A surge in oil prices has led to the best revenue report for Wyoming in a few years. The Consensus Revenue Estimating Group (CREG) is calling for Wyoming's general fund to see an increase of roughly $212 million in the next fiscal year and other sources of revenue are also expected to increase.
It's the second straight year Wyoming has seen a positive revenue forecast. CREG Co-chairman Bill Mai said natural gas will see a slight increase in production, while coal should see a slight decrease. But oil is expected to have a major impact on state revenues.
"In terms of sales and use tax, in terms of severance tax, ad valorem taxes and federal mineral royalties, just that price increase and the increased production that it drives, it's really pretty amazing how quickly it will drive up your revenues."
Investment income is also expected to do well.
Mai added that while things look much improved, lawmakers still have some funding challenges in areas such as education.
"In my opinion long term K-12 still has a revenue versus expenditures kind of problem. And obviously, there's some additional revenues in this report that weren't available to the legislature for budgeting purposes back in February and March, so that might be seen as a source."
The CREG report notes that revenues are much improved, but they are not expected to return to the levels of the last decade.
