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Maternity deserts, Medicaid cuts a reality for Wyoming mothers

Dear Casper,

Wyoming legislators obsess over protecting the unborn while gutting nearly every support system for children who are already here. They are planting seeds and then refusing to tend to them.

In October of 2025, the Joint Labor, Health, and Social Services Committee voted against increasing Medicaid reimbursement rates for obstetricians. In Wyoming, one in three births is covered by Medicaid. In the past five years,  four Wyoming hospitals have shuttered their Labor and Delivery Services because of the high costs and low reimbursement rates. The proposal to increase the Medicaid rate for obstetrics was supported by hospital associations, the Department of Health, and numerous health care providers. Asking pregnant people to give birth in a maternity desert is forcing people to plant a garden and then making sure they don’t have any land.  

Seeds need water to grow and thrive, and kids need health insurance. In the first round of the Wyoming Joint Appropriation Committee discussions of 2026, they discussed reducing funds for Medicaid. In 2024, children made up for 63.3% of medicaid enrollees. Cutting funding for Medicaid leaves these children and their families vulnerable. Asking people to have more babies while refusing to make their medical care affordable is unacceptable.

In Wyoming, one in five children lives with food insecurity. In June 2025, during a Joint Labor, Health, and Social Services Committee meeting some of the legislators asked why they should continue to fund programs like SNAP and WIC. These programs are meant to support babies and children who are earthside, and yet the Freedom Caucus wants to cut these resources from the children in our communities. One legislator openly worried that providing these resources would mean allowing people to be “too comfortable” in their poverty.

For two years in a row, elected officials have chosen not to participate in a federal food program that helps feed children over the summer. Children in Wyoming communities are going hungry, and yet we have legislators demanding that Wyomingites have more babies? 35,000 children statewide receive free or reduced lunches. We are witnessing our lawmakers knowingly taking nutrients away from our children, from the seeds we are tending to. 

Children need a place to grow — and for nearly all Wyoming kids, that place is public school. According to Public School Review, ninety-seven percent of K-12 students attend public schools in Wyoming. In 2025, the Wyoming legislature made many questionable decisions regarding public education. It passed the Steamboat Legacy Act, which siphons public money away from public schools. They cut property taxes, which is fundamentally how we pay for our public schools. In the life of our seeds, education is the sunlight that allows our children to grow, and yet the Freedom Caucus keeps voting for darkness.

Planting a seed is only the beginning. We have to tend to the seeds; plants need to be invested in season after season to be successful. It’s the same with babies and children. The lawmakers who demand that every pregnancy be carried to term are slashing the programs that keep our children growing. Wyoming’s legislators, and the Freedom Caucus specifically, need to remember that real responsibility means tending to the fields long after the planting is done, just as we tend to our children long after they are born.

Writing in solidarity for a better Wyoming future,

Betsy Erickson
Casper

Where is the rest of the funding for fire station?

Dear Casper,

After voters approved an increase in our sales tax to fund $4.4 million towards the project for a new fire station in town, the city is still $16.6 million short as the total project is projected to cost $21 million.

I still have no answer from our City Council on how they plan to pay for the rest of the cost of this project. Please see my email below I sent to our council on Feb. 4 with no response as of Feb. 6 after asking about this at the Feb. 3 meeting.

I should not be the only one asking this question. Why are our local reporters not asking council as well?

Dear Members of City Council,

At last night’s meeting, I was hoping to get an answer as to what funding source has been considered to close the gap of the $16.6 million needed to fully fund the Fire Station No. 1 project. I have been asking this question periodically for two years since the ballot questions were being discussed.

As stated last night, it is likely that by June 30 we taxpayers will have funded, through the approved ballot question, the required $4.4 million towards this project and we deserve an answer to this basic question about the rest of the funding.

It would be fiscally irresponsible to ask citizens to fund 21% of any project and not have a plan to fund the other 79%.

At the same time, if there is a funding plan, then there is a lack of transparency for not disclosing what it is to the public.

If there is no funding to complete this project, what happens to the $4.4 million you will have already collected from us taxpayers?

Ross Schriftman
Casper

Communities pay when state employees are undercompensated

Dear Casper,

For the last few years, a growing faction of legislators have railed against various budget proposals which would benefit communities throughout Wyoming. One of the current proposals recommends compensating state employees closer to market rates to avoid losing experienced public sector staff and continue to provide services to the great citizens of our state.

State employee compensation is behind the national average by between 7% and 10% . Those employees continue to contribute in more ways than just serving the public in a departmental capacity. Those citizens are Little League coaches, charitable organization volunteers, church deacons, role models, and many more who contribute to their communities. These individuals work hard to provide services for their communities and neighbors while facing increased staff shortages, which in turn creates increased workloads hindering efficiency.

For every dollar spent on their salary, it returns into the community they serve at a rate of $1.30 to $2 of value, through the “local multiplier effect.”

I believe some legislators are not considering all of the facts and variables that go into every staff member lost throughout state agencies. First and foremost, the tens of thousands of dollars that go into the training and initial hiring of these staff members is lost when we lose a staff member. Second, the experience that is lost is sometimes irreplaceable and creates negative economic impact in terms of increasing liability exposure for the state. Third, lower staffing levels due to lower wages increases the workload for current staff and can lead to burnout and ineffective solutions for a citizen’s needs. Lastly, we are losing members of our communities and their families’ positive impacts on those communities.

Certain misguided views based on national talking points and organizations are part of what is creating a cultural disdain for many state agency responsibilities and their staff. Wyomingites are being subjected to principals and arguments which contradict the true frontier spirit of our great state. I have witnessed an ideological change in our legislative body over the last decade, many of those who are attempting to change our state into a place that hinders prosperity and drives out diverse career opportunities for our children.

I implore you to reach out to your legislator and don’t let them ruin our home because of outside influences.

Jason A. Senteney
Torrington

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