Sheridan/Johnson County Legislators React To Supplemental Budget Proposal

Although next year’s Legislative session is not a budget session, the budget will be one of the topics of conversation when it convenes.

About 2 weeks ago, Governor Mark Gordon announced his supplemental proposal for the 2023-24 fiscal year.

Wyoming has about a $913 million surplus and Gordon has proposed putting about half of that into savings to generate revenue.

Representative Barry Crago of Johnson County and eastern Sheridan County says he agrees with that idea, but the Legislature will have to spend and appropriate some of it.

They just have to choose carefully.

“I’m probably on the same side as the Governor on this one. I think we do need to be conservative with our budget. Just because we have all that money to spend, doesn’t mean we need to do it. At the same time, if there’s big projects, big infrastructure things that we can attack, and put to bed so to speak, that maybe now is the time to do some of those things, but I think we got to be careful and judicious on how we do that.”

Representative Cyrus Western of western Sheridan County says he agrees.

“I’m certainly fine with some of it getting spent for one-time expenditures for infrastructure needs and our communities, but I also think we need to stock quite a bit away in some of our trust funds. There are several mineral wealth funds that generate money for the state and revenue. That’s one of the reasons we can have the low tax burden we do here in Wyoming is because we pay for those services, those needs with revenues from our oil and gas severance taxes and other avenues.”

The 2023 8-week Wyoming Legislative General Session is scheduled to begin on Tuesday, January 10th.