RONAN - Rick and Vicki Wheeler recently got their first letter from the Lake County Health Department saying someone had complained that people were still lighting up in their Ronan bar, The Club, despite a statewide smoking ban that took effect on Oct. 1.

Rick Wheeler says they demanded to know who had turned them in - the law entitles them to that, he said.

Then he lit a cigarette while tending bar.

Here on the Flathead Indian Reservation, the Montana Clean Indoor Air Act has run into some hazy skies.

Tribally owned bars and casinos are exempt from the state's smoking ban. That means the Grey Wolf Peak Casino north of Evaro and the Kwa Taq Nuk Resort in Polson, owned by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, still offer both smoking and nonsmoking casino areas.

But here on the Flathead Reservation, some enrolled tribal members who own liquor licenses also allow smoking in their bars.

"The way I understand it, the state and health department won't pursue it if we allow it, because they have nowhere to take it," says Lori Peterson, an enrolled member of the tribes and owner of the Pheasant Lounge in Ronan.

Rick Wheeler's bar sits a block away, on the other side of Ronan's Main Street.

"Ninety percent of my customers smoke," says Wheeler, who is not a tribal member. If he enforces the smoking ban, Wheeler says, virtually all of them will simply cross the street to a bar where they can light up inside, and the business he's owned for 20 years will go belly-up.

"That's not right," he says. "This bar is my retirement - do they want to take that away from me, too? It's racial discrimination."

The majority of bars on the Flathead Reservation had either already gone smoke-free or did so on Oct. 1 when the ban on smoking in enclosed public places was extended to those that serve liquor.

Even Peterson pressed a "smoke-free establishment" sign on the window of her door and put away the ashtrays for a week, before learning it was up to her whether she would enforce it.

"We did lose customers" when the Pheasant initially went nonsmoking, Peterson says. "I have nowhere for smokers to go, except into the street or the alley. Most of the other bars have a deck or a beer garden where they can smoke outside."

Her business hasn't gone up from pre-Oct. 1 levels since the ashtrays returned to the bar and tables, but it did allow her to recoup the business she had lost.

"It just lets us keep our own customers," Peterson says. "It's not like Missoula, where if there was just one bar where you could smoke, it's where all the smokers would be."

That's because Peterson isn't the only tribal member on the reservation who owns a bar and allows smoking.

Neither is Wheeler the only nontribal member who owns a bar on the reservation but is not enforcing the smoking ban.

He's just not afraid to admit it.

"The next thing they'll go after is the obese thing," Wheeler says. "If you're 10 pounds overweight they won't be allowed to serve you anything but water and vegetables in a restaurant. They'll get it to where they won't let you eat what you want. This country is turning into a dictatorship."

Wheeler, 65, says he's smoked since he was 15 years old. His wife smokes, two of his three bartenders smoke, and the third chews smokeless tobacco - also banned under the Clean Indoor Air Act.

Like Peterson, Wheeler says business isn't up because he still allows smoking - it just hasn't gone down. Of the 10 percent of his regulars Wheeler says don't smoke, only one has quit coming into The Club.

Likewise, Peterson says her nonsmoking patrons have remained loyal since she removed the "smoke-free establishment" sign and replaced it with one that says "smoking allowed."

"If people want to smoke, they should have that right," Wheeler says. "It's their choice. We have rights, too. There are plenty of places for nonsmokers to go."

One of them is the Second Chance Saloon, which sits next door to the Pheasant Lounge and doesn't allow smoking. The Second Chance has a deck and fire pit out back where customers who smoke can go outside and stay relatively warm in the winter months.

Owner Rod Smart, who has had the Second Chance for nearly 30 years, says the recession has hurt local bars more than the smoking ban. His friend and next-door competitor, Peterson, agrees.

"It isn't gaming, it isn't smoking, it's the recession," she says. "We lost Plum Creek, which was a big employer here. People don't have the money for groceries, gas, lights and heat."

Still, both Peterson and Wheeler say they know bar owners on the reservation who enforce the smoking ban, and who say their businesses are off as much as $1,000 since their smoking patrons were directed outside every time they want to light up.

"It never should have been passed," Peterson says of the smoking ban in bars. "The state's not paying our bills, what gives them the right to step in and tell people how to run their businesses? I think if people aren't allowed to smoke, the state shouldn't be allowed to sell cigarettes."

Wheeler says he invested in high-dollar exhaust systems at The Club.

"You can have it full of smokers, and not see much smoke," he says. "I do what I can to keep secondhand smoke out of here."

That, Wheeler says, includes the use of high-efficiency particulate air, or HEPA, filters, and he changes the filters each week.

Diana Schwab of the Lake County Tobacco Prevention Program was out of town attending meetings Tuesday and Wednesday and could not be reached for comment. The director of the Lake County Health Department, Emily Colomeda, did not return a phone message Wednesday.

Likewise, Linda Lee, a supervisor with the Montana Tobacco Use Prevention Program, did not return messages left on her phone Tuesday and Wednesday.

But last week, in a Billings Gazette story about smoking being allowed in the Little Bighorn Casino on the Crow Indian Reservation, Lee told reporter Diane Cochran, "Reservations are sovereign governments. Unless they pass their own similar smoke-free laws, native-owned casinos on reservations have the choice whether to be smoke-free."

Wheeler maintains he should have the same choice.

"Let them fine me, I'm not going to pay it," he says. "They can appoint me an attorney and I'll take them to court. Are they going to come in and fine my customers? Maybe they can fill the jail in Hardin up with smokers.

"This is a smoking establishment," he continues. "Are they going to push me out of business because of that? I don't know. Is that what they want? How many more taxpayers do they want to put on the street?"

Reporter Vince Devlin can be reached at (406) 319-2117 or at vdevlin@missoulian.com.