What’s at stake

Last week, when the Legislature’s Joint Revenue Committee met in Casper, committee members heard testimony that they usually don’t. 

About two dozen homeowners attended the meeting to urge lawmakers not to make further property tax reductions. Homeowners said they worry additional reductions will lead to a further decline in the tax revenue that pays for local services.

In Wyoming, property taxes fund a range of government services – principally counties and schools. Property taxes also fund special districts, including fire, ambulance, cemetery and hospital districts, among others.  Importantly, these taxing districts do not have other options for raising revenue. 

Responding to voter concerns about increasing property taxes, in both 2024 and 2025 legislators passed bills that would reduce residential property taxes. 

It is fair to say that some residential property taxes did increase dramatically following the pandemic, causing homeowners to rightly be concerned. But that increase wasn’t due to some sort of “tax and spend” plan by the state or counties. That increase was solely tied to the state’s housing market. Home prices went up, and as a result, so did residential property taxes. 

Now those surging prices have slowed, yet some legislators seem to be operating under the pretense that promising to continue to reduce property taxes is good for getting reelected. 

As a political strategy, this makes tremendous sense. It’s made all the easier by the fact that the taxes the legislators are cutting don’t fund the state’s budget. So they get all the benefits of being able to tell constituents that they’ve reduced property taxes, but they don’t have to make any of the hard decisions – like which roads to quit plowing or how to stretch the ambulance service budget to provide coverage for the entire county. 

Thanks to increased oil production, Johnson County fared better than most in the latest round of property tax reductions. The Buffalo Senior Center was able to stave off draconian cuts this year by tapping into their reserves. This is not a long-term solution and unless more funding can be found, the center is looking at dramatic cuts in services. In Big Horn County, commissioners closed two branch libraries. In Casper, the city reduced its parks maintenance budget for the summer. 

The committee will discuss a draft bill at its November meeting that would abolish all property taxes in the state. How those estimated $2 billion would be made up is unclear, though legislators have floated the idea of raising the state’s sales tax. 

What is clear is that the latest property tax reductions – and subsequent cuts to services people enjoy – have gotten residents’ attention and they understand what is at stake.