People don’t want change. Housing costs are too high. Mayors are anti-development.
These were top complaints that Gov. Mark Gordon fielded from a room of entrepreneurs during a two-day conference in Jackson’s SpringHill Suites on April 14. He touted progress in nuclear power and data center development while acknowledging the state is losing companies and other opportunities.
“We’re really struggling right now,” he said.
The outgoing governor would like the Cowboy State to be a wealth-generating state. That’s as opposed to a wealth-preservation state, where the wealthy park their money, without feeling the need to donate to social goods like the state university, he said.
“That sort of entrepreneurial spirit is going to die if all you care about is making sure you don’t pay for services, you don’t pay taxes,” he said.
Gordon’s remarks came months after a contentious budget season where state lawmakers threatened to cut millions from the University of Wyoming and effectively dismantle the Wyoming Business Council, which organized the Jackson summit. Lawmakers eventually restored the budget that more closely mirrored Gordon’s proposal.
Council CEO Josh Dorrell told KHOL his organization is still doing damage control, hoping to convince the public and lawmakers that the money they funnel to businesses is warranted. He was encouraged that nearly 70 people signed up for the venture capital summit — double what the event drew in 2025, its second year.
“I bet in other states the governor doesn’t come and make face time with a small audience to understand their problems,” Dorrell said. “That close connection is really important because we can change policy and make investments quicker.”
After Gordon concluded his prepared remarks, he fielded questions from the room that echoed familiar frustrations.
Housing costs make it challenging for Lexy Borstelmann, a co-founder of Pirate Ship, a Jackson-based software-driven shipping company, to hire and retain employees.
Once companies reach a certain degree of success, they leave Wyoming for Colorado or neighboring states, another attendee said. Or if they want capital fast, they go to Silicon Valley and never look back.
One of the youngest attendees suggested the state is stubborn and doesn’t like change.
To that point, Gordon went on a tangent about gas fireplaces, suggesting that people “don’t want to feel guilty about running that gas all night long.”
At the same time, he said, “we also don’t want to have a lot of carbon dioxide going into the atmosphere because we love skiing.”
“Maybe those two are connected,” he said, seeming to reference competing arguments he hears across the Cowboy State. The recent legislative session also saw the approval of a new $105 million energy dominance fund to develop oil and gas projects in the state at the exclusion of green energy alternatives.
Gordon said the state needs reliable electric generation even “when the wind is not blowing.”
The governor also touted progress with Meta, Microsoft and Amazon on data centers. All three sent representatives to Jackson earlier this month for an event Gordon opened alongside top federal regulators. But he said water and electric rates remain a bottleneck.
Wyoming should build a regulatory structure that “empowers” data center developers to tap into any energy source of their choosing while also protecting rate payers, Gordon said. “Let’s embrace that future.”
Before he wrapped up, the governor heard one more gripe from Bryce True, a partner at the Casper-based developer Brick & Bond. He said that city inspectors and mayors across the state are killing residential and commercial projects “before we even have an opportunity to bid.”
Gordon’s suggestion? Resolve that issue at the ballot box.
“They don’t respond to me,” Gordon said of Wyoming’s mayors, adding: “I know that’s not quite the answer you’re looking for.”
The outgoing governor had similar advice for his replacement. He declined to endorse a gubernatorial candidate but told KHOL all of them should be thinking about how to support Wyoming’s business community.
“It’s a conversation that all the potential governor candidates ought to speak up to,” he said.
The governor acknowledged that it’s hard to make certain businesses work in the Cowboy State.
Making it easier to do business here might mean pushing through the stubbornness the one attendee highlighted, but “it doesn’t mean we’re going to be overcrowded. It doesn’t mean we are going to turn into some crazy place that we don’t ever want to live,” Gordon said.
“It means that we can control our future. If you’re not growing, you’re dying and we need to figure out how to grow.”
