New Mexico has a rocky gambling past. When the IGRA was signed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Native casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a panel in Nineteen Ninety to discuss a contract with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the panel came to an accord with two prominent local tribes a year later, Governor King refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that Amerindian gambling in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the compact with the Native bands, anti-gaming forces were able to tie the contract up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, thus denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the CNA, signed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the State of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. A decade had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Native casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo business has gotten bigger since 1999. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game providers acquired just $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since then. 2005 saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is categorically beloved in New Mexico. All sorts of providers look for a bit of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are through batting around gaming as an important issue like they did in the 90’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.
