Why It Matters: The Wyoming Travel, Recreation, Wildlife, and Cultural Resources (TRWC) Committee’s interim work sets the stage for the 2026 budget session, directly impacting sportsmen and women through policies on hunting licenses, wildlife management, and habitat conservation. Engaging now ensures that sportsmen and women play a key role in shaping Wyoming’s future.
Highlights:
- The Wyoming Travel, Recreation, Wildlife, and Cultural Resources Committee recently reviewed key proposals aimed at balancing increasing development with habitat, wildlife, outdoor recreation, and cultural heritage.
- Other topics of interest included license proposals for landowner tags, fishing guides, former residents returning home to hunt, and consideration of seasons based on method of take.
- The Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation (CSF) will be tracking the upcoming meetings, working with the members of our Wyoming Legislative Sportsmen’s Caucus, and our local partners as the bill proposals develop.
As states across the northwest conclude their 2025 legislative sessions, Wyoming has launched its 2025-2026 interim session with key meetings, including the TRWC Committee’s June 5-6, 2025 hearing. Wyoming’s biennial budget session is held every even-numbered year starting the second Monday of February and spans just 20 short legislative days as representatives work vigorously to craft a two-year budget. With hundreds of proposals in these fast-paced sessions, interim preparations are crucial for effective policy.
The recent TRWC meeting featured updates from the Wyoming Game and Fish Department (WGFD) and the Wyoming Department of State Parks and Cultural Resources, as well as legislator proposals. Discussions at this month’s meeting covered:
- Lodging tax Distribution
- Since the program began in 2021 the Wyoming lodging tax has raised just shy of $80 million for the state, revenues from which are currently utilized by the Office of Tourism for marketing and tourism development.
- State parks, wildlife, and outdoor recreation represent a significant portion of the tourism in Wyoming each year, and some believe that this fund could be utilized to supplement the existing revenue for departments like WGFD.
- Industrial Siting and Wildlife
- As a leader in energy production, Wyoming emphasized protecting wildlife migration corridors during solar and wind project siting, with potential compensatory fees to mitigate impacts.
- Landowner hunting licenses
- There is an interest in addressing hunting tag distribution in units where landowners receive a large percentage of available tags (up to 100% of the tags in a few instances). This issue was raised at the November WGFD commission meeting, and discussions will continue in July in Casper. The draft regulations will be reviewed at the July meeting, which will provide an opportunity for public testimony.
- Legislators will receive updates from WGFD and may consider other steps as well.
- Mule deer population status update
- Boasting the third largest population of mule deer in North America, Wyoming has been experiencing a steep downturn in population, declining by 47% since 2000.
- Habitat degradation, development, disease, vehicle strikes, and predation are just a few of the factors impacting the overall population.
- Despite the issues the population is facing, the buck to doe ratio has remained strong (32:100) allowing for continued mule deer buck harvest while management work continues.
- Fair chase and technology
- Legislators began some early exploratory work on the question of hunting technology like long-range rifles with advanced scopes and range finding systems.
- Questions that they considered as a group ran gamut of; the enforceability of any potential regulations, if the legislature should be regulating an ethics question?
- Hunters are familiar with the equipment ethics debate from archery advances to improvements with muzzleloaders. Generally, a question best resolved through outreach and education or with Departments of game and fish from a management standpoint, this conversation has boiled up to the legislature through constituent outreach and will likely be explored further at their meeting in August.
- Welcome home to hunt
- Modeled partially after Montana’s Nonresident native and come home to hunt, this proposal would offer discounted license fees for former residents hunting with a sponsoring family member
- Transferable and marketable landowner tags
- Currently, landowner tags (mentioned in the bullet above) are reserved for the landowner and/or immediate family.
- The committee heard a legislative request to consider allowing for a wider transfer pool and ever sale of those tags.
- During the 2025 session Senate Bill 118 was proposed but did not move out of committee.
- The Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation had joined with our coalition partners in Wyoming to raise awareness of how SB 118 would conflict with Public Trust Doctrine, a pillar of the North American Model of Wildlife Management.
The TRWC committee will reconvene in August to refine bill drafts and gather public input and you can count on the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation to keep sportsmen informed as recommendations develop for 2026. CSF will advocate for sportsmen’s interest throughout this process ensuring that the Sportsmen’s Voice is reflected in any resulting legislation or rulemaking.
