Wyoming Legislative Update

Wyoming legislators are considering a number of ag-relevant issues this session. Brett Moline, Wyoming Farm Bureau, shared insights into HB0019, a corner crossing clarification bill; SF0025, a bill implementing landowner big game license limits in limited quota hunt areas; and SF0084, regarding a voluntary water conservation program.

HB0019 goes back to a court case over a checkerboard area near Rawlins, Wyoming, a few years ago.

“Hunters brought out a stepladder, crossed at a corner from one government section to another. Landowners tried to get them for trespassing, but a Federal court ruled that it was not trespassing as they never touched private land.”

HB0019 is “an attempt to give some clarification,” Moline said, “but it doesn’t do anything to clarify the issue.”

 Landowner groups, including Wyoming Farm Bureau, “have serious concerns” about the bill.

“It is kind of pitting landowners against sportsmen, in a situation where the minority on both sides are at fault,” he said. “The court case a few years ago was very specific to federal lands. This bill, and some of the people who worked on it, said the court case clarified it for all government lands, but it didn’t. The judge was very specific to federal lands.”

It may be possible to amend the bill, but Moline said Wyoming Farm Bureau wants to kill the bill because there are so many aspects of the issue it does not address.

“It doesn’t help anybody out,” he said. “Some sportsmen are also against it.”

The old adage that “whiskey is for drinking and water is for fighting” holds true in Wyoming, Moline said. SF0084 is a bill that would encourage voluntary water conservation, or voluntary limited use of water for a limited timeframe.

“If you do not use your water, you can’t have a negative impact on somebody else,” Moline said. “Say four people are along one diversion; if one person didn’t use their water, would there still be enough to get all the way to the end. It might be good for one person, but if the water can’t get to the end, that’s harm, not fair.”

This issue relates to negotiations on the Colorado River Comapct.

“We are trying to do some voluntary things in Wyoming, to show that Wyoming is trying to conserve water and do the right thing,” Moline said.

“Our big goal on the Colorado River Compact is to not go to court. We have a feeling that if we end up in court, when they see that Wyoming and parts of Colorado and Utah haven’t used all the water allocated to them, the court will say ‘if you’re not using your water you don’t need it’ and reallocate it.”

The Colorado River Compact is unique in being the first water agreement in the nation  to be allocated on actual acre feet basis instead of on a percentage of flow basis, Moline said. Worse yet, it was established based on the highest flow years of the river in history.

“It has never approached that level again,” he said. “We are trying to do everything to voluntarily conserve water and encourage conservation.”

Downstream states can’t afford to lose water, and want more water to use, Moline said, and political pressure would probably favor those states. Mexico is also part of the compact.

“They don’t want to cut back,” he said. “This bill will hopefully make some progress. We will store water and as Lake Meade and Lake Powell need water for their hydroelectric generators we’ll release it.”

SF0025 is intended to provide a compromise on big game tags between landowners and sportsmen in certain “limited quota” areas of the state, Moline said.

“In some of these limited quota areas, landowners could take all the licenses and sportsmen don’t think it’s fair that landowners can get them all,” he said.

Landowners are required to meet certain criteria to be eligible for these tags and still pay for them.

“This is a reward to landowners for supplying habitat,” Moline said. “It is safe to say that much critical winter range for deer and elk in Wyoming is on private land, and these tags reward landowners for supplying habitat for big game animals.

“Right now the Game and Fish Commission doesn’t have the authority to limit the number of landowner licenses. What landowner groups have come up with is that landowners should be guaranteed some licenses. I think they have settled on landowners getting at least 40 percent of the available deer and elk tags in these areas, and 60 percent or less would go to sportsmen. Any tags that aren’t used by landowners can go to sportsmen, but we feel landowners should get some.”

Wyoming runs on a biannual budget, and 2026 is a budget year. Moline said debate has been strong.

“One side wants to cut spending and the other side doesn’t want to make some large cuts,” he said. “Hopefully we can continue working together and in another week we will know where we’re at.”