GUEST VOICES


Is strategic leadership essential in the Governor's office? Yes. The Western Governors Association (WGA) placed the economy, energy, water, national security, and people of the Western states at grave risk. The WGA promoted a false narrative of Decarbonizing the West. Meanwhile the real disaster looming was the Colorado River mega drought.

Contributing to the Colorado River crisis is decades of over-permitting and development in 7 desert and arid states. The Colorado River 1922 Compact’s defects have been known since the 1930s. Now six states are directly compromising the region and nation. The effect cannot be understated.

Roughly 25 percent of the U.S. food supply originates in the Imperial Valley along the Colorado River. Its loss is estimated $1.3 trillion annually to U.S. GDP. The abuse of water from the Colorado River will have a negative multi-trillion-dollar economic impact on the nation and erosion of food security and food sovereignty.

The Western electrical grid is threatened by loss of Glenn Canyon and Lake Powell that are critical to energy security and will set back national energy independence by half a century.

Impact on national defense of relocating 95 of 335 military bases that are 30 percent of strategic defense—plus 37 percent of national defense industrial base is a major threat.

Water levels continue to drop in Wyoming and the West. Overbuilding is a direct threat to us all. AI data centers expand while agricultural and domestic water use is cut off —a direct threat to human safety. Development, and permitting must stop until this situation reverses, if it ever does.

This is not fiction. The illusion of land made utopia in a desert or arid lands defies common sense. Consider a housing-price collapse, a mass out-migration of homes abandoned, colossal unemployment, cascading home equity losses as prices plummet, the domino loss of banks and insurers. This is a colossal leadership fail that could cause a personal, regional, and national economic Armageddon. Water availability is at a fraction of historical levels, and population has multiplied. Bureau of Reclamation estimates 40 million are now affected by the low water level. Where will residents of 7 major cities resettle? If we don’t fix Wyoming we face the same fate.

The crisis the WGA governors created is REAL. The Wyoming Legislature and our Governor share equal responsibility for not preparing. We are next.

Protecting people, water security, food security and national resilience above corporate welfare is the first priority of government, and they have done nothing as far back as 2010. History will judge the consequences of their negligence and their choice of over building. Was it to get more property tax? Where was any compassion for people?

Who you elect for Governor and every public office is critical. These Associations are the problem because they have the arrogance of influence over government. One single metric would have prevented this catastrophe: - - Compassion for the condition of people. Governor Gordon, former Speaker Barlow, and SLIB board are just as guilty of negligence to prepare the state. They promoted big government and corporate welfare while ignoring the real need of Wyoming people that the government serves. Water, agriculture, power. Except during election years.

Brent W Bien

Brent Bien For Governor

Cody, Wyoming