THE ANSWER, MY FRIEND:

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Robin Lockman feared the worst for her town of Cheyenne, Wyoming. As the city's treasurer, she estimated that it might lose up to 25% of its budget as tax revenues stalled and the prices of oil, gas and coal tanked, eliminating money the city typically receives from the state as royalties from the extractive energy industry.

So the city did the hard work of laying off 18 employees and cutting funds for travel and training. And then a surprising thing happened: The huge deficit never arrived. In fact, over the summer, the city brought in more tax revenue than the year before.

Between July and September, Cheyenne saw a 20.5% increase in tax revenue compared to 2019. In September alone, the increase was a staggering 83%, or $1.4 million. "I was in shock when I saw it," said Lockman. She feared the good news was a mistake, so she called the Wyoming Department of Revenue to confirm the numbers. "The tax reported was legitimate, and was due to the Roundhouse Wind Project," said Lockman, referring to an energy development west of the city.

Throughout Wyoming, counties typically depend on industries like coal, oil and gas drilling, mining or tourism and recreation to bring in the taxes necessary to pay for education, community programs and infrastructure. Overall economic activity is down -- statewide, sales and use taxes shrunk 6% over the last year -- but revenues from mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction are down nearly twice that. Meanwhile, profits from wind energy developments, like the Roundhouse Wind Project, are booming. Now, residents and officials are asking whether wind energy can help the state survive the economic storm of the pandemic -- and become a reliable revenue stream for the future as fossil fuel income dries up.

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