How you can and should help protect and develop Wyoming's Natural Resources and Core Industries





On Brand Budget Header

Volume 1, Issue 5 | December 2025

'Tis the Season ...

Capitol Chrsitmas Tree

As many are preparing to celebrate this special time of year with family and friends, another very significant season is in full swing at the State Capitol. 

For those elected to serve the people of Wyoming, discussion is underway as we consider how best to use precious state resources to build opportunities. 

Our obligation to better position Wyoming to meet the challenges of an increasingly complicated, yet promising, future.



We do this by focusing on The Essentials

My administration remains committed to four core principles:


* *Protect Wyoming citizens and ensure their future.*
* *Support core industries, grow new ones, and expand opportunities*.
* *Maintain and improve effective and efficient government.*
* *Respect the principle that the government is best when it is closest to the people*.

I want to make sure you know my specific budget requests reflect an expectation for government to provide the essentials, be accountable, and remain accessible.

My special invitation to you …

Please take an active role this year as the Wyoming Legislature grapples with setting our state’s biennial budget. Reach out to let your legislators know your thoughts on the issues and opportunities important to you, your family, and your community. You can write and submit an editorial, contact your elected state representative or state senator [ [link removed] ], attend a hearing [ [link removed] ], or provide public comment. [ [link removed] ]

Mike Shober |5486 _no restroom signage

Recently I presented my requests to the Joint Appropriations Committee. I discussed portions of my full budget message during my presentation. I’m sharing the following excerpt with you. I believe all Wyomingites value our precious core industries and expanding opportunities

*Supporting Wyoming's Core Industries and Expanding Opportunities*

Our core industries are not accidental. They exist because past and present leaders, in industry and government, shared a vision and made vital investments in infrastructure, supported research and development, pursued trade opportunities, and maintained reasonable regulatory oversight. It is important to remember, Wyoming is not unique in its ability to provide coal, critical minerals, oil, or gas. If we are eager to see those industries remain central to our economy, we must understand the cutthroat nature of today’s marketplace as well as what it takes to make Wyoming competitive nationally and internationally.



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*"I believe all Wyomingites value our precious core industries and expanding opportunities."*

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*Natural Resources and Core Industries*

Protecting and enhancing Wyoming’s ability to develop our natural resources provides economic stability and vitality. This budget recommendation is predicated on supporting our core industries: *agriculture, energy, mining, and tourism*.

The 2025 change in federal administration portends well for Wyoming, recognizing what Teddy Roosevelt stated: *“Conservation means development as much as it does preservation."* Wyoming has a long history of working with our core industries. We understand we can have energy development alongside a thriving agricultural industry *and* a vigorous environment that supports abundant wildlife, superb recreational opportunities, and tourism assets.  

I am encouraged that the federal government’s direction is right; however, the pace of reform is slow. At the time I prepared this budget message, Wyoming had only thirteen  active rigs drilling. Coal and other minerals have not yet returned to pre-Biden Administration production. Nonetheless, we can celebrate that Wyoming’s efforts have generated a resurgence of the nuclear industry, once a core part of Wyoming's economic history. The Natrium project in Kemmerer continues toward completion, and other nuclear-related businesses are contemplating further job creation in the Cowboy State. 



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*"We can do more with coal than just burn it." [ [link removed] ]*

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Gordon, Zeldin, Western [ [link removed] ]

We are spurring interest domestically and internationally, but so are Tennessee and Texas. We are honoring President Trump’s call for energy dominance. True energy abundance includes a broad supply of energy sources to meet a broad variety of markets, both domestically and internationally. Wyoming cattle and sheep producers know the value of having the right product for the right market. 

Wyoming energy is no different. To capitalize on this window of opportunity, this budget provides sufficient funding for the Department of Environmental Quality to timely process permits for energy development and ensure protection of public health and the environment.

I also recommend expenditures that will continue internationally recognized leadership in energy-related research, including *continued enhanced oil recovery research, *the full development of our *coal pyrolysis plant in Gillette* to produce more products from coal, and research to extract critical minerals from coal ash. We can do more with coal than just burn it. It is a precious resource and one so many Wyoming families count on to make ends meet. Embracing our energy sector and the research that supports it is essential to our future and to meeting the President’s call to action.  



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*"The crisis in the making is no joke."*

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Wyo Office Tourism | Thoman 1

*One essential natural resource for everything we do in Wyoming is perhaps our most precious.* Unhappily, in neighboring downstream states, irrigation districts, cities, and others also crave Wyoming water. We have a rendezvous with destiny and many of those states and districts are  already armed with talented legal and engineering counsel.  As we continue to experience drought, the prize of control of our water becomes ever more pronounced. This crisis in the making is no joke. Wyoming farmers and ranchers, refiners, and residences – potentially our whole economy – are threatened if we do not get this one right.



Thoman Women | Green River Ranch

You remember I sought to add State Engineer staff to Southwestern Wyoming and legal counsel to the Office of the Attorney General in prior budget requests. I am saddened to tell you because we were unable to rise to that challenge, Wyoming is now behind. We are out-manned and out-gunned by virtually every other state on the Colorado River. Worries about the downstream demands on the Bear, the Snake, the Tongue, and the North Platte are not far behind. As we become drier, protecting our water becomes ever more essential. I recommend funding to shore up our State Engineers Office and the Office of the Attorney General to protect the use of our water not only in the Colorado River Basin but in all basins that provide water to downstream states.   

"Photo Credits: Wyoming Office of Tourism | Mickey Thoman & Family | Green River Ranch"







 The Essentials Budget : Please Review

Budget Cover [ [link removed] ]

*Click the cover photo above to review my proposed        Essentials Budget.*










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