When you think about how the state of Wyoming spends its money, where it all goes and why it goes where it goes, things can feel pretty abstract.
Those cash questions got real this month, when state lawmakers on the Joint Appropriations Committee (JAC) started holding public hearings on the governor’s proposed budget.
The budget is a big deal.
It’s a blueprint for state spending over the next two years. It’s also a barometer of which parts of government electeds care about, and which they’ll kick down the road.
The fates of thousands of state employees, scores of agencies and grants to local projects hang in the balance.
Editor’s Note: This conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.
Kamila Kudelska: How does the budget hearing process work?
Chris Clements: The governor sets the stage first. Every other year, he or she releases a [biennial] budget proposal that was crafted with input from agency leaders, attorneys and other “top dogs.”
Jordan Uplinger: The governor can either recommend agencies and programs be funded at the level their leadership asked for, below the level they asked for or above what they asked for. Since this upcoming legislative session is a budget session, funding decisions made this year will carry over to the next two years [2027-2028].
CC: After the governor does his thing, lawmakers on the JAC hold hearings at the Capitol. Agency heads make their funding pitches directly to lawmakers, and it might sound like a real snooze-fest.
But these discussions really reveal the health of the state’s bank accounts, where government is and isn’t living up to its promises to Wyomingites, and what its long-term goals are.
JU: Legislators will continue this process for one more week in January and then they’ll start marking up the budget as they see fit. Then it’s introduced in the House and Senate for the budget session in February.
KK: So that’s the nuts and bolts. Who’s on this committee?
JU: There are 12 members, seven from the House and five from the Senate. The Wyoming Freedom Caucus has a majority on the committee, between members and endorsees. That means the further-right caucus may have some leeway to determine how the first steps of this process shake out.
KK: Moving on to the highlights of the last two weeks, let’s take it day by day. Fill me in on what you’ve been watching and why, and what’s stuck out.
CC: Things got peppery on day one, Kamila, when Secretary of State Chuck Gray presented his office’s requests. Gray testified that Gov. Mark Gordon failed to adequately fund his office when he denied a $125,000 expenditure. That money was meant to advertise the 50% property tax reduction ballot initiative that will be on the 2026 ballot.
Chuck Gray: I’m going to make sure that this is done, and that’s going to include possible litigation against the governor’s office if we don’t have the process in place for us to do this. This is statutorily required.
CC: Gordon’s spokesperson said if Gray wanted more money, he should ask the JAC.
KK: Okay, so a dust-up between a moderate and a founding member of the [Freedom] caucus. What else?
CC: A few days later, the Wyoming Business Council went before the JAC. Council CEO Josh Dorrell faced scrutiny from Freedom Caucus lawmakers and senators like Sen. Tim Salazar (R-Riverton), who sounded skeptical of the state’s economic development agency.
Tim Salazar: The document that you gave us here that we've all gone through, slide after slide: ‘We are in a long-term decline. Jobs are stagnant. Wages are shrinking. Worst outmigration rate in this country.’ I guess my question is: Help me understand what the Wyoming Business Council has done over the years.
CC: Dorrell said the council has been trying to figure out how to better serve the state, and that doing so might require more investment. He said it’ll be harder to do that if lawmakers go with the governor’s recommendation, which was [roughly] half of what the council asked for.
KK: What about the health department’s request? They’re the largest agency in the state. How did they fare?
CC: Over the fall, Freedom Caucus member Rep. Ken Pendergraft (R-Sheridan) was trying to figure out how to find cuts in the state health department’s budget as part of a subcommittee under the JAC. Lawmakers have compared that panel’s goals to those of DOGE [U.S. Department of Government Efficiency]. Here’s a colloquy between Pendergraft and the agency director, Stefan Johansson, that I thought exemplified the dynamic between them fairly well.
Ken Pendergraft: Thank you, director [Stefan Johansson], for being here. It seems like we've almost become family.
Stefan Johansson: It does feel like we've become family. And as the old saying goes, you can choose your friends but not your family. And I bet that's felt both ways.
KK: Fascinating. Jordan, what about you?
JU: Broadly speaking, I’ve noticed a theme common across agencies and departments. Obviously, everyone wants a qualified worker for the job, but directors and administrators kept adding this caveat: Even if we get the qualified worker, it's hard to retain them. There's a few examples.
The director of the Office of Consumer Advocate, Anthony Ornelas, said he’s lost two attorneys in less than 24 months. One left due to the challenges of the role, the other one…
Anthony Ornelas: .... was recruited by a competing out of state law firm who works in utility litigation … So we are constantly competing with a variety of outside firms to retain this talent.
JU: That difficulty in retaining an attorney kind of starts to make sense when you hear Erin Williams with the Department of Administration and Information. Here she is talking about the state’s pay tables compared to the market average.
Erin Williams: Our nursing pay table numbers are still 21.2% behind … similar numbers for our attorney pay scale. We're 17.9% behind.
JU: And then there’s State Forester Kelly Norris comparing wildfire fighter benefits here to benefits in nearby states.
Kelly Norris: For hazard pay, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Alaska, Arizona – they all have hazard pay … We don't do hazard pay.
KK: I’ll note that Gordon and the University of Wyoming (UW) president also both said their priority was increasing employee wages. Since I mentioned UW, what are they asking for?
JU: The university asked for more than $2 million for a coal research project that’s looking for non-energy uses for Wyoming coal. That $2 million would go toward a project that’s already underway in Gillette. UW also asked for more money for athletics, research and education.
KK: Got it. And staying in education, what were the Department of Education’s asks?
JU: This one’s a little more difficult to nail down. That’s because there’s an elephant in the room: the ongoing recalibration process. Lawmakers will draft a separate bill this upcoming session reworking how Wyoming funds its public schools. The specifics of that individual bill will impact how funding is calculated in the state budget bill overall. So this means adjustments will be made to the department’s budget up to and into the legislative session in February.
KU: A lot to take in, and they’re really just getting started.
CC: Correct, the JAC will hear from more agencies next month, and then start altering the budget as they see fit.
JU: Before we go, I thought it was interesting [that] members of the Freedom Caucus have twice now worn red blazers to the budget hearings. They say it's to raise awareness that the state is heading into the red fiscally, and they'd like to bring spending back to pre-COVID levels. More moderate lawmakers, though, caution that cutting to the bone would bring about a budget crisis. It is a narrative and debate among lawmakers we’re sure to see more of in the upcoming budget session.
This reporting was made possible by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, supporting state government coverage in the state. Wyoming Public Media and Jackson Hole Community Radio are partnering to cover state issues both on air and online.
