Lance Oviatt, Chairman of the Lincoln County Republican Party, stepped into the SVI Radio studio on Wednesday, March 4 to discuss a petition from the Lincoln County GOP to go from three to five commissioners in Lincoln County.

(0:00) Into another guest interview segment this morning and joining me live in studio right now is Lance (0:05) Oviatt. Lance is the current chairman of the Lincoln County Republican Party and here to (0:10) discuss a petition from the Lincoln County GOP regarding the number of commissioners within the (0:16) county. Lance, good morning, how are you doing today? I’m doing great, thanks.

Appreciate your (0:20) time with this. I heard about this petition so thought we well maybe we better go find out what’s (0:24) going on here so I appreciate you stepping in studio to tell us about it. So currently three (0:29) commissioners in Lincoln County.

The party wants to see that go up to five. So walk us through (0:35) that. Why did the Lincoln County GOP decide to put this petition together? All right, thanks.

(0:41) You know the one of the biggest reasons is as our county has grown a lot of the growth has been in (0:51) Star Valley and not in the rest of the county and so occasionally you end up with all three (0:56) commissioners from Star Valley and the rest of the county feels like they’re underrepresented. (1:01) So by going to five commissioners and having it districted that’s the other part of that petition (1:06) is it would allow better representation throughout the entire county and that was one that was (1:12) probably one of the main reasons that people brought this petition to the Republican Party (1:18) was they felt underrepresented throughout the county and most counties in Wyoming have five (1:26) commissioners. So it as as growth occurs and the need is there for more representation they felt (1:35) it was time to go to five.

You know Lance a couple questions I have is first off there’s some some (1:42) boards will have a mix of district and open positions school board for example. Is that a (1:49) potential possibility in this case or would all five have to be districts? So it would the way (1:54) this is written it would be all five would be districted. It wouldn’t be a mix.

The statute was (2:00) changed to allow for a mix but there’s only one county in the state that does a mix and there’s (2:06) some challenges with doing a hybrid district mix. So at this point it would be for all five district. (2:13) Gotcha and and what would be the reasoning for not doing a district system now with three (2:18) commissioners? Statute only allows you to have it districted if you go to five.

So with three (2:25) they serve at large and the petition if it passes and it would go on the ballot (2:32) it’s a two-part question. One should we have five commissioners and two should it be districted (2:36) if it if the districted part fails then all and but the five passes there would be five (2:43) at-large commissioners. Okay okay so you’ll vote you’ll vote twice then yes basically there’ll be (2:49) two questions on the ballot.

Okay so what has to happen through this petition process in order for (2:54) it to qualify to be a ballot measure? So we need a right around 1100 signatures in order to get it (3:00) on the ballot. So we’re in the process of collecting signatures and actually this Saturday starting at (3:08) 9 30 is our county republican convention in Thane at the Thane community center and we’ll (3:14) have petitions there that people can sign. So we would invite people to come down and and (3:21) visit our county convention and see what we do as as at a republican convention.

There’s some (3:27) important business that’s conducted there and this petition will be one of those things (3:32) and that meeting will pretty much go all day so you could drop in any time and we’ll have the (3:36) petition there for people to sign. Okay that’s Lance Oviatt in studio this morning again (3:42) Lance is the the current chairman of the Lincoln County Republican Party. Anything else on this (3:46) petition specifically you’d like to mention today? You know maybe just quickly I know some people (3:52) have been concerned about the cost of going to five.

One of the things that happened and that (3:59) people were concerned about was the commissioners hired an administrator a chief of staff and his (4:05) salary is $120,659. So and then one of the reasons they they did that was they said that (4:13) the workload was too much for those three commissioners they needed an administrator (4:17) to help handle the workload. Well if they went to five they would be able to save money by (4:23) eliminating that position and let the commissioners do their job instead of having this person that’s (4:28) that isn’t accountable to the voters between the commissioners and their constituents.

(4:34) Excellent and if people are not able to if someone wants to sign but maybe isn’t able to (4:41) go to the convention are there other ways to to do that? Sure you can go to our our website (4:50) lcwygop.com and you can contact us through the website and we’ll get a petition to you. Okay (4:54) and do you anticipate having it out and around any other places or any other times I know you’ve been (5:00) at certain businesses at certain times. We have and we’ll continue that and and we’ll have it at (5:05) the fair and you’ll see it around different places in the community.

Okay when is the the (5:11) deadline do you know to reach that the required number of signatures? It would be on the general (5:16) ballot so it’s it’s we’ve got quite a bit of time before we have to get that turned in. Gotcha (5:21) all right anything else you mentioned the convention coming up maybe tell us more about (5:25) that while we have you in the studio. Sure.

What happens at a party convention? At a party (5:30) convention one of the big things is we’ll discuss resolutions. Resolutions are requests to the to (5:37) the legislature or maybe to the county commissioners to change a law or to create a law (5:43) and it’s been interesting you know a lot of times you think well how can one person can I really (5:49) make a difference and there have been several times just out of our county where we’ve had (5:54) people submit a resolution that has become a law or changed a law and it started with one person (6:01) submitting a resolution on a change they’d like to see and it came up through the party and then (6:07) ended up with the legislature and became a law. So it’s an opportunity for people to come and (6:12) make a difference in our community in our county in our state so anyone’s welcome to come attend.

(6:20) We have delegates that have been elected and alternates and we do this every two years so (6:25) it’s just a it’s just a it’s a special thing because it only happens every couple of years. (6:30) That’s what we got in studio this morning so Lance will just just wrap things up and and remind (6:35) listeners what you have with this petition you must be a registered voter in order for the the (6:39) signature to count correct? Correct you need to be a registered voter when you sign it so well (6:46) once we collect all the signatures we’ll go through and verify that everybody’s a registered (6:50) voter. So if you aren’t registered to vote that’s a good reminder get out and register to vote it’s (6:55) important that we exercise our civic duty to go and and and vote and have our voice heard.

And a (7:02) much earlier deadline than it used to be. Yes they’ve changed that deadline you know there it (7:08) is still possible to register at the polls so you can do that but again you there’s things like (7:16) this petition that you really can’t participate in unless you’re registered to vote and a lot of (7:21) people don’t think of that and then they’re like oh yeah I’d like to that’s a good idea I think we (7:25) ought to go to five commissioners and then they realize oh I let my registration lapse and a lot (7:31) of people don’t realize if you don’t vote in the last election they will purge your name for the (7:36) from the voter rolls and so you may think you’re registered but if you didn’t vote last time you (7:42) you may not be your name may have been purged from those voter rolls. Gotcha yeah so it’s important (7:46) to double check and make sure then sounds like so all right Lance anything we missed that you’d (7:51) like to mention today? No just that again I encourage you to to get out and and get involved (7:58) and sign this petition I think it’s an important thing for our county school I don’t know of any (8:05) other board that has only three members school boards have more hospital board lower valley (8:10) energy there’s a reason why you need more people on the board just like I’m involved in the legal (8:17) field and a jury where you’re making important decisions you either have a jury of six people (8:23) for minor decisions and a jury of 12 people for major decisions because you want more (8:29) input into making important decisions especially those decisions like our commissioners make.

(8:34) Lance Oviatt president sorry chairman of the Lincoln County Republican (8:37) Party it’s all part of the weekday wake up this morning on SBI radio.