New Mexico has a bitter gaming history. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in 1989, it seemed like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the American Indian casino craze. Politics assured that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in Nineteen Ninety to negotiate a contract with New Mexico Native bands. When the task force came to an accord with 2 prominent local bands a year later, Governor King declined to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it seemed that Amerindian gambling in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the contract with the Native tribes, anti-gaming groups were able to tie the contract up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, thereby denying the government of New Mexico 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 contract between the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. A decade had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico charity game operators brought in only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the owners.
Bingo is categorically popular in New Mexico. All sorts of owners look for a slice of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting over gaming as a key factor like they did in the 1990’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.
