Nonprofit compliance in Wyoming

Wyoming has no general volunteer-screening law. Volunteers must be checked only in licensed or funded settings: DFS-licensed child care (Central Registry, sex offender registry, FBI fingerprint and state criminal history checks before working), DFS-certified group homes, residential treatment centers and child-placing agencies, the Medicaid Community Choices Waiver, and state-funded victim-service programs. An organization whose volunteers may have unsupervised access to children or vulnerable adults may request a $10 DFS Central Registry screen with the volunteer’s consent, and youth-serving and family-violence volunteer groups pay no more than $10 for a Division of Criminal Investigation fingerprint check of a prospective volunteer (W.S. §§ 7-19-108(a)(ii), 14-3-214(f), 35-20-116(a)).

• Voluntary Record Information Check and Volunteer Fee Cap (Wyo. Stat. §§ 7-19-106(c), (k)(ii), 7-19-108(a)) — Lets any person obtain a Division of Criminal Investigation fingerprint check of another person with proof of that person’s consent, filed through a Wyoming criminal justice agency. The fee is at most $15, and at most $10 when the applicant is an organization providing volunteer services to youth or victims of family violence and the check is solely to decide whether a prospective volunteer is suitable; DCI says the $10 check covers Wyoming and the Western Identification Network states only, not the FBI.
• Child Care Licensing Background Checks (Wyo. Admin. Rules, Dep’t of Family Services, Child Care Licensing ch. 11, § 3(g)–(h) (effective Apr. 21, 2026)) — Owners, directors, adult staff, employees, substitutes and volunteers in the facility during operating hours, and household members 18 and older, must have Wyoming and out-of-state Central Registry checks, national and state sex offender registry checks, an FBI fingerprint check and state criminal history checks for every state lived in for the past five years on file before working. The Wyoming Central Registry and state sex offender registry checks repeat every year; the FBI, state criminal history and national sex offender registry checks every five years. Disqualifying offenses include felonies involving child or vulnerable-adult abuse, sexual offenses, violence, domestic violence, arson or animal cruelty, felony drug or alcohol offenses within 10 years, misdemeanor battery or assault, domestic violence, sexual, or child abuse, neglect or endangerment offenses (no time limit), and misdemeanor drug or DUI offenses within the last five years (a first misdemeanor DUI excluded); a pending deferred prosecution counts as well.
• Community Choices Waiver Volunteer Screening (Wyo. Admin. Rules, Dep’t of Health, Medicaid ch. 34, § 10 (Community Choices Waiver)) — Community Choices Waiver providers must screen adult volunteers who may have unsupervised access to participants: a DFS Central Registry screen, an HHS-OIG exclusion search, a national name- and Social Security number-based criminal database search and a National Sex Offender Public Website search, repeated every five years. An individual convicted of a sexual offense may not volunteer, and volunteers under 18 must be directly supervised by someone who passed screening.
• Who it reaches: Volunteers, substitutes and adult staff in DFS-licensed child care facilities during operating hours, plus household members 18 and older (Central Registry, sex offender registry, FBI fingerprint and state criminal history checks before working); Volunteers and interns at DFS-certified group homes, residential treatment centers, crisis shelters and child-placing agencies (Central Registry check every year and FBI fingerprint check every five years); Adult volunteers who may have unsupervised access to Medicaid Community Choices Waiver participants (screening every five years); Volunteers with contact with children at state-funded domestic violence, sexual assault and victim-service programs (child abuse registry check before starting); Optional, not required: youth-serving and family-violence volunteer organizations may request a Wyoming fingerprint check of a prospective volunteer for no more than $10; Optional, not required: any organization whose volunteers may have unsupervised access to children or vulnerable adults may request a $10 DFS Central Registry screen with the volunteer’s consent; Optional, not required: fire departments, ambulance services, fire protection districts and the military department may require volunteers to be fingerprinted for state and national checks.
• Check types in use: Fingerprint-based Wyoming and Western Identification Network (WIN) check through the Division of Criminal Investigation ($15, or up to $10 for youth and family-violence volunteer organizations); FBI fingerprint-based national check only where a statute or licensing rule provides for it, such as DFS child care and substitute care; DFS Central Registry of Abuse and Neglect of Children and Vulnerable Adults screen ($10, with the person’s signed consent); National and state sex offender registry checks; HHS Office of Inspector General exclusion search (Medicaid waiver providers).
• Administered by: Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation (DCI), Office of the Attorney General, for fingerprint checks; Wyoming Department of Family Services (DFS) for child care licensing and the Central Registry; Wyoming Department of Health for Medicaid waiver and facility rules.
• Typical processing: DCI fingerprint checks are generally completed within 2 weeks but can take 5–6 weeks depending on volume and fingerprint quality; DFS Central Registry screens currently take 6–7 business days.

Yes. Wyoming requires all persons to report suspected child abuse without naming any professions at all — so a volunteer's role is irrelevant to the duty. Everyone in your organization — teen volunteers included — is a mandated reporter. Confirm Wyoming's current statute before writing your policy — these are amended often.

• In every state, territory and the District of Columbia, ANY person is permitted to report suspected abuse even when not required to. A volunteer who is not a mandated reporter can still call, and should.
• The safest operating posture, whatever the statute says, is to train every volunteer on what to report and to whom — a policy that only trains "mandated" staff leaves the person most likely to witness something untrained.
• Reporting duties are personal. A volunteer who is a mandated reporter cannot discharge the duty by telling a supervisor and stopping there in most states.
• Screening and reporting are different obligations. Clearing a background check does not satisfy a reporting duty, and no reporting policy substitutes for screening.

Wyoming does not require charities or professional fundraisers to register before soliciting; we found no charitable-solicitation registration statute in the Wyoming Statutes. That is not the same as nothing to do. Every Wyoming nonprofit corporation, and every foreign nonprofit corporation authorized to carry on its affairs in Wyoming, files an annual report with the Secretary of State listing its officers, directors, principal office and any compensation paid to officers or directors, on or before the first day of its registration month, with a $25 annual fee (W.S. § 17-19-1630). Bingo and pull tabs are legal only for charitable or nonprofit organizations that have existed in Wyoming for at least three years and hold a free Wyoming Gaming Commission license; they must be run by bona fide member volunteers or paid employees or contractors, pay out at least 65% of gross sales as winnings each month and donate 75% of remaining net proceeds within a year (§§ 6-7-101(a)(iii)(D), 11-25-104(n)). Charitable raffles need no license, but since July 1, 2026 all net proceeds after costs, supplies and winnings must go to charitable purposes (§ 6-7-101(a)(iii)(H)).

• A Wyoming charity does not register with the state to solicit, but a Wyoming nonprofit corporation files its annual report and $25 fee with the Secretary of State by the first day of its registration month, and bingo or pull tabs need a free Gaming Commission license (W.S. §§ 17-19-1630, 11-25-104(n)).
• Soliciting residents of other states can trigger registration in those states regardless of where you are based — an online donate button reaches all fifty.
• Exemptions exist in most registering states (small organizations, religious organizations, membership appeals) but they are specific and usually must be claimed rather than assumed.
• Confirm current requirements with your state charity office before relying on this — thresholds and exemptions are amended frequently.

These apply regardless of which state you operate in, and they are the ones most commonly missed by small organizations that assume state registration is the whole picture.

• Annual Form 990, 990-EZ, or 990-N. Three consecutive years of non-filing revokes exempt status automatically — this is the single most common way small nonprofits lose their status.
• If you run background checks on volunteers, the Fair Credit Reporting Act applies to you as a user of consumer reports: a standalone written disclosure, separate written authorization, and the pre-adverse and adverse action sequence before acting on a result.
• Public disclosure: your exemption application and recent 990s must be made available on request.
• Employment obligations attach to paid staff regardless of exempt status — payroll tax, worker classification, and wage and hour law all apply.