Wyoming lawmakers give young people more reasons to leave

The Wyoming Legislature convenes on Feb. 9

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When my family moved to Wyoming in 1969, folks told me most young people were destined to leave this rural state. Self-deportation was often chalked up to wanderlust, but many of my friends bolted because of the lack of job opportunities after high school and college.

I’ve watched generations of state lawmakers tearfully lament the loss of our “best and brightest” and “our future,” yet they never find ways to stem the tide. Many don’t even try. Our current crop of legislative leaders in Cheyenne — many who came from out of state — seem hell-bent on finding new ways to make Wyoming a less attractive place to live and raise a family.

What other conclusion should we reach after the Joint Appropriations Committee last week turned in a budget that punishes both higher education and efforts to recruit and retain businesses? It was loonier than any Mad Hatter’s tea party.

I can’t imagine that most Wyomingites agree with the committee’s short-sighted goal to cut budgets at all costs. A state can be fiscally conservative without making the kind of reckless, nonsensical moves that’s become our Legislature’s trademark.

There are many reasons to be proud of the University of Wyoming, which has developed a unique culture over the past 140 years as the state’s only public four-year university. But the Legislature’s budget cuts to UW show a pattern of punishing the institution for its failure to conform to lawmakers’ values.

In recent years, some lawmakers have focused on gutting the UW Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, shutting down gender studies programs and ensuring that students can’t get a state-funded abortion. They spent more time debating those issues than funding academic programs.

Last week, the Joint Appropriations Committee gave us a downright chilling preview of UW’s future. Put on a coat and take a look:

The panel slashed $40 million from UW’s block grant without even bothering to make a case for why the drastic cut was necessary. It made $21 million in other cuts to targeted programs, for a total budget reduction of nearly 13%.

Among the casualties: 

• Wyoming Public Media, which saw all of its $1.69 million allocation for public radio removed from UW’s block grant.
• The athletic department’s $6 million request aimed at  better compensating student athletes for their name, image and likeness, commonly known as NIL, which was made necessary by a landmark NCAA settlement in 2025.
• A $285,783 request to hire a physician assistant at UW’s family medical residency program in Casper. 
• The denial of $450,000 from UW’s $4.5 million request for its critical minerals institute.

Adding insult to injury, the committee also nixed UW’s request for $12.5 million to obtain matching donations or grants that potentially could have made up some of these losses.

The cuts to Wyoming Public Media and the athletics department are particularly egregious decisions that strike at the heart of what unites the people of Wyoming. Rep. Ken Pendergraft, R-Sheridan, a far-right Freedom Caucus member who also brought the $40 million block grant reduction to the committee, made both motions.

Wyoming Public Media ramped up its fundraising efforts to deal with a $500,000 cut after Congress defunded the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. But if it stands, this state cut would result in eight employees losing their jobs and reduce the news reporting and local programs the station provides its statewide audience.

The athletic budget cut has sparked renewed speculation that UW might leave the NCAA’s Division 1 for inferior but less costly competition. UW sports boosters have weathered such calls from within the university and the Legislature for years, but the inability to raise NIL budgets without state assistance could be the tipping point. 

If it happens, UW’s fan base will never recover, and many donors to athletic and academic programs will disappear. Playing colleges in Montana and South Dakota can’t remotely match fans’ excitement when UW is in a football bowl game or national basketball tournament with top-notch competition.

The budget-cutters have already given Wyoming’s young adults more reasons to shun UW and look at universities beyond our borders. What about the Legislature’s failure to deliver on calls for economic diversification and higher-paying jobs?

Sen. Dan Laursen, R-Powell, led the effort to dismantle the Wyoming Business Council, proposing to reassign some of its work to agencies that haven’t even been notified and completely shut down programs like Main Street and the Small Business Investment Credit.

Why? Let’s hear Pendergraft’s explanation.

“The concept, the underlying idea behind this, is to get government out of the way and allow businesses to find their own way and work for themselves, to survive on their own,” Pendergraft said.

I agree that parts of government should get out of the way, specifically legislators who don’t believe that government should have anything to do with how the state can assist businesses and grow the economy by adding jobs and infrastructure that help communities thrive. 

Yes, if businesses somehow do find a reason to come to Wyoming, I guess they can just fend for themselves. Why care if they survive?

Randall Luthi, Gov. Mark Gordon’s policy director and a former GOP speaker of the House, had an appropriate response to the committee’s work: “This is nuts. This is crazy.”

Sen. Ogden Driskill, R-Devils Tower, former Senate president, told his colleagues that if Wyoming wants a tax base it must want businesses to come here.

“We’re doing just the opposite,” Driskill said. “We’ve openly come out and said we’re anti-wind, anti-solar, anti-carbon capture, anti-this, anti-that. Name me, around this table, what you’re for — and how do you want taxes paid in Wyoming?”

When I was a kid, I planned to leave Wyoming as soon as I could. I don’t regret my decision to stay because I grew to love this state. It’s been a good home.

But as a senior, I look at how lawmakers punish the university, push to decimate the Business Council and do virtually nothing to solve monumental problems like lack of access to quality health care and our unaffordable housing statewide, and I can’t honestly say I’d recommend my decision to any young person today.

What I would say to them is, “Will you please stay and run for the Legislature and get these dangerous people out of office before they do more damage?” Because that’s really our best hope.