- [Introducer] Funding for this program was provided in part by the Wyoming Public Television Endowment and viewers like you.

(motivational instrumental music) - [Introducer] Wyoming PBS, Wyoming Public Media, and Central Wyoming College present, Election 2022, the Wyoming Gubernatorial Debate, live from the Robert A Peck Theater on the campus of Central Wyoming College.

(upbeat instrumental music) - Good evening and welcome to the campus of Central Wyoming College.

I'm Craig Blumenshine, and it's General Election Debate Night here on Wyoming PBS and on Wyoming Public Media.

We have two debates that we're having this evening.

The first are the candidates to become Wyoming's governor, and that will happen just momentarily.

The second debate will begin in about an hour, and those will be for the candidates for Wyoming's Lone US House Seat.

All three candidates for governor are here this evening and I'd like to introduce them to you now.

The first is Democrat candidate, Theresa Livingston.

The second is Libertarian candidate, Jared Baldes.

And the third is Wyoming Governor, Republican, Mark Gordon.

We have three panelists who have joined me tonight and we'll be asking questions of the candidates, and I would like to introduce them also to you now before we begin the debate tonight.

On my far right is Steve Peck, the longtime newspaper publisher of the "Ranger in Riverton" and current Wyoming PBS Public Affairs producer.

In the middle of the panelist section is Katie Roenigk, also a longtime reporter for the "Ranger in Riverton" and now a reporter for "County 10".

And to my immediate right is Kamila Kudelska from Wyoming Public Media.

She is the managing editor for Wyoming Public Media.

Every candidate will get an opportunity to answer every question this evening in what we know will be a very civil debate, with issues that are important for Wyoming voters to hear.

Candidates have not seen the questions that the panelists will ask them, and they are appearing in front of you from a random draw that was held just a moment ago.

The candidates have been briefed and have accepted the rules for tonight's debate.

So without any further ado, we're gonna begin the Gubernatorial Debate right now.

And the first question for Ms. Livingston will be asked by Steve Peck.

- Candidates, good evening.

State data show that about 25% of state workers in the executive branch of government alone have left their jobs in the past two years, creating a lingering gap in filling these state government positions.

Similar worker shortages have been reported, at least anecdotally, in judiciary and legislative staff positions as well.

What could be done to remedy this worker exodus in Wyoming?

- That's a good question.

I'm on the School Facilities Board, so I'm aware of this because they've had a hard time filling positions on that.

And COVID caused a lot of things to happen.

People found different ways to do jobs and other jobs that they would like to do where they could be at home or live closer to their family.

We could raise the wages, but I think that we need to maybe be a more liberal state instead of such a conservative state.

'Cause sometimes I really wonder if that has an issue with people staying on or young people moving here.

But mostly we need to listen to the younger people 'cause I think they can provide us a lot of really great answers of how to make this all work and have people in those jobs.

Thank you.

- Thank you, Ms. Livingston.

Mr. Baldes?

- Well, I wanna first thank everybody for being here tonight and thank you PBS.

This isn't just in the executive branch, we're seeing this throughout Wyoming and its economy.

What Wyoming needs to do is Wyoming does need to make this a place for families to stay, where families wanna come.

We can solve these, try to be specific to one place, and it's not just in government.

This isn't a private sector, so we need to be making sure that this is a place that Wyoming families wanna stay and this is where they wanna come.

- [Craig] Thank you Mr. Baldes, Governor Gordon?

- Well, thank you and thank you for you tuning in tonight.

It's great to be here with great candidates on the stage.

This is an issue that I looked at four years ago and one that we've tried to address in a number of ways.

One is, we moved to raise the wages of people working for the state.

The second thing is that we needed to recognize that there are a lot of people that work for the state that are approaching the end of their careers or have found a way to find more rewarding jobs in the private sector.

And so what we're really working on now is trying to make the workplace a better place to be, and then also increase the pipeline of people coming through into state government.

And we're doing that with our educational initiatives.

And then finally, I think it's just really important that we make sure that our state employees are recognized for the great work that they do, and we're trying to do that across the executive branch.

This is not an issue that is unique to state government.

It is an issue that we're seeing across the state and it really talks about getting ready for a future, and Wyoming can embrace that future and bring more people into our workforce.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor Gordon.

Ms. Livingston, or excuse me, you have rebuttal time if you'd like it.

- No, I agree with everybody.

It's a consorted effort of a whole lot of people.

Even the Federal Government is having a hard time filling jobs and those used to be, we got some many candidates, we had to limit it because we had good benefits.

But it's not the same anymore.

- Thank you, the next question will be for Mr. Baldes from Katie Roenigk.

- State lawmakers and officials have been discussing a number of potential changes to Wyoming's voting system.

Among them, a statewide commission to oversee elections, open primaries, and this week, removing absentee ballot dropboxes.

What do you think of those ideas, and in general, do you have confidence in Wyoming's voting system?

- Thank you for the question.

I think if removing those dropboxes is gonna make Wyoming voters more, giving them more confidence in their voting, then it's something that we may look at.

Listen, our elections is what defines us.

That is where all of our confidence comes from.

That is our revolution every two to four years.

So whatever we need to do to restore confidence, then that's what we need to do.

As far as open primaries, we can look at it.

You're talking to a libertarian, okay.

We've been fighting this fight for 50 years.

So if that's what we need to do, then that's what we need to do.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor Gordon?

- Well thanks for that question, it's certainly a topic that's much in everyone's mind.

I have said over and over again that Wyoming elections are secure.

I know this 'cause I vote with the same election judges I have ever since I started.

A few of them have passed, sadly.

But I know that Wyoming elections were secure and they were handled correctly.

I know that in those cases where there were dropboxes, they were under surveillance on a regular basis.

That's obviously an issue the clerks can take up on an individual basis, and I certainly support that discussion.

As far as looking at revamping our election code, I signed the bill for voter ID a few years ago.

I think both Secretary Buchanan and I worked hard to try to strengthen our absentee balloting to make sure that we had proper credentials and identification for those things.

There's always ways that we can improve what we do.

But I think as we look at major revamps of the way that we're gonna conduct our elections, we should do that carefully and thoughtfully 'cause there are outside consequences on the other side.

So I'm really looking forward to what a Corporations Committee can do, and I'll review those bills carefully.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor.

Ms. Livingston?

- I've had the privilege to be an election judge, which I think everybody should do because it really shows you how secure our elections are in this state.

There is no way you could get one ballot in there.

All you do all day long is count.

Count how many people came in.

Count how many ballots were voted on.

Then the machine, all those counts have to be exact.

So it was a really good thing for me to do to see what it was like.

The absentee ballots show up that day.

We open them up, mark them off and then run them through the machine.

So they're done while the election, during the voting time, and that way we're assured that those ballots are safe too.

I like the fact that some states do mail-in stuff and they actually send you a booklet and it's about the propositions and a little bit about the candidates and other places you can find information.

And you're automatically registered to vote when you get your driver's license.

Half the people in this state don't vote.

A lot of the younger generation don't vote.

So to me it's more important to get people to vote and find easier ways to do it that are very secure.

- Thank you, Ms. Livingston.

- Mr. Baldes, you have rebuttal time if you'd like.

- I'm good.

- Okay.

The next question from Kamila Kudelska for Governor Gordon.

- Thanks for being here, everyone.

During COVID-19, Wyoming spent a lot of federal money to improve our mental health programs, which were much needed.

How should the state plan to sustain those programs as the federal money is starting to end?

- Well, thank you very much for that question.

And it was indeed clear that Wyoming needed to address the situation that arises from being isolated, we're a social species, so not being able to congregate.

We tried to make as much effort as we could to keep the state open, always balancing lives and livelihoods.

Your question goes to how do we sustain the efforts?

We need to first kind of grow our efforts on the mental health side.

We've passed the 988 number for suicide.

We brought in 24/7 suicide hotline in Wyoming.

These are all first steps.

The Legislature has said, let's look at how we can support community health.

The Wyoming Life Resource Center is now about to come online.

These are all facilities and technologies.

The summit, I stood up this week, really talked about how do we network, how do we do a better job of lifting up our mental health, not only at the community level, but to be able to do best practices from across the state?

We can do more there.

And I think as that begins to spin out, we'll begin to do a better job of targeting what resources we have for the best use, thank you.

- [Craig] Thank you Governor.

Ms. Livingston?

- Mental health, I've gone through years of suffering from depression so I know what that can be like.

But I was lucky enough to work for the Federal Government and have places I could go and people I could talk to.

But I think that if we passed Medicaid expansion, we would have more money for this.

This would help all of us find the care we need, especially in the schools right now.

We really need to go in there and have more mental health care workers to work with these kids and let them know they're okay.

And we need to accept everybody for who they are.

- [Craig] Thank you, Mr. Baldes?

- So, anytime we accept federal dollars, we can expect them to go away at some point or them to be used against us.

So this puts us in an interesting position because mental health is so important with our veterans, with our students, and with the population of Wyoming in general.

So I believe that this needs to be pushed.

We have gotten these programs started and they need to be self-sustaining.

But if we can get our communities more involved and our local municipalities and our counties, that would be the direction to push them.

But if we don't have the funding, Wyoming cannot afford to be continue spending money.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor, extra time if you'd like it.

- Well thanks, and I think the question really went to how we use some of our CARES dollars, not so much Medicaid expansion, which I have been on record as opposing.

I think the costs that Mr. Baldes talks about of the Federal Government walking away from that can be dramatic for the state.

But we do need to do a better job for our veterans that can start at the community level, and it's really important that we continue to engage.

- Thank you Governor, we're ready for our second round of questioning for Ms. Livingston from Steve Peck?

- It's now been more than five years since the Wyoming Legislature with strong encouragement from Matt Mead, who was the governor then, passed the ENDOW program whose initials stand for Economically Needed Diversity Options for Wyoming.

It was intended to tackle the problem of diversifying Wyoming's economy away from so much dependence on mining and energy industries.

There's not much talk of ENDOW these days, at least publicly.

And now the economy is benefiting again from a fiscal pendulum swing tied to higher oil and natural gas prices.

Governor, when you answer the question, you'll have your unique perspective on that on where we stand on diversifying the economy?

And to the other candidates, what do you think Wyoming ought to be doing to diversify?

- Well, thank you for that question.

And I was privileged to meet Matt Mead a couple of times but we didn't talk about that.

But I always believe that diversity is the best thing we can do because, like, when I first moved to Lander, the iron mine had just shut down and housing prices were really low.

But we're a really a resilient state when it comes to things like that so, for always, we need to be looking at better ways.

We have rare earth minerals, soda ash.

They're talking about having a mine for that.

There are endless things we can do.

I would like to see the younger generation be a brain pool and even think of more things that we can do all the time to diversify our economy, so we'll be a strong state no matter what is going on in the worldwide economy.

And we're also part of the worldwide economy and we have to remember that.

'Cause a lot of people seem to think that we're on our own and we control gas prices but we don't, it's all worldwide.

Thank you.

- Thank you, Ms. Livingston.

Mr. Baldes?

- Thank you.

So with oil and gas, it is a major part of Wyoming, and I fully support oil and gas.

I spent 15 years in the oil industry, not just here in Wyoming, but traveling throughout the Rocky Mountains.

So I firsthand can thank oil and gas for everything I own.

I do support oil and gas and not because it's how we as a state get our revenues, but because that is how I made my living and that's how I was able to provide for my family for many years.

My family had to diversify.

I had to find a different job.

My wife had to find a different career and we moved on.

And Wyoming is always gonna have oil and gas, but we do have to diversify.

Our economy, to diversify, we do have to have a qualified job market.

Our families have to quit leaving Wyoming.

We're educating our youth here with taxpayer funds at the University of Wyoming and then they're leaving.

So we do need to figure out how we're gonna keep those families here, how we're gonna keep those students here.

Our infrastructure, high bandwidth internet, we are in an age where internet is everything.

Hopefully Starlink can help that, but in rural Wyoming, you're not getting internet.

And the last thing is regulations.

We have to pull regulations off a new industry.

The Food Freedom Act was a great example of that right here in Riverton.

We had a local food market open up last weekend or weekend before last and it's doing great.

(beeper beeping) - [Craig] Thank you very much, Mr. Baldes.

Governor Gordon?

- Well, thank you.

And specifically talking about ENDOW.

ENDOW was a wonderful and aspirational program and we've taken a lot of the lessons that were delivered by the ENDOW panel and really morphed them into the work of the Wyoming Business Council.

At this point I said, the ENDOW work gives us sort of a footprint, which is what Governor Mead wanted, but now we need to put everything into action.

That came about the same time as the Saudis and the Russians were going at it tooth and tong, to try to figure out how to cut the legs out from our domestic oil and gas business.

And then of course we had COVID.

But during that time, over these last four years, we've seen a remarkable amount of diversification.

Wyoming is growing its trust business, it's growing its banking business.

Wyoming has introduced the first advanced nuclear reactor, which is be coming online fairly, fairly soon, in the next few years.

What really is exciting about that though is not the reactor itself, but all the ancillary business in advanced manufacturing that will come from that.

We've also had right here in Riverton, CAFARO move in.

Soon, Brunton is coming back.

These are exciting things.

Eagle Claw has moved into Casper.

Tourism industry has grown, to Mr. Baldes' point.

We've had a lot of growth in our ag processing sector.

So diversification is happening and not at the expense of our traditional oil and gas or coal industries, which we're still fighting for.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor.

Ms. Livingston, additional time if you'd like it?

- No, thank you.

- Next question from Katie Roenigk for Mr. Baldes.

- The Legislature's Revenue Committee is looking for new funding sources to support K-12 schools in Wyoming.

One suggestion is to build a gaming facility on state-owned school trust land to generate revenue.

Would you support that strategy or more broadly, what do you think Wyoming should do to address its K-12 funding shortfall?

- Yes, I would support that.

I think that it's, I always draw a pause when gambling comes up in the state of Wyoming and we're so quick to stop it, when, what do we do when we are drawing an L-tag or a big game tag?

It is the same thing.

So to support something like that and not support gambling, I do not see the difference.

I think it's very hypocritical.

As far as education goes and funding, the Legislature needs to do a better job of defining the constitutional revision that is tying our hands right now.

The Supreme Court stepped in, they defined it for the Legislature.

The Legislature needs to take that back.

There's no reason the Supreme Court should be controlling our purse strings.

That is the Legislature's job.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor Gordon?

- Well, thanks.

Specifically, no, I don't support necessarily just sort of opening gambling.

I kind of regard gambling as a tax on people who have a hard time with math.

But nonetheless, we do have gambling in the state and it's gonna proceed on a local basis.

I'm a local government guy and I think that's fine.

For the state to try to set that enterprise up, I think is a mistake.

What I will say though is that three years ago, actually more than that, it was clear that we weren't gonna be able to fund education the way we always have.

That legislative discussion has always gone about.

The Supreme Court said you have to fund it and the Legislator is saying, we can't.

And so what I specifically did is to say, let's take a look from the bottom to the top at what we're expecting our schools to deliver, and let's make sure we're doing that correctly.

What we found out of the R.I.O.T Initiative is it takes 23 years to teach all the assessments that our state now requires.

That's obviously too much.

And so we're trying to figure out with the Board of Education and their Portrait of a Graduate, how to refine those down to a narrower set of really important, really important educational tools, and then we can talk a little bit more about what the funding source could be.

- [Craig] Governor, thank you.

Ms. Livingston?

- The biggest gamble of my life I've taken is to run for office and I'm really enjoying doing that.

I don't know if I feel like we should have more gambling, but that would be a whole contingency of people finding out the ways, is that gonna create more mental health problems and more issues for our jails because of corruption and things like that?

Not saying that that would happen.

The K-12 schools, I think we need to rethink a lot of things and how we're doing it.

We're never gonna have enough money to do schools the way I would think that we should do them, but there are other ways to do it.

Looking at schools, instead of rebuilding a school, remodeling a school has started to come up, which I think is a good thing.

I'm worried a lot about the charter schools, especially when I heard that they're gonna, the three of them, in 2023 are gonna cost like $14 million to operate.

But I think it's time to get a lot of people together to talk about this and see what the people of Wyoming think and what they really want.

And well, that's it.

Thank you.

- Thank you.

Rebuttal time if you'd like it, Mr. Baldes?

- I'll just say that as far as gambling goes, that's an individual liberty and we have to be able to trust that our citizens can make the right decisions.

It is not up to us, and I'll just stick with the individual liberty.

- Thank you, before we continue, I want to apologize to our viewers.

I understand we've had some brief technical problems.

It's also my understanding that they've been fixed and we're gonna press on with the debate here this evening.

Next question from Kamila Kudelska for Governor Gordon.

- We're gonna continue on the education funding, since it's so very important.

The Wyoming Education Association is saying that the state isn't properly funding the education system in the state and so is suing over it.

So I think we would like you to specifically address the question of whether educational funding in the state, if there is actually enough right now, and if so, is it constitutional?

- Well, thank you for that Ms. Kudelska.

I think when the Campbell cases and the Washakie cases were brought to the Supreme Court, the conclusion was how do we solve this issue of how do we educate kids equally, how do we provide the same constitutional requirement, really, across the state?

And the way they chose to solve it was on one variable, which was money.

And we have put more money towards education with mixed results.

But I'm not taking aim at the education system and I'm not taking aim at teachers who, I served on a school board.

I know how hard that work is.

I am saying when you have 23 years of assessments, when you have as many tests as are required, and when we're not necessarily achieving the kind of teacher opportunity that we'd like to see, it is time to sort of review what we're asking of our schools and then we can start the conversation about how do we provide the best education, which we can do.

How do we make sure that families find it great to live in Wyoming, which they'll wanna have because of education?

How do we make sure we have a strong education system?

These are all the things that we need to ask, not just how much money can we throw at education?

- [Craig] Governor, thank you.

Ms. Livingston?

- Well, my family moved to Wyoming from Montana because there were better schools here and smaller schools and I didn't want them to go to a big school where there was a lot of bullying.

And both my kids graduated from Lander High School and they've both done very well.

So the school system here is good.

I also worked as a special ed para in the school, so I got very involved in stuff and went to School Board meetings.

We just have to keep hacking away at it and we have to get our Legislatures to understand more about funding schools and what's necessary and what's not.

Being on the Facilities Board for schools, I've got to visit schools and it's amazing what they have done with their schools.

They're really just resilient.

They need something and they figure it out.

They needed housing for teachers, they've bought some cabins and fixed them up.

So it's really cool to see all these little things happening that could add up to a big thing, making us being able to have the funding we need for schools.

- [Craig] Thank you Mr. Baldes?

- Sure, so I'll go back to the constitutional revision.

We need to look at that for our funding.

Why are we spending so much?

And it is a constitutional revision but we take a look at that and the spending that we are doing is tying us to the Federal Government.

We need that federal monies.

If we can start pulling away from there, pulling away, get that constitutional revision, get it clarified, we can start taking back control of our schools and spending the right amount of money for our schools.

That's gonna help our students.

That's gonna help our teachers and our parents.

- [Craig] Thank you.

Governor, rebuttal time?

- Well, I just wanted to take a moment to just talk about how what we heard from our surveys, which were extensive across the state, is teachers are feeling overwhelmed.

They have too much to do in the classroom and they don't really have the time to teach.

We need to be able to liberate that kind of constraint so that teachers can do their job.

We also need to tell teachers that you can bring more people into the profession.

We really can do a better job.

- Thank you governor.

All right candidates, we're gonna shift gears now and begin our, what we call our lightning rounds.

You'll have 20 seconds to answer or to talk about each of these topics that will be thrown at you with no rebuttal time.

The first topic for Mrs. Livingston from Mr. Peck.

- Is it time to quit worrying about COVID in Wyoming?

- No, it's never time to quit.

I did some studies about pandemics when I was a lab tech in the military, as I am also a veteran, and they are going to happen again probably, so we need to be prepared for them for future pandemics.

But we did a good job and out of adversity comes great things.

We found lots of ways to do things differently.

(beeper beeping) - Thank you Mr. Baldes?

- I don't think it's ever time to quit worrying about a sickness, whether that be COVID, the flu or anything else.

But yes, Wyoming does need to keep moving forward.

We need to keep on the track we are on with our businesses opening and everything else.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor?

- It continues to be a concern but not something that should constrain the way we work.

And I'm particularly worried about our National Guard and our federal employees who are suffering with a mandate that is compelling them not to work.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor.

Katie Renick for Mr. Baldes?

- Electric vehicle infrastructure?

- We need to be careful what we're doing with electric vehicle infrastructure.

We cannot afford for our electrical grid to go down in the middle of winter in Wyoming.

That's all I got.

- Governor?

- So our electric vehicle plan is really designed around tourists being able to come in and access the great points that they can get at the parks and other places.

So people are gonna be driving passenger cars.

It's not suited for over the road traffic, for trucking.

- [Craig] Thank you, Ms. Livingston?

- I think it's a great idea but then I like to try new things.

There's always a better idea out there, why not?

We can get these electrical charging stations.

I think the cities and stuff could use electric vehicles around their towns and save money and help our climate.

- Thank you.

(Craig clearing throat) - Next, excuse me, lightning round topic for Governor Gordon from Kamila Kudelska?

- Property taxes?

- So property taxes have gone up a lot this last year, largely because of assessed valuations 'cause people wanna move to Wyoming.

There is a chance to look at targeted relief with the people that need it most.

- [Craig] Thank you, Ms. Livingston?

- I agree with that, that we need to help some of our senior citizens, not just an overall senior citizen things, but ones that really need help to have tax relief of some kind.

But the tax money is gonna be good for the state and the cities and the counties.

- [Craig] Mr. Baldes?

- Property taxes needs to be addressed now.

This is out of control.

This is affecting every Wyoming home, every Wyoming family, every Wyoming business.

We need to address it and we need to figure out how to bring this down, or at least control it.

And it goes back to property taxes funding education.

- Thank you, next set of lightning round topics.

We'll re start again with Mr. Peck for Ms. Livingston?

- Decriminalizing marijuana and cannabis products?

- Oh yes, I think we should.

I think it's a great idea.

We have a lot of people in jail that we won't have to pay for them to be in jail.

And medical marijuana is needed.

I can't take any opiates or anything.

They don't work on me.

They make me violently ill.

So I think it's a good thing.

And then, I don't know, I just think it's a good thing to do and we really need to think about it.

- [Craig] Mr. Baldes?

- Right now, the statistic is 80% of Wyoming wants this.

It's time we do it.

We already know the consequences and the health effects of alcohol.

Why do we continue down this road, filling up our jails, putting our police in danger for this type of thing?

It's time to move on.

- Governor Gordon?

- Well it's gonna be taken up by the Legislature, I'm sure at some point.

Personally, I'm opposed to it, but I will certainly look at whatever legislation comes.

- Thank you, next topic from Ms. Renick for Mr. Baldes?

- Medicaid expansion?

- Listen, Wyoming needs to come up with a solution.

Is that Medicaid expansion?

I don't think it is.

And the reason that is, is we will tie ourselves further to the Federal Government.

And when Wyoming wants to start making decisions, when we have our constitutional right to health access, (beeper beeping) Oh, we're on lightning round.

- Thank you.

Feel free to always finish your sentence if that buzzer goes off, Governor Gordon?

- So I'm opposed to Medicaid expansion because of what happens when it's stops.

I do think Wyoming is a small enough state that we can come up with a Wyoming solution, and I've been working on that over the last four years.

- [Craig] Ms. Livingston?

- Oh, I am very much for Medicaid expansion.

We've had hospitals here close down services like labor and delivery because they weren't getting enough income in.

Montana did Medicaid expansion and it really did help them keep hospitals and services open.

So yes, we need it.

- Thank you.

The last lightning round topic for Governor Gordon from Kamila Kudelska?

- Inflation?

- Well, it's interesting to hear this administration talk about pumping more oil from overseas when we can do it right here.

That's the cause of inflation.

We need to develop our resources here domestically for security and to stop inflation.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor.

Ms. Livingston?

- It's a worldwide economy.

It doesn't really matter how much oil we pump here, that's all based on the prices that OPEC has, and we don't have anybody on OPEC.

So we're gonna have to learn more about worldwide economies so we can understand them better.

- [Craig] Thank you, Mr. Baldes?

- Inflation is a form of tax.

The Federal Government is being funded very well right now with it.

But I have to agree with the Governor, we need to be pumping our own oil, we need to get our gas prices down.

We were independent not so long ago.

- Thank you very much.

I want to warn our panelists that we are ahead of schedule and we may need to dig in those extra questions that you guys have already discussed.

Just be ready for that.

And we'll begin with our regular Q and A time with rebuttal here.

Mr. Peck for Ms. Livingston?

- Another K-12 education question because no public institution in the state involves more Wyoming citizens from the thousands of public school, faculty and staff, to voters and their children than our K-12 education system.

Last month, the State Loan and Investment Board approved applications for three new charter schools in the state.

Given the challenges already facing our public school system, including as was mentioned earlier, a lawsuit from the Wyoming Education Association claiming state funding for public schools is inadequate, is the state's endorsement of three charter schools consistent with the constitutional mandate to provide the best possible public education for all Wyoming students?

- Do I think it's the best mandate?

No, I'm not really for charter schools.

I know of places they've had charter schools but they were tuition-based and grants and stuff like that, they weren't paid for by the state.

Just listening to what kind of curriculum they have, I can't think of the name of the institute where it comes from but to me, I looked into it and it's very bothersome.

I want our children to have a really diverse education and I think charter schools, the money that we give will hurt the other schools.

And by the way, the Federal Government gives us a lot of money for schools.

- [Craig] Thank you, Mr. Baldes?

- Well, I think that more school choice is always good.

I think SLIB would've probably looked at that and looked at it very closely, and they do amazing work.

So yeah, more school choice is the better.

We need to have that kind of choice.

Personally, I have one son in private school.

I have two daughters that are in public schools and we've also homeschooled.

- [Craig] Governor Gordon?

- Well, thanks.

And I wanna just make it clear that I don't believe the State Loan and Investment Board's passage really was an endorsement.

What it said is that you can proceed to kind of figure out how to negotiate a contract under very specific kinds of considerations, such as curriculum, sustainability and so on that will continue to go forward.

It was clear, and I've pointed this out when the bill came across my desk, that the system we have for setting up these charter schools is currently flawed and we are working on ways to try to tighten that up so that it's a stronger representation.

School choice is something that larger school districts of, like Natrona, have been able to accomplish.

And even in my old school district, which was Johnson County 1, we tried to provide a lot of latitude there.

School choice is important, and charter schools have a role to play.

But the way Wyoming is doing that needs to be refined and improved.

And it is really interesting when you look at one of those schools.

It came about organically, not from a national movement, but really from a community that said, we wanna build a school that makes a lot of sense for our community.

And I think that is a great model for our future.

- [Craig] Governor, thank you.

Ms. Livingston, extra time?

- There is good and bad things about it.

Like I said, I went to a Catholic school so I'm well versed in private schools.

I think our public school system here is great and I've heard that there's issues with special ed in some of the charter schools, but I'm not sure if that's correct or not.

But it's a lot of things to comprehend to have a good charter school if we do have them.

- Thank you very much.

Katie Roenigk, next question is for Mr. Baldes?

- Several communities are participating in Wyoming's relatively new Capacity Purchase Agreement that helps support continued commercial air service in the state.

Do you think it's appropriate for the state to be so involved in helping to maintain commercial air service in Wyoming cities and counties?

- Well, I think it's very important.

Riverton Regional is the middle of, it's central Wyoming, it's central of Wyoming Regional Airport.

And if Wyoming wants to continue its tourism, then it better be very involved in it.

- [Craig] Governor Gordon?

- Yeah, I think actually the Capacity Purchase Agreement is essential.

Riverton's obviously a beneficiary.

Sheridan, Rock Springs, Gillette, these are all communities that really depend on that Capacity Purchase Agreement, and it's important for them to be able to build out and diversify their economy.

That's something that we need to continue to work on.

Look, when I was was a kid, you could fly to Worland on Western Airlines, you could fly to Sheridan, you could fly to Casper.

Those services are now depleted.

And what we really need to have to be able to make our economy grow and diversify is reliable access.

And in order to get that reliable access, you have to have reliable ridership, and that reliable ridership comes from the Capacity Purchase Agreement.

- [Craig] Governor, thank you.

Ms. Livingston?

- Yes, we need this.

We need air service in our state.

I travel and my kids live on, one on the east coast and one on the west coast, so I count on that.

Cody used to have two airlines, now they only have one.

So it's hard but if you want tourists to come in here, you have to provide air service for them.

I'm also on a tourism committee so I know how important tourism is and how much it's grown, it's great.

- [Craig] Thank you, Ms. Livingston.

Mr. Baldes, extra time?

- Just back to what the Governor said just with the economy.

We have Brunton coming back to central Wyoming.

We have CAFARO here.

Those businesses do need to be able to ship their product and be able to ship it in a timely manner.

- [Craig] Thank you, next question from Kamila Kudelska for Governor Gordon?

- The Supreme Court is considering the constitutionality of the Indian Child Welfare Act this year.

Should Wyoming develop its own state level version of the law to ensure protections remain in place for Native American children?

- Well thank you for that question, and I won't opine on the Supreme Court's deliberations.

That is something that they'll figure out on their own.

But we don't wait for the court.

I will tell you, my administration has been extremely engaged with both of Shoshone and the Arapaho tribes to try to make sure that we do not only a better job of making sure our children are taken care of, but making sure that missing and murdered indigenous people don't go unrecognized or unaddressed.

And I'm very happy with the progress that we are making and have made over the four years.

It takes a certain amount of effort to get that done.

There's a trust and a capacity that has to be built up over time.

And we really feel very strongly that we have made enormous strides.

And I think the solution that comes is best done at a local level and it will be best done by the state.

- [Craig] Governor, thank you.

Ms. Livingston?

- I agree with Governor Gordon.

They're part of our state, we need to take care of them and help them with whatever resources we can.

Mostly, we need to listen to them, and I know that's happening a lot more and I'm very grateful for that, thank you.

- [Craig] Mr. Baldes?

- It is very important that we are listening and we're doing what we can.

Right here in Riverton, we're right next to the reservation.

And I think Riverton has made great strides in the direction of communication and support.

- [Craig] Thank you.

Governor, rebuttal time?

- Really, I have none.

- All right, thank you.

Next question from Mr. Peck for Ms. Livingston?

- Wyoming received a big chunk of federal money under the Federal Infrastructure Bill passed by Congress.

The state has a plan in place, but in your view, what are the state's specific top infrastructure priorities?

- We need to go around and I'm sure we have, and look at our bridges, our dams, our highways.

There are issues with plumbing and the sewer lines in different cities that should've been addressed a long time ago.

And now we have this money, we should be using it so that everybody is safe here and they can stay healthy.

- [Craig] Thank you.

Mr. Baldes?

- I alluded to this earlier with high speed internet.

Wyoming needs to get up to date on their internet and that will help us expand our economy and draw new business.

- [Craig] Governor Gordon?

- Well, thanks.

Wyoming's putting hundreds of millions of dollars into broadband expansion and it's gonna be exciting.

The challenge is gonna be, how do we maintain it after we get it there?

And that's something that we'll have to wrestle with.

But we are gonna be able to bring a lot more broadband throughout the state and that's gonna be exciting, not only for economic diversification, but that's just a cost of being alive these days is to have reliable internet.

But beyond that, we have a number of cities and towns that have dilapidated and failing infrastructure.

We need to be able to address that.

Whether it's water and sewer, this is an opportunity for us to be able to take the tax dollars that we pay and bring them back to Wyoming and put them to good use in rebuilding a lot of that infrastructure.

We also need to look carefully at irrigation infrastructure.

We saw with Goshen Irrigation District canal collapse of the tunnel a few years ago, that it's a multimillion dollar project to get that fixed.

When you look around at our irrigation infrastructure, most of it's over a hundred years old.

This is a great opportunity for us to be able to put more work into making sure that we can produce the food that this nation's gonna need.

- [Craig] Governor, thank you.

Ms. Livingston.

Extra time?

- I'm just grateful that this money is coming in to help our state.

- Thank you very much.

Next question from Katie Roenigk for Mr. Baldes?

- Plans have been announced for a new direct air carbon capture facility to be built in Wyoming.

Would you welcome that kind of development as governor and how do you see carbon capture fitting into Wyoming's energy economy in the future?

- Sure, so if it's creating more jobs, of course I'll be on board for it.

I think that we are, for some reason we are pushing away from coal in Wyoming and that's federally mandated.

But if we can create a way for us to continue the coal industry, if we have to carbon capture, then that's something that we need to do.

- [Craig] Governor Gordon?

- Well thank you.

Wyoming was the first state in the nation to talk about being carbon negative, not carbon neutral, not renewable, just carbon negative.

The challenge is how do we get carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere?

So direct air capture is obviously one way to do that and Wyoming has the capacity to be able to geologically store carbon dioxide, tremendous volumes of it for hundreds of years, and we need to be able to develop that.

But what's really important is that we also look at carbon capture off of our existing Legacy Fuels like coal, like oil and gas.

I've often said, the issue here is not an or, it's not renewables or a good environment.

It is renewables and our coal and oil and gas and we can do a better job for our environment.

That's why Wyoming is really leading the nation on carbon capture, improving these technologies, which is really the way we're gonna be able to address climate change in a meaningful way, not by putting people out of work, but by just making the work they do better.

And we can do that here in Wyoming.

We're already leading the pack.

- [Craig] Governor, thank you.

Ms. Livingston?

- I think carbon capture is a great idea.

We need to do everything we can in this state to keep our area safe and so that climate change doesn't take us over and end up being a totally desert state more than we are instead of a living desert state.

So things like carbon capture are a great idea.

- [Craig] Thank you, extra time Mr. Baldes?

- No.

- All right, candidates, this will be our last question before closing statements from Kamila Kudelska for Governor Gordon?

- Wyoming has no personal or corporate income tax.

Is that a sustainable tax policy?

- I think it absolutely is.

There are a number of states that don't have an income tax.

Wyoming actually has a constitutional prohibition.

Well, it's not a constitutional prohibition.

If we ever pass an income tax, you can write that off against your sales tax or your property tax or any other tax you pay.

So it doesn't really make sense to even talk about an income tax.

Wyoming can do a better job with our spending.

Already, in my time, we have the leanest budget that we've had in over a decade.

We've cut spending, we've leaned it up.

And at the same time, we've improved wages for folks working for the state of Wyoming.

We can do a better job and we'll continue to work on that in the next four years if I'm privileged to have that opportunity.

But to answer your question specifically, no, absolutely against any kind of income tax.

- [Craig] Ms. Livingston?

- Could you repeat the question?

- Yes, one moment.

Wyoming has no personal or corporate income tax.

Is that a sustainable tax policy?

- No, I don't think so, but then I'm a democrat and we always wanna have more taxes.

But when they were talking about it, they were talking about people that made more than $400,000.

I don't think there's anything wrong with corporate taxes because we would keep them low and none of those companies are gonna run away from Wyoming because we have a small corporate tax.

We need to be brave enough to try something new sometimes, so why not?

Thank you.

- Thank you, Mr. Baldes?

- Absolutely not, Wyoming does not need an income tax.

And to the tax, any taxes, if the Legislature sees fit to create taxes in Wyoming, the Legislature needs to know that if it comes across my desk, that it better have a sunset clause on it.

I understand if the Legislature passes it, that is the people speaking, but there needs to be a sunset clause on it and they can revisit it in two years.

- [Craig] Thank you, anything to add Governor Gordon?

- Just briefly, right now, Wyoming people benefit from the enormous taxes that are paid by our mineral industry, really an outsize share.

And really, if we're going to look at sustainability, I think it's important we look at what kinds of opportunities we can provide.

I think an export tax on electrons might be something to consider.

That's something that we've looked at before, but that would be a valuable tool.

- Candidates, we have a little bit of extra time, so we're gonna ask one more question and we'll limit the responses to our timekeeper to one minute.

If we would, Mr. Peck for Ms. Livingston?

- A big percentage of the COVID relief money that Wyoming received has been earmarked, not for spending but for saving.

What's your position on how much money should be saved versus spent, particularly in times when the economy appears to be on the upswing again?

- Well, I guess I thought that the COVID money was supposed to be spent now for things we need, not saved.

How do you justify that?

I'm not sure.

But there is so much more we can do with the COVID money.

We need to figure out somehow a way to help have more housing built and stuff like that.

Because they're gonna build a nuclear power plant, that's a lot of housing.

There's a automotive dealership going in Sheridan, that's a lot of housing.

Housing is a big crunch in a lot of places except maybe Worland.

- [Craig] Thank you, Mr. Baldes?

- Spent verse saved.

That money has come from the Federal Government with its strings attached, I'm sure.

If it's here then we need to spend it.

And where we spend that, let's look at where we have our shortfalls.

We had the question earlier on healthcare, there we go.

Education, let's look at those kind of things.

- [Craig] Thank you, Governor Gordon?

- Well, I think it's a little misleading to say that we haven't spent the CARES money.

What we have done is we've used the revenue replacement features of CARES to be able to spend the CARES money and set aside some of the money that that we had.

And the reason why we did that was because at some point those dollars are gonna run out, and we need to be able to have a glide path that allows us to slowly lower our expectations of that federal money being here for us to use.

- Thank you, Ms. Livingston?

All right, Candidates, we are at the point for closing statements and we'll go in reverse order of the draw that we had before the debate.

Governor Gordon, you're first.

- Well, thank you all for tuning in this evening.

Thank you Craig for running a wonderful debate this evening.

Thank you, panelists, and it really is a pleasure to be here.

Four years ago, Jennie and I stepped into this job really eager to see Wyoming grow and expand.

We had no expectation that we would see COVID hit, but as you know, Jennie's Hunger Initiative has grown to sort of meet the needs of people everywhere in this state, whether they be veterans or kids or seniors at home.

In in my time here, I've really tried to focus on diversifying the economy and making Wyoming a better and stronger place to live.

I think that's shown its results.

We were the state that had more kids in school longer than any other state in the nation.

That's reflected itself in the scores that we've had.

And we've now seen small businesses on main streets across Wyoming grow and expand.

For the first time in our state's recent history, we saw sales and use tax actually meet sort of the same level that our mineral taxes did.

So in the end, I've been very honored to be here and look forward to four years if you trust that.

And I would love to have your vote and I thank you very much for the opportunity and the favor you've given Jennie and me to serve the state these four years.

- [Craig] Governor, thank you.

Mr. Baldes?

- Well, thank you Wyoming PBS for holding this.

Thank you to both the candidates for being here tonight and thank you to the audience.

Wyoming's future is bright and we are heading in a good direction no matter what we see.

I think Wyoming can take a lot from our small town that we're in tonight in Riverton.

Riverton has been facing a lot of these struggles for many years and we're seeing a lot of growth here as well.

But Wyoming's future is bright.

It will be a tough road ahead and all I can ask is that you do your civic duty and you get out and vote on November, 8th, and I would appreciate your support, thank you.

- [Craig] Thank you, Mr. Baldes.

Ms. Livingston?

- I started out and I still am running for women's rights.

I want us to have all our rights.

It will help having these rights when medical care is necessary and doctors don't have to go through a whole checklist trying to find out if they can take care of you or not, or worried about being sued.

I think Medicaid expansion is very important to keep up medical hospitals and care like that because people won't wanna move here if there is not good care.

I believe there's always a better way.

I had students for many years when I worked for the BLM and that was our motto and we always tried to prove, to find a better way to do stuff.

We get a lot of money from the Federal Government that we need to be thankful for because it does help us keep our state going, 'cause there's no way we can make enough money that we wouldn't need all that federal help.

I always like to tell this story, so I want people to gather people together.

So I usually get asked that question, how do you get people together?

So Golda Meir, she was the first prime minister of Israel, and she brought Anwar Sadat and some other leaders from the Middle East that never talked to each other, into her kitchen and cooked for them to get them to talk to each other.

I wanna do things like that to get the Legislature and the younger people all to talk to each other about how we can make Wyoming even better.

And we need to listen to the younger generation, they're amazing.

- Candidates, thank you very much for participating tonight.

We proved to the nation and to the state again that we can have a civil discussion on topics that are important to Wyoming voters, and I appreciate your comments here this evening.

Thank you very much for being here tonight.

Up next at the top of the hour will be a US House Candidates Forum debate.

We'll be right back here in just a moment.

My thanks to Jennifer Amend, who was our timekeeper for this debate, and to the panelists as well.

We join the candidates in encouraging everyone to vote on November, 8th.

We'll see you in just a few moments for that US House candidates debate.

(upbeat instrumental music)