Treasurer’s Office still holding on to more than $100 million owed to State residents

The Unclaimed Property Division of the Wyoming State Treasurer’s Office issued a check exceeding $117,000 to a Kemmerer resident at the end of January.

The Lincoln County man had a total of 331 properties owed to him, with most of the money related to proceeds and dividends from securities dating back to the early 2000s. The individual had a wide range of
investments in his portfolio, including well-known companies such as AT&T, Chevron, Hilton Hotels, MetLife, Union Pacific, Verizon and XCEL Energy, among others.

While this man received a nice payday, there is still more than $100 million left in the Wyoming Unclaimed Property fund, including $1.80 million earmarked for those who reside in Lincoln County and
another $2.59 million for those in Uinta County. Some of the high-dollar amounts in the two counties available for claim by individuals and/or businesses include $134,216 in Evanston, $70,498 in Kemmerer, $43,349 in Afton, $31,547 in Mountain View, $28,081 in Diamondville, $28,000 in Auburn and $15,085 in Fort Bridger.

Those wanting to see if they are owed any of the properties held by the State are encouraged to watch the 2-minute instructional video at www.mycash.wyo.gov before searching the online database.

“With more than $100 million available across the State, why wouldn’t you want to take a couple minutes to see if you are owed any money?” Wyoming State Treasurer Curt Meier asked. “We returned $7.4 million over the past fiscal year that ended June 30, and then in the month of July alone we returned securities valued at more than $6.7 million.”

Meier said staff members work to locate and contact owners of larger properties, but there are more than 900,000 individual properties in the State’s database, meaning the vast majority of owners will only get paid if they initiate a claim on their own at www.mycash.wyo.gov.

“Even if you got a check from us a year ago, it’s worth the time to search to see if any of these new properties turned over to the State belong to you,” Meier said. “We have received more than $11 million in new funds since the start of this fiscal year.”

Unclaimed property is turned over when a business, agency or governmental entity owes money, securities and/or the contents of a safe deposit box, among other items, to someone and for whatever
reason cannot locate the owner for a specified duration of time. The property is turned over to the State of last known address, if an address was ever known. If there was no last known address, it is turned over to
the State in which the business was incorporated.

With this in mind, those who ever lived in another state may want to visit www.unclaimed.org and click on the state (or states) on the map to get redirected directly to other official unclaimed property sites.
To make a valid claim at www.mycash.wyo.gov or any other state’s site, owners will need to provide information about themselves and may need to submit official documents. This could be as simple as a
copy of a driver’s license, but additional documents may be required for those claiming as an heir or a
business.

Wyoming law requires the State to hold unclaimed property in perpetuity until it is claimed by the
rightful owner.