2025 Wyoming Legislature

Week #7 Feb. 24, 2025

LWVWY Lobbyist Marguerite Herman

marguerite.herman@gmail.com, 307-630-8095

  • We begin the seventh week of the 2025 Wyoming Legislature with two major deadlines: bills must be out of committee on Thursday and pass initial floor debate in Committee of the Whole on Friday. House and Senate leadership exercise control over what stays alive by controlling that list of bills considered on Friday.
  • Legislative rules require lawmakers to consider each bill individually and on its own merits, but those considerations typically get political at this stage of a session, as bills must be culled at each deadline. Most of the election restriction bills are still alive.
  • Check the LWVWY bill tracker for 2025 elections-related proposals and our positions. Go to the Legislative Service Office (LSO) bill page and use the “Active Bills” filter for bills that are alive, and check the bill Digest for all the votes and current status.  In the top right corner of a bill that has passed the first house with amendments, you will find the word “ENGROSSED.”   The engrossed version is printed on blue or green paper.
  • Another deadline results from the desire to get bills to the governor in time to override possible vetoes before adjournment March 6.
  • Working in the background are House and Senate members who want to reach compromises on two bills vital to the Republican leadership this session: the supplemental budget bills (HB1 and SF1) and the property tax bill, SF69. Both budget bills are in joint conference committees (JCC) for compromise work.
  • The LSO legislative meeting schedule shows no JCC meetings posted for either. If they are working on these important budget and tax cut bills, they aren’t doing it in public. The Legislature is exempt from the state public meetings law, though legislators usually do a better job at transparency and having these important discussions in public. Rep. J.T. Larson of Rock Springs said during House debate on SF69 it seemed half the members were favored with advance notice of amendment ideas.
  • SF69 Homeowner property tax exemption is a significant tax cut with potentially devastating consequences for education and local government funding, but 35 House amendments left senators confused about the extent of cuts and revenue “backfills.”
  • They rejected concurrence with House action 6-25, and the bill is in JCC with Sens. Salazar, Gierau and McKeown and Reps. Locke, Heiner and Knapp. In all JCC talks, legislators must defend their own chambers’ votes for the first round of negotiations.
  • Fiscal accountability also came up in Senate debate of HB33, about redirecting $70 million a year in vehicle sales and use taxes from the General Fund to the Highway Fund. Tax cuts this year rely on slashing services or making up the difference from the General Fund or the Legislative Savings Reserve Account (LSRA). Sen. Larry Hicks of Baggs warned, “You’re driving this thing off the cliff,” by spending down those two sources to finance favorite causes.
  • Public school funding is another item that will draw on LSRA to meet constitutional obligations, if the proposed property tax cut goes through.
  • Meanwhile, HB316 School finance-model recalibration is on second reading in the Senate Monday, after the Senate removed virtual schools and charter schools from the (re)calibration study. State-authorized charter schools are a big cause for education funding increases, yet the state lacks a cost-based funding model that accounts for their administrative costs.

Five bills to restrict voters and elections are in Senate Committee of the Whole Monday:

HB131 Ballot drop boxes prohibited

A committee amendment would let clerks use an external slot to access a secure indoor box.

HB154 False voting amendments

Can’t vote twice in a Wyoming election OR in Wyoming and another state in a federal election

HB156 Proof of residency-registration qualifications

Adds requirement to prove citizenship and state residence for 30 days before an election

HB238 Ballot harvesting prohibition

Lists few who can deliver an absentee ballot for someone (WY has no “harvesting” problem)

HB173 Independent candidate requirements

Increases petition signatures required and moves deadline to 2 ½ months before the Primary.

In the House, SF98 to list party affiliation on a nonpartisan school trustee ballot is on second reading. It’s amended to let people to be listed as unaffiliated. Consequently, the amendment removed the three-month lookback sought by the Secretary of State.

SF190 Election transparency omnibus bill is in House Corporations.

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