Raymond seeks seat on town council

Local business owner Krista Raymond has put her name in the running for town council.

Originally from Thermopolis, Raymond attended college in Montana before returning and starting a restaurant. She also flew pipeline, owned a local motel, worked with the Youth Alternatives program and also was an EMT and dispatcher here.

After moving to Cheyenne, she worked in the brand recording and research division for the State of Wyoming. “I learned a lot about that level of government,” she noted.

Another move took her to Colorado and a job with the Lakewood Police Department, working in economic crimes. She later moved into IT at Lakewood, as an administrative assistant to the director. This was just before 2000 and the issues Y2K brought, so she helped upgrade the city for the new millennium. One day, she chose to leave the IT business and purchased a jet catering service. After a couple years she moved back to Thermopolis and got back into the restaurant business.

“I’m a fiscal conservative, but I’m not left, not right. I’m pretty much middle of the road,” Raymond said. “I also believe there’s always two, maybe three sides to every story so if constituents have something they want to bring up to council . . . I definitely believe in listening to both sides. You’ve got to kind of walk in the shoes of both sides, see it from their perspective.”

One of the issues she sees is there not being enough jobs in town. “I think we need to strengthen our workforce, which means we’ve got to have the jobs here for that workforce to come in.”

Raymond said there are also issues with cleaning up around town, and knows law enforcement and the town works to keep weeds down. While there is a risk of fire for overgrown properties, she noted there is also rodent problems and garbage stacking to think about.