Seeking a third term, Commissioner Gosar says he’s ‘in the business of solutions’
The Democratic primary has drawn four candidates. Among them is Pete Gosar, an incumbent who has supported renewables, aquifer protection and public lands across his first two terms.
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Albany County Commissioner Pete Gosar said he’s proud of what the county has accomplished during his eight years on its highest elected body — from aquifer protection to renewable energy approvals and more.
But there’s still work to be done, and Gosar said the experience he brings as the only incumbent running in this year’s Democratic primary will be an asset to that work.
If reelected, Gosar said he’ll be able to collaborate with whomever joins him on the three-member commission next year.
“Most of our job, I think it would be surprising to you, is not ideologically driven,” Gosar told the audience during a Progressive Voter Alliance forum last month. “It’s solution-based, and if you’re in the business of solutions, I’ve not found somebody who wouldn’t meet you some part of the way.”
Gosar is seeking his third term on the commission, having first been elected in 2018 and reelected in 2022.
As in those earlier cycles, 2026 sees two of the commission’s three seats on the ballot. Accordingly, each major party may send two nominees to the general election.
The Republicans have theirs already: Commissioner Terri Jones and former Laramie Police Officer Chris Cleven, who were the only two members of the GOP to file this year.
The Democrats, however, have decisions to make. Four candidates are seeking the party’s two nominations. In addition to Gosar, they are Albany County Democrats Chair Klaus Halbsgut, Young Democrats leader Erik Boss, and retired wildlife ecologist Merav Ben-David.
Democrats will get to pick two of those candidates when they head to the polls next week.
“I still like the job. I still feel committed to the community,” Gosar said. “I would like to see the aquifer further protected, whichever ways we are able to do that. I’d like to see … the funding for Pilot Hill become more sustainable, so that the future generations of people in Albany County and Laramie can really just count on that being part of the reason that we all live here.”
Gosar said he has a track record of returning constituent calls and of being honest with members of the public — even and especially on topics where he disagrees.
“Laramie, Albany County, is a small enough place with few enough resources that collaboration is required,” he said. “And I feel that that has been something I’ve tried to be an example of.”
Outside of his work as commissioner, Gosar is the executive director of the Downtown Clinic, which serves uninsured residents of Albany County. He has been the director for more than a decade. Gosar also rents out two apartments, which provide him additional income.
The current commissioner is the only candidate in the Democratic primary who has held elected office.
The primary election is Aug. 18. Early voting has already begun.
What happened in Gosar’s first two terms?
The commission is a three-member body. All three seats are elected by the public. Those three then vote on a commission chair from amongst themselves. Typically, when a party takes control of the commission, its members elect their longest-serving compatriot to the chair.
Gosar has been on the commission for eight years. He spent the middle four as chair.
Gosar was elected in 2018, but spent his first two years on the commission as its only Democrat. In 2020, Democrats took the commission and Gosar became the chair. In 2022, Gosar was reelected to a second term. Because Democrats still held a majority, he kept serving as the commission’s chair. In 2024, Democrats lost control of the commission and Gosar lost his chair, becoming, once more, the body’s only Democrat.
The last eight years have been a transformative time for the county. As a member of the commission, and sometimes as its chair, Gosar played an active role in most of the major developments.
Those included the Pilot Hill Project: the successful effort to collaboratively purchase 5,500 acres of open land directly east of Laramie. With private donations and buy-in from a range of community partners, including the University of Wyoming, the land has been preserved as animal habitat and as a non-motorized recreation area, connecting the city of Laramie to National Forest land.
The commissioners also hammered out a Natural Resource Management Plan in 2022, going through multiple revisions before landing on a final version. The plan outlines the community’s wishes for the 24% of land in Albany County managed by the federal government.
“We passed the most public land-friendly natural resources plan this side of Jackson, and I think maybe on the other side of Jackson as well,” Gosar said to a forum audience last month. “I really do think public lands are a really important part, not only for protecting the aquifer, but for making a livable city.”
Other major developments from Gosar’s time as commissioner enjoyed less universal praise. While it’s true that much of the commission’s work is not “ideologically driven,” some of the work very much is.
Gosar has supported efforts to shield Laramie’s main source of drinking water and he voted to allow a new wind farm south of Laramie. Neither move was unpopular, but both faced some backlash — up to and including lawsuits against the county.
Aquifer protection
Debates about aquifer protection have dominated much of Gosar’s tenure with the commission. Those who advocate for greater “aquifer protection,” as Gosar does, seek to mitigate contamination by limiting what can be built on the land above the underground water source.
In 2019, advocates targeted the Tumbleweed Gas Station, which sits above the aquifer. A gas station could not be built there today given updated aquifer regulations, but the business predated those and had been grandfathered in.
County officials filed a lawsuit that year arguing Tumbleweed had lost its “grandfathered” status. But they soon after reversed course, revoking the suit in the belief that the local government could not win.
Gosar was the only commissioner who supported continuing the lawsuit in 2019.
The following year, Democrats flipped the commission and Gosar became the chair. Under Gosar’s leadership, the commission approved aquifer protection regulations in 2021. These were challenged in court and the commission was sent back to the drawing board.
In 2022, Gosar was reelected and Democrats retained control of the commission. This electoral victory paved the way for stronger aquifer protections.
In early 2023, the commission approved revised aquifer regulations and the new version of those regulations stuck.
Simultaneously, the county developed an updated Casper Aquifer Protection Plan. This new plan eliminated discrepancies between the county’s and the city’s former plans. The CAPP also passed in 2023.
In 2024, Democrats lost control of the commission and Gosar went from serving as the commission’s chair to its lone Democrat.
The aquifer protection work completed during Gosar’s tenure in the leadership role has not been undone in the two years since Democrats lost the majority.
Renewables
Gosar has been a reliable vote in favor of renewable energy proposals. That includes supporting solar buildouts on county facilities wherever possible.
“I’m a big supporter of renewables for the county, and I think what’s important is I support it personally,” Gosar said. “The rentals I have are both solar-powered. The clinic that I work in is solar-powered. I think it’s a really smart move financially. I think it’s a really smart move [as] an environmental piece.”
He said voters can expect more support for solar in his third term.
“As we think about, and we see, electrical fees continuing to rise, what we’ve done at the courthouse, and at the search and rescue building, and at the county’s IT building, is we have locked in the cost of that electricity at a rate that will no longer rise,” Gosar said. “There’s more to be done. I’d love to see all county operations go to renewables with batteries backing [them] up.”
Gosar has also been a consistent supporter of wind energy developments, including the Rail Tie Wind Project.
In 2021, he voted alongside other commissioners to approve Rail Tie’s WECS (Wind Energy Conversion System) permit, siding with advocates for the wind project. Despite objections from some local opponents, Gosar viewed the proposal as beneficial for Albany County.
He stressed that getting a good deal for local residents was paramount in his decision to approve.
“I’m the son of an oilfield worker in western Wyoming and I have seen businesses run over local populations,” Gosar said before the vote in 2021. “It’s my job, as I see it, as a commissioner, to represent those local populations and to do the very best I can to make the very best deal for the people I serve.”
Rail Tie’s opponents did not give up after the WECS vote. They have tried to halt the project at various government levels and with multiple lawsuits. These efforts have not killed the project but they have successfully delayed construction, and the WECS permit — good for just five years — came back to the commission for an extension vote earlier this summer.
Gosar joined Republican Terri Jones in the 2-1 vote that extended Rail Tie’s permit another five years.
On the horizon: Property tax relief
If Gosar is reelected, there will likely be more decisions to make about public lands, restrictions above the aquifer, and the installation of solar panels and wind turbines.
But another issue can already be seen on the horizon, and county leaders could have tough decisions to make following the November election.
As property taxes have risen, state lawmakers have sought to offer relief by reducing what Wyoming homeowners owe the government. Though many proposals have been brought to the table, the most significant so far was a 2025 bill that applied a 25% cut to the property taxes charged on the first $1 million of a home’s fair market value.
That cut has reduced property tax bills, but the corresponding drop in collections has been felt by local governments, in fire departments and in public libraries.
As Gosar explained to a League of Women Voters forum earlier this summer, Albany County was able to weather that cut better than some other communities because of the windfall in sales taxes coming from new wind farm construction.
“The county would have faced a $1.9 million shortfall if it wouldn’t have been for sales tax off of turbines and big items,” Gosar said. “We realized a $600,000 cut. But how many more times will they buy turbines and generators?”
And there could be an even more significant property tax slash coming down the pike, if voters approve the “People’s Initiative to Limit Property Tax” — a ballot measure slated for the general election this November.
The measure would exempt half of a home’s assessed value from property tax calculations. If approved by voters, it would cut taxes for most homeowners and could reduce state collections by nearly $125 million, or about 23% of what it now collects.
Gosar said that would be devastating for Albany County.
“Think to yourself about your home budget. Could you take a 20% cut? And would you be able to just be fine with that?” Gosar said. “When you think about cutting 20-25%, you can’t do the math without cutting people.”
In Albany County, there is bipartisan agreement among local officials that the ballot measure, if passed, would mean diminishing government services. At various forums this summer, Gosar and others have urged voters to vote no.
Rapid fire topics
No analysis can completely anticipate every topic commissioners will face in the next four years. But Commissioner Gosar, like his fellow candidates, has spoken on a number of issues across multiple forums as well as in an interview with The Laramie Reporter. Below are some excerpts.
Meeting times
When Gosar was chair, the commission alternated its twice-a-month meetings between 9:30 a.m. and 6 p.m. time slots. The argument for this arrangement was that it allowed more people to attend commission meetings.
When Republicans regained the majority after the 2024 election, the meetings were moved to 9:30 a.m. exclusively. The argument for this arrangement was consistency, for the public and for county staff, who must sometimes work into the evening when there is a 6 p.m. meeting.
“When I was the chair, I moved one of the meetings to night because I felt like having meetings during the day excluded people who worked and didn’t have the time,” Gosar told The Reporter. “The current commission doesn’t believe that and moved it back to the day meetings. But I think anything that you can do to engage and to have people put their best ideas to improve government — I think that’s a really useful thing.”
Meeting times will depend on more than Gosar’s reelection chances. But if his party retakes the commission in November, meetings could return to the alternating schedule.
Data centers
Like his fellow candidates, Gosar has not taken a hardline stance on data centers, though he has been critical.
So far, no company has proposed building an AI data center in Albany County. But as communities across the country confront these typically unpopular development proposals, residents of Laramie and the surrounding area are beginning to discuss how they ought to respond should such a proposal land at their front door. City and county leaders are hosting a joint meeting Tuesday to discuss the issue.
Gosar has said his vote on any data center proposal will depend on the proposal itself.
“As a sitting commissioner, you really don’t have the ability to say yay or nay until you’ve seen something cross your desk,” Gosar said during a League of Women Voters forum in June. “It would have to mitigate the electricity use, the water use, the heat islands, and the lack of employment once it’s done.”
But Gosar said he would also ask what all that computing power would be used for.
“I don’t know that anybody else in this room thinks they need more data collected on them,” he said to the forum audience. “So if it’s here to help cure cancer, I’m all in, right? But if it’s here to help ICE run down people on the street, not interested.”
Housing and mobile homes
The commission is limited in what it can do to support housing development. Most of the policies being pursued by housing advocates would have to be enacted at the state and municipal level.
“But I think we [the county] could work with the city and with other interested parties to figure out a strategy and be helpful,” Gosar told The Reporter. “I think what is often overlooked in affordable housing is what’s happening in our trailer courts in Albany County and Laramie. Big outside interests are coming in and buying up the trailer courts and then raising the rates on people, our Albany County residents, because they can.”
Gosar said there’s little the county government can do to intervene, but it could foster discussions about mobile home park cooperatives. Co-ops are resident-owned and resident-run, and lot rents tend to stay down because they aren’t feeding millionaire investors. In co-ops, rent hikes only happen when the residents themselves decide to pitch in for new roads or other maintenance.
Albany County currently has no mobile home park co-ops, though the idea has been gaining traction nationally.
“We don’t have many tools legally to intercede in what the state views as a private contract between the renter and the trailer park owner, but I think there are creative ways to make other options available to people so that they are not at the mercy of some well-financed, well-lawyered outside entity,” Gosar said. “I don’t think that conversation has been had, but I really will be pushing that conversation.”
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Thank you for these in depth articles in preparation for the primary.