New Mexico has a stormy gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Native casino craze. Politics guaranteed that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a panel in Nineteen Ninety to draft an accord with New Mexico Native tribes. When the panel came to an agreement with 2 prominent local tribes a year later, Governor King refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Indian gambling in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the contract with the Indian tribes, anti-gambling groups were able to hold the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing a deal, thus costing the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the Compact Negotiation Act, passed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the State of New Mexico and its Indian tribes. A decade had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, including American Indian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has grown since 1999. In that year, New Mexico charity game providers brought in only $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the providers.
Bingo is categorically beloved in New Mexico. All kinds of providers look for a slice of the pie. With hope, the politicos are through batting around gaming as a key issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That is most likely hopeful thinking.
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