In Gray’s financial disclosure he claimed Mount Rushmore Broadcasting, Inc. as an employer for “a portion” of 2022 on his disclosure form. Gray’s father, Jan Charles Gray, is president and owner of the Delaware-based entity.
As WyoFile previously reported, the corporation was administratively dissolved by the state almost two decades ago for failing to pay its license fees to Wyoming and file annual reports to the office Gray now heads up. Foreign entities may not transact business in Wyoming without a certificate of authority, per state statute, and those that do business in the state without such authority can be liable for back taxes and legal penalties.
Under Wyoming statute, Mount Rushmore Broadcasting cannot be reinstated since it didn’t make right with the Wyoming Secretary of State’s Office during a probation period.
Gray declined to answer questions for this story, but emailed WyoFile a statement. In full, it reads:
“Just as they did during the campaign, Wyo[F]ile is once again doing the bidding of their socialist Democrat financial backers by falsely trying to link me to something that I had nothing to do with and that occurred when I was 3 years old,” Gray wrote. “Wyo[F]ile’s continued false statements about me are driven by their liberalism and their hatred for the conservative policies that I continue to stand for.”
Gray also noted in his response that he was forwarding the correspondence to his attorney.
The majority of WyoFile’s revenue comes in the form of voluntary donations from individual readers. A list of WyoFile’s institutional supporters and Publisher’s Circle donors (those donating $1,000 or more per year) can be found at the above links.
Below are financial disclosure forms and code of ethics forms received by the Wyoming Secretary of State’s Office as of Feb. 3. See something fishy? Missing? Send any tips to editor@wyofile.com.
House of Representatives
David Zwonitzer
Wyoming Senate
RJ Kost *
Executive offices
*Denotes former officeholders
It is stunning that this comment of trust to fully disclose information is a testament to the leadership elected. If this is a legal document why is this behavior allowed? Where are the qualified, committed, respectful of the law candidates? Is it legal to leave out information and what is the penalty?
The required form is itself a boilerplate joke, and if there is non-compliance to any information beyond the filer’s name and signature, there is no consequence. There should be line-item disclosure of any interest and amount whether it be business, stock portfolio, family financial connection with state and/or private entity having business before the State of Wyoming, or all of the above. A bone to pick, also, with the penmanship scrawl many used instead of filing the form using, what I would assume was furnished, an electronic PDF platform.
I reviewed a great many of these required financial dislcosure forms. The overwhelming lot of them were left blank , merely signed a dated. Very few officials actually complied with the letter or even the spirt of it. Especially the red shifted Freedom Caucus types. It reaked of defiance ; a ” None Of Your Business” one finger salute.
Kudos to the (very) few Legislators who actually filled out their form honestly , such as Liz Storer of Teton County. But for every one of her, there were ten who simply blew it off.
The old adage fits: ” There are no Conflicts of Interest in Wyoming government, only an interest in conflict” .
SOS Gray’s form is about what I was expecting to see from him. Submissions from interim SOS Allred and outgoing SOS Buchanan are also disturbing to me for some other reasons: Mr. Allred simply signed and dated a blank form (again pretty much a testament to this particular individual’s regard for the institution of the Office of the Secretary of State). Mr. Buchanan submitted the legibly handwritten document that you would expect to see from a someone who’s job it is to be the designated collector, certifier, and curator of such scraps of scrawls and scribbles. However, if you look closely at that careful penmanship and then compare it to the date and signature provided by the actual hand of Mr.Buchanan it becomes evident that this solemn duty was farmed out to a more qualified individual, and that he put about as much thought and effort into pencilwhipping the exercise as the rest of them. It would be refreshing to see the SOS set a better example, and to see the rest of the elect(ed) feel just the slightest twinge of embarrassment when they fail to follow suit…
We are actually pretty fortunate to be represented by a citizen legislature and not the spit polished professional politicial elite that some states are saddled with. These people live their lives and make their livings and try to serve their constituents as best as they can. They definitely deserve our thanks as well as our scrutiny. When they fail to maintain public-personal balance though, it is our civic responsibility to help them regain it. That said, it is my opinion that Senator Driskill’s vote (while sitting as a.member of the Select Water Committee) to green light the Newcastle Madison Well Project ( currently under construction) while also belonging to the Horton Family Partnership (an entity that will gain substantial benefit from its completion) is an inexcusable conflict of interest. The following links are documents of public record that I believe illustrate the point. https://wyoleg.gov/InterimCommittee/2015/SWCMin0604.pdf
http://library.wrds.uwyo.edu/wwdcrept/Newcastle/Newcastle-Madison_Well_Level_II_Project-Final_Report-2017.html
(This is a rather lengthy read……. please reference Alternative #2 on page 55)
Thumb on the scale? Fingers in the pie? I would like some answers. Thank you WYOFILE for providing this platform for civil discourse, transparency, and good governance.
Wait a minute. Tim French, SD18, the quintessential Wyoming rugged individualist that demands other to not accept gubbbermint handout and payouts, but in turn has received hundreds of thousands of $$$ from the Feds and gimmies from the Wyoming Dept of Ag & U of W to operate his heavily subsidized farming operation, yet claims $00.00 on this disclosure form???
“trying to link me to something that I had nothing to do with and that occurred when I was 3 years old” And is still apparently occurring today.
Classic fox in charge of the hen house. Gray is now in the office that should be collecting fees from his dad’s business. Or did I miss something?
I continue to look for something to admire or respect about Chuck Gray. Still looking……..
Chuck Gray never misses an opportunity to show that he is both thin-skinned and a one-man ideological freak show.
What happened on voting on the limit of train length??
looks like serving in the legislature & executive branch doesn’t have a lot of financial reward.
lucky most have a job outside of government.
some legislators are even retired !
It’s a matter of public record that chuckie and his main financial backer (dear old dad) aren’t compliant with the secretary of states office. It’s not a conspiracy…
How did you people vote for this clown?
Good question: Why would any reasonable adult vote for Chuckie Gray?
Excellent point. He is the one who listed the illegally operated company as his employer.
What’s the saying? You couldn’t make this up…….
And I pointed this out frequently during many of his election runs and especially this one. He is a fraud.