Unintended Consequences

Purpose: AN ACT relating to medical assistance and services; authorizing payment for services rendered by a birthing center under the Wyoming Medical Assistance and Services Act; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: While the desire to support birthing centers as a practical, lower-intervention option for families is understandable and aligns with values many conservatives share around maternal health and parental choice, HB0004 still expanded Medicaid coverage by authorizing state payments for those services. It is difficult to reconcile consistent votes against other Medicaid measures—whether rate increases, eligibility expansions, or new service categories—with support for HB0004 simply because the particular benefit touches an issue we care about. Principle requires treating Medicaid the same way regardless of the sympathetic use case attached to it.

Medicaid remains a joint federal-state entitlement that has no foundation in the U.S. Constitution as a core responsibility of the national government. Every time Wyoming accepts additional federal Medicaid dollars, even for a narrowly tailored purpose like birthing-center services, we also invite further strings, reporting mandates, and federal constraints that erode local control.

True consistency means declining these incremental expansions across the board and focusing instead on private, charitable, or purely state-funded alternatives that do not deepen dependence on Washington’s purse and conditions. Sticking to that standard strengthens both conservative credibility and Wyoming’s long-term sovereignty.

Purpose: AN ACT relating to eminent domain; creating a landowner’s bill of rights brochure as specified; requiring notice of rights to landowners during the initial eminent domain process; imposing responsibility on any person attempting to exercise the power of eminent domain to provide these rights to the landowner; specifying applicability; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: HB0011 did not accomplish the intended goal of strengthening Wyoming property rights. It merely required any entity seeking to condemn land to hand the owner a glossy “Landowner’s Bill of Rights” brochure that restates rights landowners already possess under the Wyoming Eminent Domain Act and Constitution. Nothing in the bill raises the standard for “public interest and necessity,” tightens compensation rules, limits the scope of takings, or imposes new procedural hurdles that actually stop or slow a condemnation. It creates no new cause of action, no additional damages, and no substantive barrier. Landowners walk away with a piece of paper summarizing the status quo; the power to take their property remains exactly as broad and as easy to exercise as it was the day before the bill was introduced.

Worse, the brochure’s description of pre-condemnation entry actively misleads landowners about their right to refuse access. Item (v) states that persons seeking to survey or test “must provide written notice fifteen (15) days in advance of the entry pursuant to W.S. 1-26-506.” That phrasing implies the only requirement is notice and that entry then becomes automatic. Existing law is clearer and more protective: the condemnor must give the landowner fifteen days to grant written authorization; if the landowner refuses or obstructs, the condemnor’s only remaining option is to petition the district court under W.S. 1-26-507 for an order permitting entry. A landowner is under no obligation to open the gate without that court order. By omitting the authorization requirement and the necessity of judicial intervention, the bill’s own language undercuts the very property right it claims to highlight.

Finally, the bill’s repeated references to “a public entity or other person,” “a person with eminent domain authority,” and the statement that property “can only be condemned by a public entity or person authorized by law” treat private parties as co-equal players in the condemnation process. While Wyoming already permits certain private entities limited condemnation authority for ways of necessity, pipelines, and similar uses, HB 11 elevates and normalizes that private power by writing it into a so-called “bill of rights” as if it were an ordinary and unremarkable feature of the law. The practical effect is not to protect landowners from private takings but to paper over and further legitimize the expansion of who may force a sale of private land. In short, HB0011 changes nothing of substance, misstates a key protection, and softens the distinction between governmental and private eminent domain—exactly the opposite of genuine property-rights reform.

Purpose: AN ACT relating to the administration of government; allowing the Secretary of State to charge a fee to expedite filings of documents as specified; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: Although HB0016 specifies that expedited processing does not alter the legal priority of rights established by the filing date, it does allow applicants with greater financial resources to receive faster government action than those unable to afford the additional fee. It establishes a two tiered system of government service. Citizens with greater financial resources receive faster access to governmental action, while others must wait in the standard queue for the same statutory service. The government exists to serve all citizens equally, and timely administration should be based on efficiency and fairness, not the ability to purchase priority treatment. This risks creating a “pay-to-play” culture within government administration, where efficiency is purchased rather than improved for all users. This type of system risks undermining public confidence in the equal and impartial treatment within the administration of government. A more sustainable solution would focus on modernizing systems, improving operational efficiency, and reducing processing times across the board so every applicant receives prompt and equitable service without creating separate classes of access

Purpose: AN ACT relating to taxes on electricity production; amending the tax on the production of electricity from wind resources to include a tax on the production of electricity from solar and nuclear generating resources; making conforming amendments; repealing the existing tax on electricity produced from nuclear reactors; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequence: While HB0046 was intended to create greater uniformity in Wyoming’s taxation of electricity generation, it also expands the state’s production tax structure to additional forms of energy rather than simplifying or reducing the overall tax burden on energy. Establishing a more uniform tax system may appear equitable, but it also creates a precedent that emerging industries should be incorporated into existing tax structures rather than evaluating whether those existing taxes remain necessary at all. Over time, this approach can encourage the continued expansion of taxation on the entire energy sector  instead of broader tax reform, making Wyoming’s tax code more complex and increasing long-term government dependence on industry-specific revenue.

The public debate surrounding HB0046 illustrates another unintended consequence. Because the bill included changes to nuclear taxation, many voters interpreted it as a vote for or against nuclear energy. In reality, the legislation was a tax policy bill. When complex tax measures become intertwined with broader policy debates, there is a risk that legislators’ votes will be characterized as positions on energy development itself rather than on the tax structure governing that development. Clearer drafting and communication can help ensure future debates remain focused on the actual policy question before the Legislature.

Purpose: AN ACT relating to state forestry; creating the forest health grant program; specifying duties of the state forester; creating an account; requiring the attorney general to approve grants; requiring reports; creating an account; providing an appropriation; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: While HB0078 addresses the legitimate need to improve forest health and reduce wildfire risk, it also establishes a permanent grant program that may continue expanding long after its original purpose has been met. A more accountable approach would be to provide targeted, time-limited funding with sunset provisions, measurable performance standards, and periodic legislative review to ensure the program continues to serve its intended purpose without becoming a permanent expansion of government.

Dedicated accounts that do not automatically revert to legislative control weaken one of the Legislature’s most important oversight tools: the review process. They can also create ongoing expectations for future appropriations, additional staffing, and expanded program responsibilities.  Over time, grant programs often experience “mission creep,” with eligibility expanding beyond the Legislature’s original intent as administrative agencies exercise broad discretion over funding decisions. As the program grows, success may be measured by the amount of money awarded rather than measurable improvements in forest health or wildfire mitigation.

The bill also shifts significant implementation authority to the executive branch, reducing direct legislative involvement in determining how funds are prioritized and distributed. Authority that is typically next to impossible to regain. 

Purpose: AN ACT relating to administration of the government; providing duties for the Wyoming energy authority; providing for the establishment of industrial sovereign zones to encourage the production of value-added manufactured products using natural gas; authorizing a board of county commissioners to nominate an area as an industrial sovereign zone; providing for certification of value-added manufactured processes; providing for an expedited licensing and permit process; providing tax exemptions; making conforming amendments; providing appropriations; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequence: While HB0120 is intended to encourage value-added manufacturing and strengthen Wyoming’s energy economy, it also establishes a framework in which the government selects specific geographic areas and qualifying industries for preferential treatment. Over time, this approach could encourage additional industries and regions to seek their own special tax exemptions, expedited permitting, and regulatory advantages, leading to an increasingly complex system of industry-specific incentives rather than a level playing field. Instead of promoting broad-based economic growth, the state risks creating a precedent where success depends on qualifying for a legislatively created program rather than competing in a free market under uniform laws.

The bill also expands executive discretion by granting the Wyoming Energy Authority significant authority to determine which nominated areas become Industrial Sovereign Zones and which projects receive the associated benefits. As more decisions shift from generally applicable statutes to agency approval, legislative oversight is reduced and businesses may perceive that access to government incentives depends upon administrative discretion rather than uniform application of the law.

The structure of the bill may invite future constitutional challenges under Article 3, Section 27 of the Wyoming Constitution, which discourages special or local legislation where a general law can be made applicable. Rather than creating statewide eligibility standards available to every qualifying manufacturer, the bill ties significant tax and regulatory benefits to specially designated geographic zones. A broader, generally applicable incentive program could accomplish the same economic development goals while reducing concerns about unequal treatment, special legislation, and government favoritism in the marketplace.

Purpose: AN ACT relating to corporations, partnerships and associations; providing for administrative dissolution of or revocation of certificate of authority for corporations, limited liability companies and statutory foundations as specified; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: HB0125 would have authorized the Wyoming Secretary of State to administratively dissolve domestic corporations, limited liability companies, and statutory foundations—or revoke the certificate of authority of foreign ones—solely because a board member “has been convicted of or found civilly liable for any act that constitutes fraud against another person under the laws of the United States or the laws of this state.” The language imposes no requirement that the fraudulent conduct occur in the course of the entity’s business, involve corporate assets, or even be known to the other directors or officers. A board member’s entirely personal fraud—whether a private real-estate scam, a tax misrepresentation on a personal return, or a civil judgment arising from a private dispute—would therefore trigger the forced dissolution of an otherwise lawfully operating organization. That outcome treats the legal entity as an extension of one individual’s private moral failings rather than as a distinct legal person whose rights and obligations are separate from those of its directors.

Such collective punishment is fundamentally unfair. The stakeholders who own the entity, the employees whose livelihoods depend on its continued operation, and the customers and counterparties who deal with it in good faith bear no responsibility for a board member’s personal misconduct; yet they would lose the value of their property interests, their jobs, and the stability of contractual relationships through an administrative process that requires no showing of corporate wrongdoing. 

Property rights in the corporate form exist precisely to shield innocent investors and workers from the private liabilities of individuals; HB0125 would invert that protection, converting a director’s personal fraud into an existential threat to the entire enterprise. The measure therefore exceeds any legitimate interest in deterring organizational fraud and instead jeopardizes the economic security of people who have no connection whatsoever to the underlying offense.

Wyoming already has multiple statutes that address fraud committed by business entities or by their officers, directors, or agents in the course of the entity’s business or filings. These rightfully focus on entity-related misconduct rather than purely personal acts of a board member.

Purpose: AN ACT relating to health care providers; prohibiting state agencies and boards from discriminating against health care providers based on the providers’ speech and expressions; prohibiting state agencies and boards from contracting with or requiring health care providers to be licensed by specified boards and agencies; requiring health care providers to be notified of specified complaints; authorizing causes of action as specified; providing definitions; amending the Wyoming Governmental Claims Act; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: HB0143 addressed a legitimate problem. Health care providers have faced professional complaints, disciplinary threats, removal from public positions, and accusations of practicing below the standard of care for expressing views involving biological sex, pediatric gender-transition procedures, COVID policy, and other disputed medical and public-policy questions.

The bill nevertheless relied on an overly complicated statutory mechanism. It created new definitions, notice requirements, evidentiary burdens, civil actions, penalties, and governmental liability, but it did not clearly prevent agencies from reclassifying protected speech as professional conduct, patient harm, discrimination, or a violation of the standard of care. A provider could still endure an investigation, reputational damage, removal, lost income, or professional discipline and then bear the burden of pursuing statutory relief after the harm had occurred.

The bill still had serious weaknesses: it tried to solve a problem of institutional courage, constitutional enforcement, and regulatory abuse by creating another statutory process. Providers already possess constitutional rights, but those rights must be asserted, defended, and faithfully enforced. During controversies involving gender medicine, COVID policies, and other disputed areas of medical practice, many professionals and institutions declined to challenge government pressure or ideological professional standards. Adding another statutory framework cannot substitute for institutional accountability, constitutional fidelity, or professional courage.

HB0143 therefore risked imposing significant administrative and litigation burdens while providing less practical protection than its supporters expected. It could have also created a false impression that the underlying problem had been resolved, even though regulators could continue punishing dissent through vague or indirect professional standards.

A better approach would establish clear limits on licensing-board authority. Private-citizen speech, legislative testimony, political or religious expression, discussion of biological sex, and good-faith disagreement concerning contested medical policies should not be used as evidence of professional incompetence unless the government proves a specific and independently actionable violation involving patient care. Any remedy should provide rapid protection before professional punishment becomes irreversible, rather than relying primarily on litigation after the damage has been done.

Purpose: AN ACT relating to education; specifying requirements for the provision of human development education as specified; specifying exceptions; specifying requirements for the department of education to establish and publish acceptable instructional materials related to human development education; specifying other duties for the department of education; requiring legislative approval for health education standards and curricula as specified; making conforming amendments; specifying applicability; and providing for effective dates.

Unintended Consequences: The pro-life objective of HB0186 was legitimate, important and needed. Students who are taught about reproduction, pregnancy, or abortion should also receive accurate information about the development of a human being before birth. The problem was not the Baby Olivia material itself. The problem was importing an out-of-state policy model without adapting it to Wyoming’s very unique education system.

The national Baby Olivia legislation was developed largely for states in which sex education, human sexuality, or family-life instruction was already required. In those states, prenatal-development content could be inserted into an existing instructional framework. Wyoming does not require statewide sex education. Rather than providing that if a district chooses to teach sexuality, reproduction, pregnancy, or abortion, it must also teach accurate prenatal development, HB0186 created a new mandatory program for every student in grades five through twelve.

The bill then went significantly further by adding “human development education” as a permanent, standalone area in Wyoming’s Common Core of Knowledge. This was not a minor curricular amendment. Subjects included in the statutory core are subject to statewide content and performance standards established by the State Board of Education, district implementation, curriculum alignment, district assessment obligations where performance standards apply, and accreditation oversight. HB0186 therefore gave the state a new and continuing source of authority over a field much broader than prenatal development.

The language of the bill made that expansion especially likely. It required instruction in the undefined field of “human growth and development” and stated that the prenatal-development videos were required only “at a minimum.” The videos were therefore a floor, not a limit on the subject. WDE would have identified acceptable materials, adopted implementing rules, and audited districts annually, while the State Board and districts took all actions necessary to implement the new core subject.

This created a statutory opening through which future boards, standards committees, administrators, or districts could expand the subject to include:

• Puberty and sexual behavior;
• Comprehensive sexuality education;
• Contraception and reproductive-health services;
• Abortion and competing claims about fetal personhood;
• Sexual orientation and gender identity;
• Gender-transition practices;
• Relationships and consent;
• Alternative family structures; and
• Broader social and emotional theories concerning sexuality and identity.

That concern is not speculative. Wyoming’s own experience with the Health and Safety Standards demonstrates the danger of creating broad statutory content areas. Health and Safety was placed in Wyoming’s Common Core of Knowledge in 1997 and the first state health standards were approved in 2000. The documented rationale emphasized health literacy and the prevention of injuries and dangerous behavior affecting young people, including motor-vehicle accidents, other unintentional injuries, nutrition, and disease.

Over time, however, the broad Health and Safety category became a vehicle for subjects extending well beyond accident prevention and physical wellness. By 2008, the state standards expressly included “family life and sexuality.” Subsequent revisions identified Family Life, Growth and Development, and Human Sexuality as instructional contexts through which general health skills could be taught. The current standards continue to connect human sexuality with health services, cultural and media influences, and activism.

This history illustrates the structural danger in HB0186. A broad statutory category does not remain limited to the immediate concern that persuaded the Legislature to enact it. Once the Legislature creates the category, future State Boards, standards committees, administrators, and districts determine how that category is defined and applied through later standards and curriculum decisions. HB0186 would have created “human development education” as another open-ended statutory subject, giving future officials authority to extend it into sexuality, contraception, abortion, gender identity, relationships, family structures, and other disputed subjects without requiring the Legislature to enact each expansion separately.

That concern extends beyond what could later be added to the subject. It also applies to how the material required by HB0186 could be presented in the classroom.  Wyoming standards establish learning expectations but leave curriculum, instructional materials, and methods of delivery largely to districts and educators. A teacher could comply by showing the required material and then characterize it as political, dispute its moral significance, or surround it with contrary abortion, sexuality, or gender instruction. The bill could therefore have guaranteed that the video was played while simultaneously creating the state authority through which its message was undermined.

This is a familiar problem in other subjects. Required history or science content can be formally presented while the teacher’s commentary undermines, ridicules, or reframes it. HB0186 would have given the state and districts authority to create a much larger human-development curriculum without ensuring that the prenatal material would be taught fairly or that its pro-life significance would not be immediately contradicted.

The bill’s provision prohibiting materials that “conflict” with the required instruction did not solve that problem. It did not define the term “conflict” or establish whether the prohibition applied only to factual claims about embryology or also to commentary about abortion, personhood, sexuality, or gender. A district could maintain that abortion-rights material did not conflict with the biological development shown in the video because it addressed legal rights, personal autonomy, or moral opinion rather than disputing the stages of prenatal development.

HB0186 therefore risked trading a narrow pro-life instructional requirement for a permanent expansion of state authority over human sexuality and family-life education. The state would have gained an open-ended curricular vehicle, while supporters received only a guarantee that a short prenatal-development video would be shown somewhere within that larger program.

A more precise Wyoming approach would use conditional “if-then” language:

If a school district provides instruction concerning human sexuality, sexual reproduction, pregnancy, contraception, abortion, or related reproductive-health subjects, the instruction shall include medically accurate information concerning prenatal human development beginning at fertilization, supported by appropriate medical imagery or animation.

Tennessee used a similar conditional structure when it enacted its Baby Olivia Act in 2024. Rather than establishing human development as a new standalone area of instruction, Tennessee amended its existing laws to require prenatal-development material when that curriculum directly or indirectly addresses human growth, human development, or human sexuality.

Tennessee’s law is an example of the if/then language but it is still substantially different then the Wyoming system. However, the approach would address the actual problem without establishing mandatory sex education or adding “human development education” to Wyoming’s Common Core of Knowledge. It would prevent districts from discussing pregnancy, abortion, or sexual reproduction while omitting the biological reality of prenatal human life. At the same time, it would preserve local control over whether broader sexuality instruction is offered and would limit the authority granted to WDE and the State Board.

Most importantly, conditional language would deny future education officials the broad statutory opening created by HB0186. The state could enforce the narrow requirement that prenatal development be taught whenever related subjects are presented, but it would not receive general authority to develop statewide standards covering sexuality, contraception, gender identity, family structures, or other disputed topics under the open-ended label of “human development.” This would make it substantially more difficult for a pro-life safeguard to become the statutory foundation for the comprehensive sexuality framework it was intended to counter.

Purpose:AN ACT relating to medical assistance and services; providing for increased reimbursement for emergency medical services under the Wyoming Medical Assistance and Services Act as specified; providing appropriations; specifying applicability; requiring reports; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: While the desire to strengthen emergency medical services is understandable and aligns with the goal of protecting public safety, SF0004 still expands Medicaid as the mechanism for addressing Wyoming’s EMS funding challenges.  It is difficult to reconcile consistent votes against other Medicaid measures—whether rate increases, eligibility expansions, or new service categories—with support for SF0004 simply because the particular benefit touches an issue we care about. Principle requires treating Medicaid the same way regardless of the sympathetic use case attached to it.

Medicaid remains a joint federal-state entitlement that has no foundation in the U.S. Constitution as a core responsibility of the national government. Every time Wyoming accepts additional federal Medicaid dollars, even for a narrowly tailored purpose like birthing-center services, we also invite further strings, reporting mandates, and federal constraints that erode local control. 

True consistency means declining these incremental expansions across the board and focusing instead on private, charitable, or purely state-funded alternatives that do not deepen dependence on Washington’s purse and conditions. Sticking to that standard strengthens both conservative credibility and Wyoming’s long-term sovereignty.

The bill also does not address the true underlying causes of Wyoming’s EMS crisis, including workforce shortages, volunteer recruitment, rising operational costs, rural service coverage, or long-term sustainability. True reform should focus on strengthening emergency medical services through structural changes, private innovation, local control, and sustainable state-based solutions rather than expanding dependence on Federal government healthcare subsidies. Maintaining that standard preserves both credibility and Wyoming’s long-term fiscal independence.

Purpose: AN ACT relating to medical assistance and services; codifying current state criteria for Medicaid eligibility; specifying applicability; requiring rulemaking; and providing for effective dates.

Unintended Consequences: SF0006 strengthens legislative oversight by requiring any future expansion of Medicaid eligibility beyond the criteria in place as of early 2026 to receive prior authorization from the Legislature (with only a narrow, temporary exception for public-health emergencies authorized by the governor). This provision appropriately reasserts the Legislature’s constitutional role over a major entitlement program and prevents unilateral administrative expansions that have occurred in other states.

Yet the bill’s far more consequential effect is to permanently codify Wyoming’s existing Medicaid eligibility structure—citizenship and residency rules, disability and SSI pathways, foster-care categories, specific waiver programs, and other current criteria—directly into statute. By locking these standards into law without any accompanying reforms to address the program’s long-term fiscal trajectory, cost growth, or operational inefficiencies, SF0006 embeds the status quo more deeply than before. What had previously been managed largely through administrative rules and the state plan now requires full legislative action to change in either direction. For conservatives who have long sought to restrain Medicaid’s growth and resist expansion, this codification creates a higher barrier to future reductions or structural reforms, effectively making today’s eligibility framework more durable and harder to unwind.

Purpose: AN ACT relating to public health and safety; amending provisions related to the involuntary hospitalization of mentally ill persons; expanding the list of examiners qualified to perform involuntary hospitalization examinations; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: While SF0023 improves access to timely mental health evaluations by expanding the pool of qualified examiners, timely evaluations are themselves an important component of due process. They reduce periods of uncertainty and the potential for unnecessary restraint when an individual’s liberty interests are at stake.

 Yet the bill as written prioritizes speed by broadening who may conduct these critical assessments without simultaneously strengthening the safeguards that protect against erroneous or inconsistent findings. Expanding the examiner pool to include advanced practice nurses, physician assistants, and other professionals risks introducing greater variation in clinical judgment and application of the legal standards for involuntary commitment, which can directly threaten the accuracy and fairness owed to the person being evaluated.

In effect, the legislation prioritizes faster evaluations while reducing other procedural protections intended to safeguard an individual’s due process rights. An alternative solution would have been to do both: expand the pool of examiners to ensure prompt assessments and require clear statewide standards, specialized training requirements, and meaningful, periodic judicial review of the resulting findings and any directed outpatient commitments. Only by pairing increased access with rigorous oversight can the system both accelerate care and protect the fundamental liberty interests of those subject to involuntary mental health proceedings.

Purpose:AN ACT relating to crimes and offenses; amending the offense of interference with a peace officer by creating an additional felony offense; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences:  While SF0087 was intended to better protect peace officers from intentional violence, its broad felony enhancements create significant unintended risks of overcharging in emotionally charged public settings. During school board meetings, other public meetings, protests, or similar contentious interactions, law enforcement is frequently called upon to remove citizens who are speaking out or refusing to leave. In those moments, any physical movement by a parent or citizen—pulling away, bracing, or incidental contact during removal—could be characterized as causing or attempting to cause bodily injury to an officer, elevating what would otherwise be a minor encounter into a felony carrying up to ten years in prison. We have already seen similar dynamics play out in school board meetings and during COVID lockdowns, where physical removal of peaceful or merely non-compliant individuals was used in ways that chilled speech and parental participation.

Although the statute requires intentional conduct, its real-world application will depend heavily on prosecutorial discretion and how officers describe the encounter. The result is a powerful tool that can be deployed not only against genuine assaults on officers but also to escalate charges arising from minor contact, confusion, or resistance to removal in the course of protected First Amendment activity. Lawmakers should ensure the provision is narrowly confined to clear, intentional assaults and is not available as a mechanism to suppress lawful public participation or dissent. Public confidence in the justice system depends on protecting peace officers while simultaneously guaranteeing that criminal penalties are not applied in a manner that discourages citizens—especially parents—from exercising their rights in public forums.

Purpose: AN ACT relating to property, conveyances and security transactions; providing legislative findings; providing definitions; providing an easement for electric transmission lines and distributions systems as specified; specifying applicability; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: From a property-owner perspective, SF0099 formalizes longstanding informal or “handshake” arrangements into permanent statutory easements without the current owner’s consent or any compensation. Traditional eminent domain requires payment for takings, and classic prescriptive easements demand proof of adverse (hostile) use. The bill instead grants utilities a nonexclusive easement by operation of law for qualifying pre-2006 visible continuous systems that lack written agreements—converting prior voluntary permissions into lasting property rights that run with the land. Current owners, who may have purchased decades later or whose predecessors only allowed temporary access, receive nothing in return for this forced transfer of rights.

This directly restricts land use within an up-to-30-foot corridor around the lines and related structures. Owners face limits on building, fencing, intensive agricultural practices, or landscaping that conflicts with the infrastructure or maintenance needs. Utilities gain the right to trim or remove vegetation deemed hazardous (or likely to become so), and workers can enter the property for reconstruction, repairs, or access (with possible alternative routes if the primary path is hazardous or encumbered). These ongoing servitudes reduce the owner’s exclusive control and flexibility over their own property.

The formalized easement also tends to reduce property values and marketability. Buyers and appraisers routinely discount land subject to utility corridors due to restricted buildable area, visual impacts, ongoing access rights, and potential future maintenance activity. While the law includes caps on width and historic-use limits, the net result is a permanent, uncompensated burden that prioritizes utility continuity over individual landowners’ free use and economic interests in their property.

Purpose:AN ACT relating to elections; requiring the completion of a hand count by the county clerk of each county in the 2026 primary and general elections; specifying requirements of the hand count; requiring reporting; and providing for an effective date.

Unintended Consequences: SF0113 was intended to verify electronic election results by comparing a hand count with the machine-tabulated results for approximately 5% of Election Day ballots. While the purpose appears straightforward, the language gives county clerks and county canvassing boards (which are appointed by the clerk) broad control over the audit while providing the Secretary of State with limited supervisory authority. 

However, the bill left important questions unanswered about how ballots and races are selected, how discrepancies are resolved and whether the audit will produce consistent results across Wyoming’s 23 counties.

The Secretary of State selects one federal and one statewide race, but neither race is required to be contested or randomly selected. An unopposed race could therefore satisfy the audit requirement even though it would provide little evidence that the equipment correctly assigned votes between competing candidates. The Secretary may also select different races in different counties and does not have to announce those selections until the Wednesday after the election, when unofficial results are already known. This means Wyoming may never receive a uniform statewide hand-count comparison of any single contest, and the lack of a public, random selection process could create questions about why particular races were chosen.

Self Audit Conflict

Even greater discretion is placed with county officials. The county canvassing board selects the electronic tabulating machines, meaning the ballots that will be audited. The selection does not have to be random, publicly observable, geographically representative or balanced among precincts, political parties and ballot styles. The county clerk then appoints the audit boards, decides how many boards are necessary and administers the hand count. This creates a structural conflict of interest. The county officials responsible for administering and canvassing the elections also control critical parts of the audit intended to verify their own work. The canvassing board selects the machines, therefore they are selecting the ballots to be examined. All the while the county clerk appoints the audit boards and administers the hand count. Because the law does not require an independent supervisor or a random, publicly observable selection process, the same local election system being reviewed also controls the scope and personnel of that review. Even if every official acts honestly, an audit should not depend solely on the discretion of the officials whose work it is supposed to verify. Without independent oversight and separation of duties, this becomes a self-audit that weakens the credibility of the results and public confidence in the process.

Limited Oversight with No Corrective Authority 

The Secretary of State is not removed from the process entirely, but the office is given little meaningful oversight authority. The bill does not expressly authorize the Secretary to supervise the hand count, approve the counties’ sampling methods, establish uniform training and counting standards, order additional machines or ballots examined, investigate the cause of a discrepancy or require corrective action. The County clerk must report the information not less than nine days after the county canvass to the SOS office. Once the SOS office receives the reports they must submit them to the Joint Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Legislative Committee which is likely to be after they have certified the election. And if there are any irregularities in the audits, the bill does not require any corrective action be taken by the Secretary of State, the Attorney General or the Legislature.  

It isn’t 5% of the Whole 

The advertised 5% audit is also narrower and less uniform than it sounds. It applies to ballots cast on Election Day and does not clearly include absentee, early, provisional, military or overseas ballots. In a county with substantial absentee voting, the hand count could examine only a small portion of the total election vote. The law also samples entire tabulating machines rather than randomly selected individual ballots. Because machines process different numbers of ballots, some counties may audit much more than 5%, while others may struggle to reach that amount. A problem limited to an unselected machine, absentee batch or ballot category could go undetected.

Certification before Verification 

The timing and response provisions create additional concerns. The audit may be completed up to nine days after the county canvass, meaning the results could be canvassed before the audit is finished. If an error is later discovered, the bill does not require an expanded audit, additional hand counting, a recount, equipment testing, an investigation or correction of the canvassed results. It also establishes no acceptable-error threshold. A one-vote difference and a discrepancy large enough to affect the outcome receive the same direction: report it to the Secretary of State. Compounding the problem, the bill states discrepancies must be reported “not less than” nine days after the canvass. Read literally, counties cannot report earlier than day nine, but no final reporting deadline is provided.

Missing Transparency and Safeguards  

SF113, also lacks uniform transparency and procedural safeguards. It does not expressly require statewide training, standardized tally sheets, a method for resolving disputed ballot marks, public notice, observers or publication of county-level audit results. The audit compares selected contest totals but does not expressly require reconciliation among voters checked in, ballots issued, ballots cast, spoiled ballots, rejected ballots and physical ballots remaining in custody. A matching hand count may show that a selected machine counted the ballots it received correctly, but it does not necessarily establish that every lawful ballot was properly accounted for.

The bill may provide a limited comparison between selected machine totals and a later hand count, but it does not establish a comprehensive, independent or uniform statewide audit. Wyoming could complete every hand count required by the law and still have no consistent audit of a contested statewide race, no meaningful review of absentee ballots and no mandatory response when a serious discrepancy is discovered. By giving county clerks and canvassing boards substantial control while withholding meaningful supervisory and corrective authority from the secretary of state, the law risks producing an audit that satisfies these new SF113 statutes without providing long term transparency, accountability or corrective measures the public deserves.

Purpose:AN ACT relating to the Wyoming Pharmacy Act; amending provisions related to the practice of pharmacy; providing definitions; requiring rulemaking; and providing for effective dates.

Unintended Consequences: SF0121 expands the statutory definition of the “practice of pharmacy” under the Wyoming Pharmacy Act. It explicitly adds activities such as assessing patients for the purpose of prescribing drugs and devices (pursuant to Board of Pharmacy rules), initiating or providing pharmacist care services (again under Pharmacy Board rules), using continuous quality-improvement programs and emerging technologies for patient safety, and engaging in collaborative pharmaceutical care. Collaborative care is governed solely by Board of Pharmacy rules, pharmacists cannot be required to participate, and the Board of Pharmacy must promulgate all implementing rules. The bulk of the act takes effect July 1, 2026.

This expansion creates a dangerous regulatory environment by placing two separate licensing boards—the Wyoming Board of Medicine (overseeing physicians and related prescribers) and the Wyoming Board of Pharmacy—in the position of regulating substantially overlapping patient-care services. Both boards now exercise authority over core functions that involve evaluating patients, determining appropriate drug or device therapy, initiating treatment-related interventions, and delivering collaborative medication management. Because each board operates independently, with its own rulemaking process, composition, priorities, and enforcement mechanisms, the standards that emerge for the same clinical activities can easily diverge.

Conflicting guidelines and safety measures are a predictable result. The Board of Medicine has long established requirements for patient assessment, documentation, informed consent, controlled-substance prescribing protocols, continuing education, quality assurance, and liability expectations grounded in the broader medical standard of care. The Board of Pharmacy, newly empowered to set parallel rules for pharmacist-led assessment and prescribing-related services, may adopt different thresholds for clinical evaluation, different documentation or monitoring requirements, different technology or quality-improvement mandates, or different approaches to risk mitigation. 

In collaborative settings—where a physician and a pharmacist may share responsibility for the same patient—these mismatched standards create ambiguity: which board’s safety protocols govern a given decision? Which set of guidelines controls when a discrepancy arises? How is accountability assigned if a patient is harmed under inconsistent rules?

The resulting regulatory fragmentation undermines consistent patient protection. Practitioners may face conflicting compliance demands, leading to hesitation, inconsistent application of best practices, or gaps in oversight. Patients receive care under dual, potentially incompatible frameworks rather than a unified standard of safety. Enforcement becomes more complicated, as each board can claim or disclaim jurisdiction over the overlapping activity. 

In short, by authorizing the Pharmacy Board to regulate assessment-for-prescribing and collaborative care services that parallel those long regulated by the Medical Board, SF0121 introduces structural opportunities for conflicting guidelines and diluted safety measures—precisely the kind of dual-board environment that heightens, rather than reduces, risk to the public.