Episode Details

It's time to take a look at what's happening around Wyoming, for Thursday, January 16th. I'm Wendy Corr, bringing you headlines from the Cowboy State Daily newsroom - brought to you by Visit Casper. Visit Casper invites you to come enjoy the Casper International Film Festival, January 31 through February 2. A broad range of films from local and international filmmakers will be shown. Learn more and get your tickets at visitcasper.com.

Search crews that have scoured a mountainous region of Sweetwater County for a missing pilot and plane since Tuesday afternoon, found the pilot deceased at the scene of a crash on Wednesday.

50-year-old Kelly Melvin was the lone occupant of the single-prop Piper Comanche that left the Southwest Wyoming Regional Airport Tuesday morning. Cowboy State Daily's Clair McFarland reports that the crash happened just minutes after takeoff, near Little Mountain, southwest of Rock Springs.

"I think that they were maybe holding out hope there was an emergency landing, but about 315 Wednesday afternoon, they confirmed that it was the crash, that he was found dead, and then it was that location that they thought, where

the plane location data and the cell phone ping data had last converged."

A preliminary report will be available within 30 days; a probable cause of the crash along with any contributing factors will be detailed in the final report, which is expected in 12-24 months.

Read the full story HERE.

Gov. Mark Gordon used his State of the State speech Wednesday morning as a promotion for his $692 million supplemental budget request to the Wyoming Legislature.

Cowboy State Daily's Leo Wolfson reports that the governor framed the approval of this budget as playing an integral role in Wyoming's future.

"He was really trying to kind of urge lawmakers to take an approach that recognizes conservatism but doesn't take a slash and burn approach to the budget. He's really trying to promote common sense fiscal decisions and pragmatism, rather than just doing rash mass cuts. So he made his arguments for that, and he basically said that, you know, this has been a pretty successful recipe for Wyoming, and there's no reason to upset the apple cart and, you know, rewrite the script, so to speak."

Gordon said he appreciated the "seriousness and spirituality" of Tuesday's opening remarks of the 68th legislative session.

Read the full story HERE.

A large water feature that looks like a lake but is being called a "habitat pond" is among the more prominent of new features and structures proposed by billionaire Joe Ricketts for the former Granite Creek Ranch, which also lies in an important watershed for one of Wyoming's best trout fisheries, the Hoback River, in the Gros Ventre Wilderness.

Cowboy State Daily's Renee Jean reports that Ameritrade founder and Chicago Cubs owner Ricketts bought the ranch last fall, after abandoning a similar project in Bondurant called The Homestead Resort, where Ricketts had hoped to set up a posh resort that would cater to the wealthy, as well as showcase the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

"It's an in holding in the Bridger Teton National Forest. It's completely surrounded by the wilderness… he is going to build some new structures, a new main lodge, a naturalist center, a spa, a brand new habitat pond. To me, it looks like a big lake, but they said it's a habitat pond… And so I asked, you know, is it fair to say that this is the ho