NEWS BRIEFS for Wednesday, January 29, 2025

From Wyoming News Exchange newspapers

Wyoming’s average gasoline prices unchanged from a week earlier

CHEYENNE (WNE) — Average gasoline prices in Wyoming are unchanged in the last week, averaging $2.89 per gallon Monday, according to GasBuddy. com’s survey of 494 stations in Wyoming.

Prices in Wyoming are 7.3 cents per gallon higher than a month ago, and stand 27.4 cents per gallon higher than a year ago.

According to GasBuddy price reports, the lowest price in the state Sunday was $2.47, while the highest was $3.69, a difference of $1.22 per gallon.

The national average price of gasoline has fallen 0.9 cents per gallon in the last week, averaging $3.08 on Monday. The national average is up 6.5 cents per gallon from a month ago, and stands 1.8 cents per gallon lower than a year ago, according to GasBuddy data compiled from more than 11 million weekly price reports covering over 150,000 gas stations across the country.

The national average price of diesel has increased 4.4 cents in the last week, and stands at $3.65 per gallon.

This story was published on January 29, 2025.

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Teen arrested in fatal hit and run

RIVERTON (WNE) — A juvenile male was taken into custody during Lander’s wrestling invite on Friday after allegedly being involved in a fatal hit-and-run crash in Thermopolis earlier that morning.

Bernadine Blacketer, 85, was crossing the street on the 700 block of Arapahoe at 6:55 a.m. on January 24 when she was struck and killed by a GMC Yukon headed east.

According to the Wyoming Highway Patrol, driver inattention may have been a contributing factor in the crash.

The driver did not stop or render aid to the victim, according to Thermopolis Police Chief Pat Cornwell, and the department asked residents with surveillance cameras for assistance in identifying the fleeing driver.

A short time later, Cornwell indicated the driver had been located.

The Lander Police Department was called to Lander Valley High School on Friday at 8:58 a.m. on a report that a wrestler for the Thermopolis Bobcats was involved in the morning incident and should be taken into custody.

This story was published on January 29, 2025.

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No preferred pronouns, Senate says

CHEYENNE — The state Senate has passed a bill out of committee to prohibit Wyoming from requiring anyone to refer to people by their preferred pronouns.

Sen. Lynn Hutchings, R-Cheyenne, told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday that Senate File 77, “Compelled speech is not free speech,” was brought to her by a constituent, and “simply states … that the state and its political subdivisions shall not compel or require an employee to refer to another employee using that employee’s preferred pronouns.”

Hutchings said there are people who use pronouns that are “pretty much made up, and (it)

would be hard for any employee to try to keep up with in the workplace.”

Ben Moritz, executive director of the Wyoming Community College Commission, said that while his organization did not have an official position on the bill, he had heard concerns that SF 77 could have a chilling effect on academic discourse and hiring procedures.

“This is about a prohibition on being forced to use a pronoun. There is a context and an atmosphere around those discussions, and that is where we have heard some concerns from faculty in particular that, will this make having frank and open discussions more difficult?” Mortiz said.

Sara Burlingame, executive director of Wyoming Equality, said that SF 77 is another in a line of bills introduced this session that fundamentally promotes “bullying.”

However, Nathan Winters with Wyoming Family Alliance spoke in support of SF 77.

“It is fine for one to believe something about themselves, even if it doesn’t line up with the reality,” Winters said. “Yet, when they compel someone else to acquiesce to their own belief, that is problematic because it forces that individual into what they would believe to be a lie.”

All five senators on the committee voted to pass SF 77, which will go to the full body for debate on the floor.

This story was published on January 29, 2025.