Wyoming Senate approves package of bills; debates noncompete ban, anesthesia licensing, anti‑money‑laundering and wildfire measures

CHEYENNE, Wyo. — The Wyoming Senate on Monday passed a wide-ranging set of bills affecting employment, health care licensing, criminal law and wildfire management after hours of debate, amendments and committee action.

The Senate approved a package of bills on third reading and cleared several other measures through the committee of the whole. Major actions included passage of a bill to restrict mandatory noncompete agreements, adoption of licensing for anesthesiologist assistants with an amendment that changed supervision rules, enactment of a state anti‑money‑laundering offense, and measures to fund and study wildfire management and to allow the Game and Fish Commission to set trap setbacks on state lands.

Why it matters: The voted measures touch on immediate state policy priorities — workforce mobility and business formation (noncompetes), health‑care staffing (anesthesia licensing), criminal enforcement capacity (anti‑money‑laundering), and wildfire preparedness and public‑lands recreation conflicts (wildfire task force and trapping setbacks). Several bills also moved by consent, clearing a long consent calendar that the majority leader described as “the longest I’ve seen.”

Noncompete ban (Senate File 107)

The Senate passed Senate File 107, titled “Freedom to Work and to Build Business,” after adopting an amendment that phased repayment obligations employers could seek when they subsidize an employee’s education or relocation. Sponsor Senator Nethercott said the bill “protects the free market, by allowing employees the freedom to work and build competing businesses,” arguing it prevented employers from “trapping” lower‑paid workers. Opponents called the bill government intrusion into voluntary contracts; Senator Ihde said the state should not insert itself into voluntary marketplace agreements.

Senator Scott, speaking for supporters, told the Senate that the bill would particularly help health‑care access by limiting noncompetes that can block practitioners from staying in communities that need them. The bill passed on third reading.

Anesthesia assistants (Senate File 112)

Senate…