Landowners east of Cheyenne say a major oil and gas firm is developing a monopoly in their county, and they have asked state regulators to put a stop to it by denying thousands of permits to drill proposed by Anadarko Petroleum. Anadarko tried to have the protests dismissed by the Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Read More…

LARAMIE, Wyo – Wyoming’s stature among energy-producing states in the U.S. is a lofty one, and a new course within the University of Wyoming’s Summer High School Institute (HSI) will help students understand why that is important. Tawfik Elshehabi, a UW Department of Petroleum Engineering associate lecturer, will present “Wyoming Energy 4 You” during the Read More…

North Dakota State Investment Board, Bismarck, posted a net return of 17.1% for its $5.7 billion pension trust for the year ended Dec. 31. The return exceeded its performance benchmark by more than 1 percentage point, said David Hunter, executive director and chief investment officer of the North Dakota Retirement and Investment Office, in an Read More…

A Casper-based energy company has no more hurdles to clear before exploring 8 square miles of the Wyoming Range’s Cottonwood Creek area for deposits of oil and gas. The project, known as the “Lander Peak proposal,” has cleared the Bridger-Teton National Forest’s approval process, which means pipeline and road construction and drilling could begin as Read More…

A national analysis says the cost to provide workers’ compensation coverage in Montana is going down, which could mean businesses around the state will have to pay less in insurance premiums. “We fully anticipate that there will be across-the-board reductions in the premiums charged to our businesses, which obviously is always a really good thing,” Read More…

Two North Dakota natives are on their quest to become the second and third Olympic gold medalists born in the state. Monique Lamoureux-Morando and her twin sister, Jocelyne Lamoureux-Davidson, were born in Grand Forks in 1989. The sisters became stand-out hockey players for University of North Dakota. The Lamoureux twins were members of the U.S. Read More…

The former LaMoure police chief, James Watson, was found guilty Monday of continuous sexual abuse of a child under the age of 15 at a courthouse in Beach, N.D. Early in the morning, Watson testified on his behalf and denied all the allegations. In her closing remarks, Golden Valley County State’s Attorney Christina Wenko argued Read More…

CHEYENNE – Canadian blockchain company BlockCrushr Labs opened its first Wyoming office last week in Cheyenne, arriving before the state Legislature considers changes that would encourage more such businesses to operate in the state. BlockCrushr Labs CEO Scott Burke announced another corporate branch housed on Cheyenne’s Second Floor at The Paramount on Wednesday. Company leaders Read More…

CODY, Wyo. – Cody’s City Council Tuesday night voted to continue its culling program, and kill another 50 deer inside the city limits. That according to Big Horn Radio Network News Director Wendy Corr. Corr said police will bait, and shoot the deer by February 15th. The city obtained permits from Wyoming’s Game and Fish Read More…

Alcohol-related crashes appear to have dropped on Wyoming highways in 2017 compared to years prior, but by how much is not yet clear. Preliminary data from the Wyoming Highway Patrol indicates that the number of alcohol-related crashes in the state dropped by 24 percent, from 712 in 2016 to 542 last year. That number is Read More…

LARAMIE – As the fall semester wound down, University of Wyoming students taking Computer Science 2030 found themselves facing each other to explain the success or failures of creating an essential data structure used in artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, cryptocurrency and electronic voting. Pretty heady stuff for freshmen and sophomores, many of whom were unfamiliar with Read More…

Attorneys representing several members of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa have filed a new complaint challenging North Dakota’s latest voter ID law. The amended complaint, filed Dec. 13, asks a federal judge to declare House Bill 1369 unconstitutional and prevent it from being implemented, arguing that it violates the national Voting Rights Act. The Read More…

Thirty four people died on the job in Wyoming in 2016, the same as the year before. The workers were a cross section of the most well-known careers in the Cowboy State, from truck drivers and coal miners to agricultural workers and oilmen, according to a workplace fatalities report released Thursday by the Wyoming Department Read More…

CODY, Wyo. – West Park Hospital is adding a new name, to reflect it’s network in Northwest Wyoming. The hospital and its clinics will not be called Cody Regional Health. CEO Doug McMillan said expansion over the past 15 years has made West Park more than a hospital. He said the organization now includes Spirit Read More…

Brooke Lynn Crews has pleaded guilty to the murder of Savanna LaFontaine-Greywind. Crews pleaded guilty in Cass County court Monday to charges of conspiracy to commit murder, conspiracy to commit kidnapping, and providing false information to police. Crews is one of two defendants accused of killing 22-year-old LaFontaine-Greywind and abducting her newborn daughter in August. Read More…

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — Fewer North Dakotans are reporting seven-figure incomes due to a prolonged slump in agriculture and energy prices, the state’s tax commissioner says. Figures released to The Associated Press show 686 people reported incomes of more than $1 million on their 2016 individual tax returns, a drop of nearly 40 percent from Read More…

CHEYENNE, Wy.(KGWN)- The Wyoming Business Council has officially launched Grown in Wyoming, a program designed to open new markets for Wyoming farmers and ranchers and expand local food options for consumers. Grown in Wyoming promotes all types of agriculture, food and fiber raised and produced in the state. The program connects farmers and ranchers with Read More…

CHEYENNE – Wyoming’s latest revenue forecast is better than it’s been in the last two years, but there’s still a long way to go before the state returns to levels preceding the latest economic downturn. The Consensus Revenue Estimating Group, or CREG, puts out reports in October and January each year so Wyoming policymakers have Read More…

BISMARCK, N.D. – The Burke County Sheriff’s Office logged a high-profile arrest. Singer Melissa Etheridge was charged with possession of a controlled substance after her tour bus was searched while attempting to enter the United States from Canada at the Port of Entry. Burke County authorities said they were conducting K9 searches at the Port of Entry when Read More…

CHEYENNE – Native Americans in Wyoming soon will receive more recognition in statewide K-12 education. During the 2017 session, the Legislature passed Enrolled Act 119, which requires the Wyoming Department of Education and State Board of Education to update the state’s social studies standards to include Native American history, cultural heritage and contemporary contributions. READ Read More…

It was a windy week in Casper, appropriate given the number of wind stories that ended up in the paper since last Monday. Each came from the same conference, a two-day forum about wind development at the University of Wyoming. It’d be overkill to lay out each of the topics from that conference for a newsletter. In Read More…

MINNEAPOLIS — Xcel Energy has proposed splitting its utility operations in North Dakota and Minnesota, telling regulators that widening policy differences between the two states over clean energy have caused stresses that might best be resolved through a breakup. But a consultant for the North Dakota Public Service Commission is arguing against the separation, saying Read More…

The Albany County Genealogical Society is helping people who have taken a DNA test learn more about their family histories and use the test results to find family members they have been separated from, Genealogical Society President Dicksie May said. “Some of the people I have been involved with recently (were trying to find their) Read More…

RAWLINS — The Bureau of Land Management office in Rawlins decided to curb the number of wild horses at the Red Desert Complex. The BLM faced lawsuits from Sweetwater County ranchers and the state of Wyoming in opposition to the decision made by the BLM. The state of Wyoming filed suit against the BLM, claiming Read More…

The U.S. Small Business Administration awarded $18 million in funding to 44 State international trade agencies through SBA’s competitive State Trade Expansion Program (STEP), to support export growth among U.S. small businesses.  The Wyoming Business Council was awarded $221,431 to assist small businesses in Wyoming expand their market through exporting. STEP is designed to increase Read More…

LARAMIE – Wyoming entrepreneurs can “WIN” access to capital financing through a new a new state program using crowdfunding opportunities, Secretary of State Ed Murray told those attending the Wyoming Working Together Conference on Friday. Murray outlined the Wyoming Invests Now (WIN) program for members of the Wyoming Economic Development Association (WEDA) and the Wyoming Read More…

It didn’t take long for a company founded by a UW graduate student in 2011 to grow big enough to have an international reach and reputation. Bright Agrotech’s six-year growth surge was capped off this week by being featured in a cover story for Bloomberg Businessweek. Bright Agrotech and its founder, Nate Storey have been Read More…

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) – Cheyenne Regional Medical Center officials say the hospital has regained its standing with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services after losing its deemed status over a complaint. The hospital had an important federal certification taken away after the Wyoming Department of Health found problems with the way the hospital discharged Read More…

The University of Wyoming is on track to welcome its largest freshman class ever just months after sending off its largest-ever graduating class. The result will be overall enrollment numbers that look roughly the same as 2016’s, said Mary Aguayo, interim associate vice president for enrollment management. “We graduated out 5 percent more students than Read More…

Inc. Magazine has doubled the number of Wyoming companies in its list of the 5000 fastest growing companies in the United States. In 2016 the list included the telecom company Mammoth Networks of Gillette and Fund&Grow, a financial servies firm based in Cheyenne. This year, both companies appeared again, with Mammoth climbing 272 positions in Read More…

Wyoming Conservation Corps (WCC) members Chris Folsom and Lola Philips work on the Casper Rotary Club Park trail on Casper Mountain, one of the first WCC projects of this summer. (WCC Photo) Projects ranging from building trails in the Shoshone and Bridger-Teton national forests in northwest Wyoming to building a yurt at Glendo State Park Read More…

A couple of large data problems from the U.S. Department of Education recently came to the attention of U.S. Sen. Mike Enzi, R-Wyo. One of those errors uncovered billions of dollars in student loan costs, of which Congress was previously unaware. The other affects potential college students’ ability to make an informed decision about what Read More…

The Microsoft Data Center outside of Cheyenne is “by far the biggest customer on the grid,” Michelle Patron, Microsoft’s director of sustainability policy explained in a recent post on the Microsoft Green Blog. “We needed more energy and wanted to use wind power to satisfy our growing demand, but didn’t want the local utility or Read More…

Grizzly bears near Wyoming schools got national attention after Donald Trump’s Education Secretary nominee mentioned them in a Senate hearing. She suggested teachers in Wapiti, Wyoming, near Cody, may need guns to fend off bears. Donald Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, was asked in a Senate hearing Tuesday, “You can’t say today Read More…