Benewah County Sheriff Bob Kirts sat in the front row of the large audience at today's tribal law enforcement hearing, but never spoke, leaving that instead to county Prosecutor Douglas Payne. Disappointed lawmakers said they wished they'd heard from Kirts. Asked about that afterward, he retorted, "Well, isn't that a pain?" and walked off, refusing to comment.

Payne said after the hearing that the county remains willing to talk with the tribe. The big sticking point for the county, he said, is that it wants the tribe to pledge not to book boaters cited for infractions like speeding on Lake Coeur d'Alene into tribal court, if they're not tribal members. That situation is complicated because the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the tribe owns the southern third of the lake - it's not like highways, which are owned by the state. Payne said the county won't concede on the boating infraction issue because it views that as a form of giving the tribe criminal jurisdiction over non-tribal members on the reservation. "That's a bright line that we never want to compromise, don't want to blur," he said.

Chief Allan, chairman of the Coeur d'Alene Tribe, said he personally doesn't care whether speeding boaters are cited into state court or tribal court, but said that's an issue for the lawyers given the U.S. Supreme Court decision. He also expressed some doubt that the county really is down to just one issue. "I've been in this game long enough to know that we do something, and it's always something else," he said.