WyoFile Feature

Death of Bin Laden Good News for Military Families of Wyoming, Mountain West

Many residents across Wyoming were no doubt rejoicing along with the rest of the country late Sunday night, as news spread of the successful effort by U.S. forces to kill Osama bin Laden, who approved the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

But Wyoming and other Mountain West states with a high percentage of rural communities are perhaps cheering a little louder, and not without good reason.

According to U.S. Census data and studies conducted by numerous groups with wide-ranging political leanings, rural America has provided a disproportionate number of military recruits since the attacks of 9/11.

In the nation’s least populous state, that outsize contribution may be felt even more acutely, as almost any resident in one of Wyoming’s close-knit, small communities is likely to personally know someone who has served. Therrel “Shane” Childers, a 30-year-old U.S. Marine from Powell, was the first American killed in the war in Iraq.

WyoFile Profile

Spending the Lord’s Money in Wyoming: How Foster Friess Decides Who Gets What

It was one of those Jackson Hole parties that you sometimes hear about, the kind that make Wyomingites who live outside the valley groan at the excess — or green with envy.

Foster Friess and his wife, Lynn, celebrated their 70th birthdays last July with four days of dinners, receptions and activities for 200 friends. All expenses were covered by the Friesses, and the weekend culminated with a dinner party at the Four Seasons Hotel in Teton Village, where the men dressed up in tuxedo jackets, bolo ties and cowboy boots.

Any bash organized by Foster Friess, one of Wyoming’s richest residents and most idiosyncratic philanthropists, has to feature a surprise, and this was one was a doozy.

In the invitations to the party, Friess, a born-again Christian, had asked the guests to identify their favorite charity that reflected the values of his favorite quote from Galatians: “Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.”

He vowed to give $70,000 to the most worthy nominee.

WYOFILE FEATURE

Montana Officials ‘Take Step Back’ to Review Chief Joe Gold Transport Plan

Montana officials have pledged to “take a step back” and re-evaluate a plan to haul tens of thousands of tons of contaminated mine tailings next summer from Cooke City, Mont., over the Chief Joseph Scenic Highway, one of Park County’s steepest and most serpentine highways.

Richard Opper, director of the Montana Department of Environmental Quality, apologized Tuesday to dozens of Wyoming residents who raised concerns about expected heavy truck traffic, and who said they had felt shut out during earlier project planning.

Opper said he understood why Park County residents might “feel like this project got sprung on you, and I would feel exactly the same way if I was in your position.”

The $24 million cleanup project connects several disparate policy issues, including government transparency, public involvement, environmental laws and highway regulations. It has developed amid a history of sometimes fractious interstate relations and a legacy of failed mining operations in the region.

NEW WEST FEATURES

A Bitter Election Do-Over Highlights the Divisions in a Wyoming Town

Over the first week of November, the tiny mind-your-own-business-and-I’ll-mind mine town of Elk Mountain was pushed into the state spotlight after coming to a tie in the mayoral elections. The community of fewer than 200 residents became a political hotbed overnight with 51 votes for the incumbent mayor, Rick Christopherson, and 51 votes for the challenger, Morgan Irene. (Two write-in candidates also received a few votes.)

In Wyoming, the only way to settle such an outcome is to draw lots – literally, to flip a coin or pull a name out of a hat to determine the next in power.

However, upon re-examining the ballots, the county clerk found one voter did not live within the town boundaries and therefore could not vote for mayor. So the whole election was declared void, and voters are being sent back to the polls on Tuesday, Nov. 23.

From WyoFile

Opposition to Damming the Green River Remains Strong

The dual pressures of climate change and ever-increasing demand for water has brought a new sense of urgency to a decades-old idea: damming the Green River just upstream of the Warren Bridge in Sublette County, Wyoming, close to its glacial source.

But the idea still faces decades-old challenges. Studies by the Wyoming Water Development Office staff indicate that the cost of the project – which includes new and improved canal systems over difficult terrain – outweigh the economic benefits for the irrigators.

It is this analysis, according to the agency, that makes it highly unlikely the dam and irrigation proposal would meet the “purpose and need” criteria under the federal Clean Water Act.

“Building a reservoir is a wonderful thing. … We need storage, we need customers, but we don’t need this project,” Wyoming Water Development Commission Director Mike Purcell said last week during a joint meeting of the commission and Select Water Committee in Casper.

WyoFile Feature

Costs Mounting as Wyoming County Continues to Fight Decision Backing Tribes

The bill for the five-year-old Fremont County federal voting rights lawsuit now stands at about $1 million, depending on how much U.S. District Judge Alan Johnson awards ACLU and other plaintiffs’ attorneys in the case. And it’s not over yet.

The Fremont County Board of Commissioners lost the heart of the case last April when Judge Johnson found persistent, endemic discrimination against Native Americans on the Wind River Reservation. But the board has decided to appeal a narrower issue—the judge’s rejection of the county’s proposed plans to redress voting rights violations under the at-large election format.

Judge Johnson dismissed the county proposals, one of which would have created a “Native American super-majority district” while electing the remaining four members at-large, as having been “crafted in such a manner that they preserve the racial separation of the county.”

If the county loses again, the appeal could add thousands of dollars to the mounting bill.

New West Analysis

Wyoming Elections Looking Red, But More Nuanced Than You Might Think

First, let’s look at the Congressional race pitting first-term Republican Rep. Cynthia Lummis against Democratic newcomer David Wendt.

Although Democratic challenger Gary Trauner came within a thousand votes of unseating Republican Rep. Barbara Cubin in 2006, Trauner was not able to run a similarly close race against Lummis in 2008 for one simple reason: Lummis is not Cubin.

Cubin had eked out the narrowest of her wins in 2004, even losing three counties. And in the runup to 2006, a certain degree of Bush/Cheney fatigue was setting in in the Cowboy State – even more so for the absentee Cubin who, when she did bother to show up in Congress, garnered negative press with non-PC statements. Trauner took advantage of all that with an aggressive, door-to-door statewide campaign and almost beat Cubin.

At the very least, that close call was likely a factor in Cubin’s decision to not run for re-election in 2008.

GUEST COMMENTARY

Why the Baucus/Tester Wolf Delisting Bill is the Better Choice

The political wrangling over wolves since the latest relisting in August is now in full force. It’s unfortunate that we’ve arrived at a place where the only solution that most Montanans see regarding wolves is political in nature.

Looking back over 100 years of wildlife conservation in the state of Montana, political solutions have rarely helped wildlife. In the past, hunter-conservationists struggled mightily to remove political influence from wildlife management, and we were largely successful. The management scenario that was developed, known as the North American Fish and Wildlife Conservation Model, has resulted in the largest rebound in wildlife populations around the globe. This is the model that would be applied to wolves if we could get to a sustainable delisting, and get beyond the pettifogging and the political grandstanding. But for now, we’re at a stalemate. This stalemate has led to congressional efforts to delist wolves: 

TIME TO MOVE ON

NRA Still Getting it Right, Except on Tester

Here’s something that isn’t news to anybody. The number of guns Americans own has skyrocketed, but how is this significant?

An incredible--and later proven unfounded--paranoia swept the country starting back in 2008 when it started to look like a perceived anti-gunner, Barack Obama, might become Commander-in-Chief. The rest of the economy tanked, but thanks to Obama, the gun industry flourished and had its best three-year run ever. Firearms manufacturers worked three shifts per day and still couldn’t make enough guns, especially handguns, to meet demand. Not only has the number of handguns owned by private citizens at least doubled, to more than 100 million handguns, about one handgun for every two adults, but sales of long guns and shotguns has also soared. Americans now own at least 250 million guns, more than one per adult, including at least 20 million firearms gun control advocates might call “assault weapons.” The number of privately owned firearms continues to go up by at least 4 million per year, and interestingly, many new handgun buyers are women.