Committee rejects plan to divert second portion of severance tax to highway fund

CHEYENNE — The House Transportation, Highways & Military Affairs Committee on Monday debated House Bill 29, a bill that would divert the second portion of Wyoming’s severance tax away from the Permanent Mineral Trust Fund and the Common School Land Fund and into the state highway fund.

The bill’s sponsor and the Wyoming Department of Transportation framed the measure as an attempt to address an agency-wide unfunded need the department estimated at roughly $400 million annually. "The first 1 is the severance tax and distribution, and the second 1 is the vehicle sales tax redistribution," the department’s representative said when introducing the bills to the committee, and later summarized HB 29 as “changing the distribution of the second tip of the severance tax to the highway fund.”

Committee members heard that the second portion of severance-tax receipts is currently split in statute between the Permanent Mineral Trust Fund and the Common School Land Fund (about $55 million…