Lisa Watson

“You guys, we’re going to build a student center,” Northwest College President Lisa Watson announced at Monday’s board of trustees meeting. 

After state funding proved elusive in the past two sessions, the capital construction bill passed by the Wyoming Legislature last week included $14 million to help build a new student center on the NWC campus.

The current DeWitt Student Center suffers from a number of issues related to it being over 50 years old. Besides leaky roofs and plumbing issues, the building lacks Americans with Disabilities Act design considerations and energy efficiencies. 

The college has been developing plans for a $25 million Trapper Center to replace DeWitt, including hiring a construction manager at risk, Groathouse Construction of Cody, to value engineer the project and remain within a requested budget of $18 million to $20 million. 

“Our biggest nemesis is inflation,” Watson said in an interview. 

There was no discussion at Monday’s board meeting about the sources of the funds for the college’s portion of the project, but the NWC Foundation has been pursuing a fundraising effort. Other potential funding sources that have been floated include utilizing reserve funds, bonds and the potential of asking Park County voters to approve a 1% sales tax.

Beyond the student center funding, Northwest College fared well in the 2022 Budget Session.

“It’s been a rough few years, and I think there were some positive vibes coming out of the capitol at the end of the session,” Watson said. 

The Legislature passed $7.5 million in ongoing funding per biennium, to be split among the state’s community colleges. The amount NWC will receive depends on a formula that includes the college’s share of the state’s total full-time equivalent enrollment. The $7.5 million will be in addition to existing state appropriations to the colleges. 

The funds can be used for operations, which includes salaries. While the state’s community colleges have lost $100 million in funding in the past several years, Watson said it was nice to see the Legislature supporting NWC employees and the college.

Sen. R.J. Kost, R-Powell, and Jeff Wasserburger, R-Gillette, sponsored the amendment for the appropriation. It was mirrored on the House appropriations bill by an amendment sponsored by Ember Oakley, R-Riverton. The mirror amendments on both sides of the Legislature made its passage considerably more certain, Kost said. 

“That’s the nice part about it. Since both sides agree, there was no concern about someone taking it out” during concurrence, he said. 

The Wyoming Community College Commission had asked for a larger appropriation, but at this month’s meeting, Watson said she was pleased with the outcome. 

“At the end of the day, it’s still permanent funding that will carry over, which is wonderful,” Watson said. 

Sen. Larry Hicks, R-Baggs, also sponsored an amendment — with a mirror amendment in the House sponsored by Reps. Sandy Newsome, R-Cody, and Art Washut, R-Casper — that will provide $200,000 to be split among all college rodeo programs, per biennium. Annually, that will roughly provide $12,500 for NWC’s rodeo program. 

The Legislature also passed a $10 million appropriation for Wyoming Tomorrow, which will create an endowment to fund adult learner scholarships, though Kost said they will need to build the fund to $50 million before awarding scholarships. Once the program is underway, the scholarships will support education for people over the age of 24 who have lost their jobs and need more education to change careers. It will support associate degrees, as well as certificates.