Tribes Praise Batt For Attention To Problems Native American Leaders Expect Same Cooperation From Next Governor

Despite the stark disagreement over reservation gambling, Idaho tribal leaders on Monday credited Gov. Phil Batt’s personal attention to their concerns with lifting state-tribal relations to a new high.

And during the latest of Batt’s almost monthly “summit” meetings with leaders of the state’s five federally recognized tribes, they signaled that they expect no less of a personal commitment from the successor to the Republican chief executive, who is not seeking another term.

“By opening up that line of communication, we have been able to solve many problems as well as head off problems,” Nez Perce tribal chairman Sam Penney told Batt. “We would hope that whoever your successor is, he will have the same attitude toward working with the tribes.”

It was the first meeting with the tribes since Batt announced last week that he would not seek a second four-year term in 1998, primarily because he is already 70 years old.

“We’re very disappointed to hear and disheartened to hear you are not seeking reelection,” Coeur d’Alene Tribal Council member Marjorie Zarate told the governor. “You’ve done some good things for us.”

David Matheson, the Coeur d’Alene’s gaming manager, recalled the 1980s when the Indians in Idaho “were kind of out of sight, out of mind. Nobody would meet with us because they would have to face our issues, and they are contentious.

“But you did the right thing,” Matheson told Batt.

At the same time, Matheson used the latest meeting to reinforce the importance, not only to the Coeur d’Alenes but to the other four tribes as well, of gambling on reservations where other development initiatives failed to revive depressed economies.

The rural isolation of reservations, lack of sufficient capital and skilled workers and competition from established businesses have all conspired to limit the success of other economic enterprises, he maintained.

“Gaming was an area (in which) we had a competitive advantage,” Matheson said. “It’s fulfilling these things we wanted economic development to do - the jobs, the income.”

And the profits are being plowed back into education, health care and other services that will make the reservation more attractive for other economic enterprises in anticipation of the time when gambling runs its course as a real money maker, Matheson said.

His pitch came as Batt’s special gambling committee is working on its final report to the governor on what - if any - legislative action should be taken to clarify the status of gambling in Idaho. Although intended to cover all aspects of gambling, the focus is on the tribal casinos where Batt believes illegal electronic pull-tab machines are being operated.

The tribes disagree, and even the governor has acknowledged the economic improvements the casinos have brought the reservations. While declining to predict the committee’s recommendations, Batt told ShoshonePauite leaders two weeks ago that he believes the recommendation will involve maintaining existing operations while assuring they do not expand.

Matheson, one of the committee’s 12 voting members, assured the governor that the Coeur d’Alene Tribe has no intention of expanding existing gambling operations until that question is resolved. The only improvements planned for its casino operations, he said, involve upgrading facilities so they become “second to none.”

“I appreciate the fact that you aren’t trying to expand the number of machines while this is going on,” the governor said. “That would compromise our attempts to do something on these.”