Northern Wyoming News - Serving the Big Horn Basin for over 100 years

CODY (WNE) — Ron Clark, owner of Town Taxi, said he’d rather take someone home for free than see them drive drunk.

However, he’d much prefer to get paid at least as much as he would charge somebody on a normal flat rate.

Now he and the other taxi companies that use the City of Cody’s Tipsy Taxi service will be paid $3 more than before each time they take someone home who has a voucher.

Since it started, the service has paid the taxi company $7 every time someone has used one of the vouchers to get a free ride home after drinking. Last week, the city council unanimously approved paying taxi companies $10 per voucher starting retroactively Jan. 1.

“I charge $8 a ride, so I was losing money,” Clark said. “It’ll help a lot.”

On average, about 16 retail or restaurant liquor license holders participate by handing out vouchers to qualifying customers.

Those who are impaired are eligible for a free ride home and driven from a participating bar or restaurant to a place of residence or hotel within city limits.

“It’s a great benefit to the community,” said Cody Cab manager Earl “Mike” Farlow. “It keeps people from driving when they’ve been drinking.”

He said the company has been participating in the program since its inception in 2011. He now charges a $9 flat rate for rides in town, so the voucher will finally no longer be a loss for him as well.

“That would benefit us greatly,” he said. “It is a program that greatly benefits our citizens here.”

Clark said he averages roughly 30-35 uses of the voucher per month. He said in the summer that use can rise to 50 vouchers in a month.

This story was published on Jan. 31, 2022.