New Mexico has a rocky gambling background. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a panel in 1990 to create a compact with New Mexico Amerindian tribes. When the working group arrived at an accord with two big local bands a year later, the Governor refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it seemed that Native gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the contract with the Amerindian tribes, anti-gaming groups were able to tie the contract up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore costing the government of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It required the CNA, passed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the ball rolling on a full compact amongst the Government of New Mexico and its American Indian tribes. A decade had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, including American Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game owners acquired only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since then. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is certainly favored in New Mexico. All sorts of operators try for a piece of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting over gambling as a hot button matter like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s without doubt hopeful thinking.