What SF0117 would have changed

It amended W.S. § 15-1-603(a). The operative passage, with the bill’s strikeouts and insertions shown as drafted:

a protest signed “by more than one (1) of the owners of twenty percent (20%) of record, as shown by the county assessor, who either own thirty-three percent (33%) or more of the area of the lots included in the proposed change, or of those comprise thirty-three percent (33%) or more of the owners immediately adjacent within a distance of one hundred forty (140) three hundred (300) feet”

and the override threshold dropped from “three-fourths (3/4)” to “two-thirds (2/3) of all the members of the governing body.”

Read together, the two halves cut in opposite directions. Widening the qualifying radius from 140 to 300 feet brings more owners inside the circle. Raising the ownership threshold to 33% and lowering the council override to two-thirds make a valid protest harder to assemble and easier to overcome.

HB0077 — repeal, in one line

HB0077, “Zoning protest petition-repeal,” sponsored by Representatives Filer, Fornstrom, Geringer, Singh and Yin with Senators Barlow, Boner, Love, Nethercott, Olsen and Pappas. Its operative text was a sentence: “Section 1. W.S. 15-1-603 is repealed.” Section 2 preserved protests filed before July 1, 2026.

Status: “H Failed Introduction 26-35-1-0-0” on February 10, 2026. In a budget session that needed 42 ayes to introduce, it got 26.²

The two bills share five sponsors between them. That is the shape of a coalition that wanted the statute weakened and was willing to take either route.

The 2025 predecessor died in conference on the last day

SF0040 (2025), “Zoning protest petition-amendments,” sponsored by Appropriations, got further than either 2026 bill and still failed:

• Senate third reading passed 29–0, Jan. 21, 2025
• House third reading passed 52–9, Feb. 18, 2025
• Senate concurrence failed 1–30, Feb. 19 — the Senate would not accept the House’s version
• Joint conference committee appointed; Senate recede from non-concurrence failed 8–23, Feb. 28
• Postponed indefinitely at sine die, March 6, 2025

A bill that passed both chambers unanimously in one and 52–9 in the other, and then died because the two versions could not be reconciled.

No committee home going into 2027

There is no zoning, land-use or housing topic on any 2026 interim committee’s approved list. Zoning protest reform has no committee carrying it, which means the next attempt is an individual member’s bill in the 2027 General Session rather than a committee bill with a sponsor already attached.

What is unchanged, and what it protects

For an owner in an established Wyoming subdivision, the position today is what it was before the 2025 session: a protest signed by more than one owner of record who together own 20% or more of the area of the lots in the proposed change, or who comprise 20% of the owners immediately adjacent within 140 feet, forces a three-quarters vote of all members of the governing body.

That is a municipal-zoning tool, and it does not reach county land use, where W.S. § 18-5-201 governs and a separate 2026 bill, SF0042 “County zoning authority-amendments,” also failed introduction, 18–12. Nor does it reach covenants: a rezoning that a protest fails to stop still does not override a recorded declaration on the land being rezoned, and a rezoning that succeeds does not relax the covenants on the land next to it.