GRAND FORKS - Police raided the Bingo Palace here, looking for smokers on the first day of a statewide smoking ban.

They found them, and they were not happy.

"What is this, Russia?" asked Diana Niles, a regular at the Bingo Palace for 16 years, who comes with her friends to mark bingo cards, talk, smoke and eat dinner.

The state law that took effect Monday bans smoking in public areas and workplaces. Bars are exempt, unless they have a restaurant that is not separated from the smoking area.

The Bingo Palace is a charitable gambling site sponsored by the North Dakota Association for the Disabled. Police showed up there about 1:30 p.m., collected ashtrays from the tables and ordered smokers to put out their cigarettes.

Ron Gibbens, president and chief executive officer of the association, which runs 12 charitable blackjack and bingo sites around the state, said the Bingo Palace drew only half the number of bingo players Monday as it had the week before.

"We're not even breaking even with 60 people," he said.

Gibbens thought he had prepared for the new ban by arranging for a retail tobacco firm to lease space in the Palace. He thought that would allow the Palace to avoid the smoking ban.

City officials disagreed and sent over police officers to snuff out any smoking.

Gibbens also applied for a liquor license to sell beer and wine, which would have made smoking possible in the Palace. The City Council denied the application.

The Palace is too close to a church and to another bar to qualify for a liquor license, City Attorney Howard Swanson told the council before the vote.

Smokers lined the outside wall of the mall Monday at the Bingo Palace.

"I respect nonsmokers," Niles said. "But this is something you do by choice."

Gibbens said the Bingo Palace sends About $750,000 a year in charitable gambling proceeds to pay for services to people with disabilities in the state, with a similar amount to the state each year in sales and other taxes. He said about $120,000 comes back to the city of Grand Forks each year.

"We'll figure something out," Gibbens said.

At the Good Friends in Larimore,the new ban was not a problem, said owner Terry Trosen. The building has a big cafe space with a large bar.

The bar is open the whole time, but smoking is not allowed until 2:30 p.m., when the caf/ closes.

"We didn't have any trouble," Trosen said. "A few people didn't remember and walked in with their cigarette and I had to say, 'No smoking,' and they had no problem with it."

A few regulars avoided Jeannie's Restaurant on Monday in Grand Forks, but it will take longer to see the effect is permanent, said owner Jeanette Sersland.

"A few of the old pros, who've got to have a cigarette with their coffee, kind of pulled a thing this morning, and didn't come in. About six of them," she said.

Sersland, a smoker herself, joined an employee Monday for a smoke break out back. She said it seemed funny to be standing outside smoking.

"In the wintertime, I suppose they will cut down," she said.

Information from: Grand Forks Herald, http://www.grandforks.com/mld/grandforks/