Laramie finance director outlines $95 million ballot plan for public safety, infrastructure and recreation

Jen, the City of Laramie's finance director, outlined the city’s proposal for a specific-purpose excise tax on the May 5 special-election ballot and said the measure would raise "$95,000,000 over a 10 to 12 year period."

The tax is a specific-purpose excise tax, Jen said, meaning the city can spend the proceeds — and any interest earned on those proceeds — only on the projects listed on the ballot, a design she characterized as providing “a really high amount of transparency.”

Jen said the ballot allocates roughly $8,400,000 for a relocated Fire Station 1, which the city says would improve response times and provide better equipment storage. "One of the projects on the ballot is actually a relocated fire station 1," she said, describing the change as needed to respond to how the community and student housing patterns have shifted.

On policing and emergency communications, Jen said the ballot includes $12,000,000 for improvements to the Laramie Police Station and to create a more integrated public-safety campus. Part of that plan, she said, is to bring dispatch out from beneath the jail and into space that better supports the work of dispatchers so they can coordinate more efficiently with police, fire and the sheriff. "There's $12,000,000 on the ballot for improvements to our Laramie Police Station," she said.

Jen also said $3,600,000 is on the ballot to move and upgrade the animal control facility into the proposed public-safety campus. She described the current animal-control site as too small to handle present workloads and said the relocation would create a more appropriately sized, humane workspace. "We're gonna bring it into that public safety campus and deliver it in a way that is more appropriately sized and more humane for the work that they do," she said.

Beyond public safety, Jen said the measure would allocate about $19,000,000 to critical infrastructure projects such as surface-water drainage and streets, and $2,000,000 to continue supporting the Laramie Recreation Center. She encouraged residents to review a roughly 20-minute informational video the city posted to learn more about the projects and their expected community benefits.

Jen said city staff have coordinated with the county and the Town of Rock River in planning the proposals since at least last summer and framed the ballot as a 10–12 year planning horizon intended to address deferred needs. "We have been planning for this tax since at least last summer to really get our priorities in line and make sure that this next ballot reflects our needs for the next 10 to 12 years," she said.

There was no formal motion or vote recorded in the presentation itself; Jen presented the informational overview ahead of the May 5 special election and urged voters to use the provided materials when they cast their ballots.