2023 Session Retrospective: Rep. Ocean Andrew of House District 46

Andrew endorsed several bills addressing K-12 public schools, charter schools and homeschooling. He also signed onto efforts to restrict abortion, undo rental regulations and prohibit red flag laws.

Mar 20, 2023

During the 2023 General Session of the Wyoming Legislature, Rep. Ocean Andrew (HD-46) sought in many ways to limit government — for example, by restricting what it can do in schools, who it can charge as it collects property taxes, and what it can ask of individuals when its agents pull them over on the highway.

But Andrew also supported efforts to limit reproductive rights and place restrictions on the types of abortion Wyoming residents can access.

Andrew did not respond to interview requests, but his interests and efforts this legislative session are well-documented in the prolific number of bills he sponsored or otherwise endorsed this year.

The House District 46 representative brought more bills this session than any other Albany County legislator. He brought more bills — via sponsoring or co-sponsoring — than Rep. Trey Sherwood (HD-14) and Sen. Dan Furphy (SD-10) combined.

Rep. Ocean Andrew represents House District 46, which encompasses all of Albany County west and south of Laramie.

Red flags, rental regulations and property taxes

One of the bills Andrew co-sponsored would have banned local communities from passing Red Flag laws and ordinances. Red flag laws allow a state or community to issue “extreme risk protection orders” and confiscate an individual’s guns if they pose a risk to themselves, to intimate partners or to society at large. The bill Andrew co-sponsored — House Bill 250 — would have disallowed such measures in the state of Wyoming, but the bill died when it missed the deadline to advance out of committee.

Andrew supported the unsuccessful legislative attempt to outlaw Laramie’s rental regulations and forbid Wyoming communities from passing their own rental housing codes.

Andrew also took multiple stabs at property tax reform, bringing one bill to exempt childcare facilities and another to exempt senior citizens and veterans — both of which failed. But Andrew sponsored a third bill calling for a review of the way property taxes are calculated, which has now been signed into law by the governor.

Education, public and otherwise

Andrew sought to award government funds to families who put their children in private schools. He sponsored one bill to do this and co-sponsored another identical bill filed in the Senate, but both attempts failed.

That wasn’t the only change Andrew sought for Wyoming’s educational system, however.

He brought a bill to make public school easier for the children of military members and another bill to relax homeschooling restrictions. Both have now been signed into law by the governor.

Andrew co-sponsored an unsuccessful attempt to review teacher salaries as well as the unsuccessful attempt to remove protections for school libraries with Senate File 177.

He also co-sponsored a bill to ban school districts from requiring vaccines or masks. Dubbed the “Grace Smith Medical Freedom Act,” the bill was a copy of an earlier bill Andrew brought during the 2021 special session. The “Grace Smith” bill would have allowed any student to gain an exemption for any reason for mask or vaccine rules. These exemptions would not be limited to COVID-19 prevention measures; they would have allowed parents to exempt their children from any and all vaccines required by the public school system. The Grace Smith Medical Freedom Act died when it missed the deadline to advance out of committee.

Andrew further co-sponsored a Senate Joint Resolution that would have placed the onus for building school facilities onto individual school districts. The resolution would have changed the Wyoming Constitution, which currently places that responsibility on the state. This bill also died.

While many of his education-related bills failed, Andrew did co-sponsor a successful attempt to establish a governing board for charter schools. The board will establish rules for charter schools, oversee their approval and renewal, and dictate how those alternative schools fit into their local public school district.

The establishment of this board was opposed by Sen. Chris Rothfuss, and Albany County Representatives Ken Chestek, Karlee Provenza and Trey Sherwood.

But that’s not to say Andrew’s fellow Albany County lawmakers always opposed him. Both Sen. Rothfuss and Rep. Provenza co-sponsored bills with Andrew. Provenza co-sponsored House Bill 120 with Andrew, which sought to limit police power during traffic stops. And both Provenza and Andrew were co-sponsors on Rothfuss’s unsuccessful senate resolution to enshrine healthcare privacy protections in the Wyoming Constitution.

Andrew is serving his second term as House District 46’s representative.

Committees:

House Education
Select Committee on Blockchain, Financial Technology and Digital Innovation Technology

The Laramie Reporter

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