Bingo halls cannot avoid state indoor smoking restrictions simply by trying to recast themselves as bars or tobacco shops, Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem says.

North Dakota's new anti-smoking law, which took effect Aug. 1, bans puffing in most indoor businesses, but allows it in bars and stores that sell little besides cigarettes, cigars and other tobacco products.

Bingo halls, where smoking was common before the ban became law, have reported a drop-off in business, and proprietors have been searching for a way to allow their customers to legally smoke.

Stenehjem, in a legal opinion issued Tuesday, said a bingo hall that obtains a liquor or retail tobacco license cannot allow smoking if conducting bingo games remains its principal business.

"There are a number of businesses that are either struggling to figure out what it is that the law means when it comes to these various exceptions, or they're trying to find a loophole in the statute that will fit what they actually want to do," Stenehjem said in an interview.

It is the third legal opinion Stenehjem has written to interpret the anti-smoking law, and the attorney general said more are being researched. It was requested by Sen. Randy Schobinger, R-Minot, who said the present law has "created a terrible, unequal playing field" for bingo operations.

Bars that conduct bingo games may permit smoking, but nonprofit organizations that run bingo halls for charitable purposes cannot allow their customers to smoke, Schobinger said Tuesday. Some are contemplating remodeling projects in an effort to allow smoking and comply with the law, he said.

"We're trying … to make sure that before these organizations make changes, or in many cases put significant investment into their facilities, that when they're done with that investment, that they'll be within the law," Schobinger said.

The law specifically identifies "bingo facilities" as an example of a public place where smoking would not be allowed.

"There are a lot of bingo halls that rely on customers who want to smoke," Stenehjem said. "They want to get an exception that the Legislature did not recognize."