The Wyoming Military Department is planning to temporarily trim the hours of more than 430 employees due to federal budget cuts. The furloughs would begin at the end of April and extend until the end of September. Colonel Tammy Maas says the reduction in hours will impact their day to day operations, but shouldn’t impact necessary missions.
“Make it difficult to get all of
our work done in a 32 hour week. However it will not affect our operational readiness. We will maintain our readiness in case the governor calls us or if we are called out for a federal mission. We will make that our first priority.”
But Colonel Maas adds that it will be a financial hit to a large number of employees who work at the Joint Forces Readiness Center in Cheyenne and the Wyoming Air National Guard.
“It is very frustrating, again I stated it equates to 20 percent of their income. So some of our lower graded individuals and we have a number of people where both husband and wife work for our agency, this is very frustrating because it causes them a significant financial impact.”
Colonel Maas says some of them might decide to look for other work. She says a number of community-support functions, including use of armories, may also be stopped or reduced.