Lex Anteinternet: The 2018 Wyoming Legislative Session. At What Point Is Enough, Enough?

I'm already running a thread on the 2018 Wyoming Legislative Session, which is supposed to be a budget session.  That thread is here:

Lex Anteinternet: The 2018 Wyoming Legislative Session.: Another one of our trailing posts. It hardly seems possible, but the 2018 Wyoming Legislative session is soon to begin and bills are n...

But I'm adding this short comment as at some point, enough should be enough.

Once again, in spite of massive public opposition to it, some hardcore right wing legislators are trying to lay the groundwork for a proposal that's actually banned by the Wyoming Constitution; that being acquiring land from the Federal Government.  The post above addresses that here:

And here we go yet again.

Yet another misguided effort to get the Federal domain transferred to the state.

HOUSE BILL NO. HB0094

State lands-net gain in acreage.

Sponsored by: Representative(s) Jennings, Clem, Edwards, Halverson, Lone, Miller, Stith and Winters and Senator(s) Hicks

A BILL

for

AN ACT relating to state lands; providing that the acquisition of lands from the federal government may increase total trust land acreage; and providing for an effective date.

Be It Enacted by the Legislature of the State of Wyoming:

Section 1.  W.S. 36‑2‑111 is created to read:

36‑2‑111.  Acquisition of trust lands.

Subject to any other limitations as provided by law, the board is authorized to acquire land from the federal government or any federal agency that would increase total trust land acreage held by the state.  Any land acquired under this section shall not be included in any rule, policy or formula that limits the total trust land acreage which is or can be held by the state.

Section 2.  This act is effective July 1, 2018.

This one the sponsors managed to sneak in somehow without much notice.  Boo Hiss.

This will go to the floor this morning, February 14, 2018.   Call your legislature and leave a message.  Enough of this.

To make sure we keep public lands in public hands, call the the House Floor receptionist before 10 a.m.—307.777.7852—and tell your legislator to VOTE NO on HB 94.

This proposal is illegal.

Illegal.

The Wyoming Constitution prohibits this and the public doesn't want it.

Regarding that public, it's interesting to note that one of the legislators proposing this was appointed to his position and was sued as he doesn't even live in his disctrict.

I mean, come on.

Likewise there's this:

In other bills, Chuck Gray has proposed a bill to bypass the Attorney General of Wyoming and allow the legislature to hire an attorney to sue the State of Washington over coal terminals. This is a really bad idea and it won't go anywhere.

If it were to pass, it would fund some lawyer for an expensive suit that would surely fail.  It would be more productive to simply burn the cash.

This is a horrifically bad ideal. The lawsuit would lose.  It has no chance  whatsoever of success.  Everyone ought to know that.

That a few gadfly bills get in every year is, I suppose, not surprise.  But attacking the will of the people on public lands, again, is appalling.

And the right wing elements of the legislature that have become so enamored with filing lawsuits ought to step back and realizes that what they do, is lose.

Come on guys.  If you want to be in court all the time, go to law school and become a public defender.  You'll be in it constantly.  And if you the idea of the Federal Government owning public land. . .New York is calling you.

Big Brown Closes

Big Brown in Fairfield Texas, a coal fired power plant that used Wyoming coal, has closed, the victim of natural gas.

We've been tracking this trend for some time.  It's this trend, the phasing out of coal for electrical power generation, that's causing the decline in demand for Wyoming coal. And this trend will continue.

It's worth noting, a day after Natrona County's Chuck Gray introduced a quixotic bill to sue Washington State over it's "no" to a coal terminal in its state, thereby proposing to bypass the Attorney General who no doubt know that such an effort is doomed to failure, that this is not only a national trend, but set to become a global one.  Indeed, it hit in Europe in some ways before here, and its in full swing here.  People who look to Asian markets to save coal are fooling themselves.  Sure, they might consume it at an increased rate briefly, but at the speed this conversion is occurring, it will be brief indeed.

As we have also noted, this is a trend line that is over a century old.  We always only live in our own times and therefore have a hard time appreciating that. But if we really want to sue somebody. . .sue the Royal Navy.  They really accelerated this change.

 

Me, third from right, when I thought I had a career in geology, and probably in coal.

ENDOW Study. Air Travel First

 

 Federal Express at the Natrona County International Airport.  An airport that can  handle a plane like this could sure easily handle intra state air travel.

We've posted a lot about Wyoming's Boom and Bust economy over the years, particularly the last few years as we've slid into a bust.  Supposedly we're coming out of that right now, although a report that the state issued last week stated the opposite.  Citing employment figures, the report felt we were still in a bust.  Perhaps note noted in that, although I've discussed it here, a revived petroleum economy is not likely to be quite as labor intensive as prior booms as technology has developed to the point where exploration and drilling are not as labor intensive as they once were.  This will not be true. . . yet, of the support infrastructure where more of the jobs actually are, but we note this as the oil industry as subject to the labor reducing aspects of technology just like everything else.  This should give economic planners in Wyoming pause.

Anyhow, a study was commissioned by the Legislature on this topic, not that such legislative committees are that unusual.  The committee had some heavyweight executive members at that.  So what did the committee come up with?  Here's its very first recommendation:

ENDOW Preliminary Findings and Recommendations:

Focus on Infrastructure

Improve and Expand Wyoming’s Commercial Air Service

Finding

Commercial air service is a significant limiting factor to expanding and diversifying Wyoming’s economy. Multiple pressures within the aviation industry have forced many states to compete for a limited number of opportunities to solve this problem. Wyoming must be aggressive in finding a solution that will support attracting and retaining reliable air service. Air service is critical to supporting businesses, residents, and entrepreneurs.

The Aeronautics Division of the Wyoming Department of Transportation (WYDOT) has proposed a Commercial Air Service Plan (CASP) that will create a predictable, reliable and affordable option for air service in Wyoming.

Recommendation

The Executive Council supports WYDOT’s 10-year CASP to augment the existing Air Service Enhancement Program (ASEP) and recommends the Wyoming Legislature appropriate funds necessary to fully implement an approved CASP.

What's the WYDOT  Commercial Air Service Plan?  Well, its the Wyoming Department of Transportation plan to have subsidized intra state air travel here.  It had some legislative support, but it seems marooned right now.

None the less, according to Joan Barron of the Casper Star Tribune, something will be happening in the legislature, that being:

To that end, the Legislature this month will be asked to consider a bill to set up an 11-member commission comprised of a mix of legislators, executive branch and private sector representatives and the public at large. The governor serves on the council but without a vote.

So we're going to get a commission.

 

 Ford Tri Motor at the Natrona County International Airport.  Our air connections in the state aren't much better than when this airplane was new.

That's good, but it isn't exactly action either.

Not that there isn't some action.  As her article also notes:

Since 2004, Wyoming’s Air Service Enhancement Program has provided financial support to airports in communities around the state with a 60 percent state and 40 percent local match.

The current funding level, however, has dropped to $2.4 million per biennium.

“We can run it for another year,” [Converse County Senator]  Von Flatern said.

This whole topic, we should note, is just full of interesting ironies.  The lack of adequate air travel in the state has long been noted as a real deterrent to economic development in the State.  Indeed, since World War Two Wyoming has actually suffered, long term, an infrastructure decline.  Coming out of World War Two we had little regional air travel (we did have service however) but we had bad roads and good rail.  Following the 1950s, however, we lost commercial rail and had the highways, which were being much improved post war, including the introduction of Interstate Highways, and we had expensive air to the neighboring state and somewhat intrastate.  That continued on into the 1970s but by the 1980s we'd lost air connections except to Denver and Salt Lake, including the loss of much of the intrastate connections.  Now we have poor air travel for the most part and are reliant on the highways.

 Curtis CW-20 in what was, unfortunately, the golden age of transportation in Wyoming.  Passenger rail still existed, air travel did as well with what would became better connections than we have now, and the Interstate Highways were going to be started by the end of the decade.

Those highways receive a lot of Federal funding, making our "get the Federal government out" campaigns fairly absurd, unless we hear wish to return to an 1880s level of transportation around here. Without Federal money, our roads are going down the tubes and we know it.  We have no passenger rail, and we are dependent upon subsides already for air travel as it is.  If the Federal bucks were gone, the Interstates would become major state liabilities and quite frankly that would end any economic development here at all.  Of course, we know that the Federal government isn't going to pull the finding for the Interstate highways, but we seem not to notice that subsidies for highways differs very little from subsidies for any other type of transportation.  Indeed, a person can make a really good case for subsidies for rail and air travel being much more efficient in some ways.

Anyhow, its interesting that when this comes up, and it does repeatedly, air travel is always mentioned.  And the only way to get this off the ground, so to speak, is to have the state do something.  ENDOW has noted that and is expressly endorsing what WYDOT came up with.  But the legislature, while stating some support for WYDOT's plan, didn't carry through with it, or at least hasn't yet.

And, as the same time, we have three GOP candidates all claiming that the Federal Government needs to get out of the state, and presumably take their money with them, which would flat out kill air travel in some towns where it's barely holding on.

Now, I'll be frank that not only do I have an opinion in this, I have a vested interested.  In my occupation, I have to travel a lot, and that means traveling by car a lot.  In the winter its risky, and it takes hours and hours to do it.  It makes simply doing business in Wyoming expensive, and the legislature knows that.  Heck, they have to drive to Cheyenne, they can't get there any other way.

We know what to do.  But are going to do anything?

I sort of doubt it.

Blog Mirror: The Aerodrome. You Can't Fly There From Here.

From The Aerodrome:

October 27, 2017

You can't fly there from here.

 

 Over the Laramie Range.

Unfortunate news from the Casper Star Tribune . . .