Good afternoon,

 

Sharing this op-ed co-signed by the Wyoming Education Association and The Wilderness Society that ran in the Casper Star Tribune (pasted + linked below). The piece discusses how proposed reforms to the federal oil and gas leasing system can help Wyoming’s public education system in the short term and the longer-term goal of decoupling the system from a financial reliance on a volatile industry. 

 

In particular, this piece allowed us to start pushing the narrative we want vs just reaction to the Department of Interior Report and playing in industry’s messaging sandbox. 

                                                            

Please consider sharing on your social channels using suggested guidance below. And feel free to reach out with any questions. 

Best,

Alex Thompson  / Julia Stuble

 

Link to opinion:  https://bit.ly/3GmSuHU

 

Suggested Social:

 

As Wyoming’s education system faces a mounting $250 million year deficit, proposed reforms to the federal oil and gas leasing program offer the state’s education system a short-term boost while long-term solutions are developed. More via @wyoea @wilderness https://bit.ly/3GmSuHU

 

Wyoming’s public education system needs the help that proposed federal oil and gas leasing reforms provide, but moving away from a financial reliance on a volatile industry is the ultimate goal. More via @wyoea @wilderness https://bit.ly/3GmSuHU

 

 

Hutcherson, Smitherman: We’re betting Wyoming’s future on Wyoming’s past

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Dan Smitherman 

 

Grady Hutcherson

 

Wyoming’s public education system is facing a life-changing crossroads.

Take the path of familiarity, and our education system continues relying on the “boom-or-bust” cycle of oil, gas and coal production that will no longer provide for the health or well-being of our communities and has the state facing a mounting $250 million yearly deficit in education funding.

Or forge a new path and finally diversify away from Wyoming’s now dangerous dependency on fossil fuel production to more stable sources of funding.

Over the past 20 years, the signals have piled up that Wyoming must find new sources of revenue rather than relying on fossil fuel production and dying industries to pay the state’s bills. Case in point, the public education “rainy day fund” that has been masking the problem and enabling the state to keep above water, even amid a deficit, but cannot be a long-term solution.

“We are at a fiscal cliff in education where we will not be able to pull from the rainy-day fund to fund education any longer. And so, I feel like people think that’s a lot farther off than it is. Our deficit in education is real. And we just don’t feel it right now because it’s backfilled by the rainy-day account,” Wyoming State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jillian Balow said in a February 2021 interview.

Reality is, even ignoring the health and environmental issues, Wyoming can’t rely on fossil fuels to replenish that rainy-day account or fill our general fund. Although the latest Consensus Revenue Estimating Group’s report had rosier-than-expected revenue projections for the short term, members of CREG, many state legislators, and even the Governor have acknowledged the volatility of the industry and revenues will continue. The world’s energy economy is already changing and will continue to change, no matter what. And Wyoming’s fossil fuel industry is experiencing that change first-hand.

Global markets are finally connecting the dots on climate change. They’re responding to the realization that human-caused greenhouse gas emissions – of which nearly a quarter of total US emissions stems from fossil fuel production on public lands and waters – are directly causing the severe heat, drought and temperature extremes battering western states.

And the cheap price of renewable energy is shifting things largely in favor of clean, emissions-free energy like solar and wind power.

As a result of being ranked first in the nation for oil and gas production from public lands, Wyoming has, for too long, tied many of our services, including public education, to now-unstable markets.

Wyoming needs a long-term plan to provide a stable, healthier funding source for schools and other important social services. But as the state is taking this major offramp from a volatile status quo, there also needs to be a short-term plan that makes the current situation fairer for students and teachers.

Making kids and teachers continue to suffer the consequences of the current bad set-up until the state has a better one in place is unfair bordering on unjust. Especially when there’s a way to make that interim period fairer.

Good news for those short-term needs came from the Department of Interior recently: DOI highlighted that the federal oil and gas leasing program is a broken system in desperate need of reform. The Department is encouraging Congress to enact common-sense fixes that would benefit funding for Wyoming’s education system and our communities such as: increasing royalty rates; increasing bonding requirements for cleanup; and closing loopholes that allow oil and gas companies to shift their clean-up costs to our pocketbooks.

These reform wins, currently included in the Build Back Better Act, would be huge and immediately inject much needed fairness in the short-term, while helping fund a just economic transition to healthier energy production that will provide clean air and water for all Wyomingites long term. They also help pave the offramp, to diversified, stable education funding and long-term fairness for Wyoming’s kids. That is, ensuring education doesn’t undergo whiplash with every swing of a single, volatile industry.

One of coal country’s biggest lessons is that the greatest threat to communities’ long-term vitality is not change but waiting too long and trying to make the transition too late. Wyoming can dither away our savings at this crossroads, putting our youth and our future at risk. Or we can embrace change on our terms with a bold vision. The consequences are clear. The path of familiarity will continue to hurt Wyoming’s youth. A new path is needed... before it’s too late.

Grady Hutcherson: A classroom teacher for 24 years, Grady Hutcherson now serves more than 6,000 education employees as President of the Wyoming Education Association (WEA). The Wyoming Education Association is committed to building and protecting a high-quality, equitable education system for Wyoming students, teachers, and all education employees.

Dan Smitherman currently serves as The Wilderness Society’s Wyoming State Director. A retired Marine Corps Officer, former outfitter and wilderness guide, Dan holds a BS degree in Aviation Management from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and is a graduate of the University of Wyoming’s Haub School Collaboration Program in Natural Resources.

 

 

 

 

Alex Thompson (she/her/hers)

Senior Manager for Media Engagement

The Wilderness Society | The Wilderness Society Action Fund

202-429-2602 | cell: 860-416-0564