Conservationists say Wyoming legislators are voting for the environment

The environmental group Wyoming Conservation Voters released its legislative scorecard for 2011. The scorecard “grades” each state lawmaker based on how they voted on key environmental legislation. This year the average score was 76 percent, and Wyoming Conservation Voters Executive Director Kate Wright says that’s better than it’s been in the past. “There’s always lower votes and there’s always higher votes, but as a rule I do believe that the legislative body is improving every year,” Wright said. Wright says the legislature passed several pro-conservation laws this year, most notably one that ensures that land owners have the right to decide whether to develop wind energy facilities on their properties. But she says there were disappointments too. For example, one new law made it impossible for the Environmental Quality Council to place environmental protections on areas it considers “very rare or uncommon. ”