07-02-2025
Another 'arrow in the quiver': 50% tax break on homes up to $200,000 passes Wyoming House committee
CHEYENNE – As representatives deliberated a bill that proposes one of the largest property tax cuts in Wyoming history on Thursday, another bill offering similar, yet smaller relief was passed by the members of the House Revenue Committee.
Rep. Scott Heiner, R-Green River, introduced a bill similar to Senate File 69 with his own House Bill 130, 'Homeowner tax exemption-amendments,' in the House Revenue Committee.
Heiner told committee members he hoped to approach this property tax relief with a 'win-win' mindset. HB 130 creates a 50% tax exemption for all homeowners up to $200,000 of the residential structure's fair market value. Lowering the ceiling to $200,000 is to help lower the overall cost to both the state and its local communities, Heiner said. The bill's fiscal impact is a revenue loss of approximately $83 million per year, according to the Legislative Service Office.
Qualified homeowners must live in the home for eight months of the year, and the bill excludes residential land from the tax exemption. The bill is effective immediately and has a two-year sunset date, ending in the 2027 tax season.
'We're putting a bunch of arrows in the quiver, and as we start going to the archery range, we're going to see which arrow is closest to the mark,' Heiner said. 'I know it's difficult with all these different ideas. Some of them are similar, some of them are kind of radical, but that's part of the act of legislation is finding the best fit.'
The bill also includes a $176 million backfill out of the state's general fund. Heiner originally included funding part of this backfill from unencumbered energy matching and large energy matching funds. Wyoming Energy Authority Executive Director Rob Kieger told lawmakers there's currently $46 million left in energy matching funds and $100 million left in large energy matching funds.
These funds are pulled out of the state's general fund. Heiner proposed using these monies as state backfill, and funding the remaining $30 million directly out of the state's general fund. However, Petroleum Association of Wyoming President Pete Obermueller said this section of the bill is a 'double whammy' on Wyoming's fossil fuel industries.
'As this bill is written, it's nothing but lose for oil and gas,' Obermueller said.
Pete Obermueller
Pete Obermueller is president of the Petroleum Association of Wyoming.
The severance tax paid by oil and natural gas companies is a major source of funding for the state's general fund. Not only does HB 130 shift the burden to oil and gas, Obermueller said, but it also claws back an investment in industrial projects. So far, $98 million in energy matching funds have been used to fund projects, 75% of which are fossil fuel projects.
'This bill claws back an investment in projects that my members leverage to help us advance what we do, to provide more revenue to the state, provide more jobs and to ride to your rescue,' Obermueller said.
Committee members later removed this provision of the bill through an amendment, so the energy matching funds would not be touched to backfill lost property tax revenue to local communities and school districts.
Wyoming Farm Bureau Federation policy advocacy director Kelly Carpenter said her organization supported this bill, 'as it is more targeted support for those truly needing relief.' She said more and more wealthy absentee landowners are acquiring large lots of land, and it's been noted the agriculture industry pays the lowest amount toward the state's general fund.
'It's very reasonable to assume that agricultural land may very well be the next place to look to raise taxes sometime in the future, leaving a larger burden for those legacy ag operations that remain,' Carpenter said.
Converse County Assessor Dixie Huxtable said the bill poses a huge administrative burden on county assessors to implement it this year. She told lawmakers an estimated 275,000 applications are expected to be submitted for this tax exemption, and county assessors would only have a couple of months to design and process those applications.
'We would be happy to work on that for 2026, but for 2025, we just don't think, as the bill is written, the application process that could be done,' Huxtable said.
Rep. Liz Storer, D-Jackson, proposed an amendment to delay the application period until next year, but it failed to pass the committee.
The bill was passed on a vote of 7 to 1, with one member excused. It will now be sent to the House floor for three more rounds of voting, with a chance for members to bring more amendments for debate.
