Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Wyoming Military Department topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Wyoming Military Department asks committee to study firearm-hold agreements, recruitment bonuses, militia statutes and veterans services
Summary
Major General Greg Porter, Adjutant General, asked the Joint Transportation Committee to study a set of military-related interim topics including firearm-hold agreements to reduce suicide risk, a recruiting referral bonus, militia statute cleanup and veterans services clarifications.
Major General Greg Porter, the state Adjutant General, presented several proposed interim topics from the Wyoming Military Department, asking the committee to consider follow-up work on firearm-hold agreements, a recruiting referral bonus, Title 19 statutory cleanup related to militia activation and veterans services including indigent burial authority.
Porter told the committee the firearm-hold agreement proposal was intended to reduce veteran and service-member suicide risk by authorizing a mechanism for temporarily transferring weapons to a third party and clarifying liability protections for the holder. "If somebody was having a really bad day ... they could take their weapons and give it to a friend to hold," Porter said, and the proposed change would relieve the temporary holder from liability when the owner later asks for the items back. The Adjutant General said a prior bill on the topic passed committee work in the interim but died on first reading on the Senate floor amid misunderstandings.
On recruitment, Porter described a referral bonus program used in recent years that pays serving Guard members who provide leads that culminate in enlistments; the program was designed to address post-deployment attrition and earlier COVID-related shortfalls. Porter asked the committee to consider extending or reproving the referral bonus so the Guard can regain and maintain strength.
Porter also asked the committee to examine Title 19 language governing state militia and governor authorities. He said some statutory language currently constrains the governor’s ability to call up forces under certain conditions and recommended either a short-term fix or a more fulsome review ahead of the 2026 session.
On indigent veteran burials, Porter said current statute explicitly references "combat veterans" and that counties traditionally handle indigent burials; the department asked for clarification in statute to ensure counties have clear authority to provide burials for other veterans. Tim Shepherd, executive director of the Wyoming Veterans Commission, told the committee the issue has national analogues and that states have taken different approaches; he said he did not know of specific unburied cases in Wyoming but supports a study to eliminate ambiguity.
Committee members expressed differing views on proper committee jurisdiction for some items. Representative Banks and Senator Cole suggested firearms-related liability and holder protections might be better examined by the Judiciary Committee because of legal and liability questions. Senator Cole said the firearm-hold bill had been tried and failed in the past and noted the legal complexity. The co-chairs said they would discuss transferring the firearm-hold topic to Judiciary with the Judiciary chair and that other military topics (recruitment/strength, Title 19 statutory cleanup, veterans services) would remain under this committee’s interim work if the committee desires.
No final vote on legislation was taken. The committee asked staff to package the military department topics for Management Council and indicated possible next steps: study and stakeholder outreach on firearm-hold language (potentially in Judiciary), evaluation of the referral bonus for enlistment impact, and a statutory review of Title 19 militia provisions prior to the 2026 session.
