New Mexico has a stormy gaming past. When the IGRA was signed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the American Indian casino craze. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a panel in Nineteen Ninety to discuss a compact with New Mexico American Indian bands. When the task force came to an agreement with 2 important local tribes a year later, the Governor refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it appeared that Indian gambling in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the compact with the American Indian bands, anti-gambling groups were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing a deal, thus denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It required the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the ball rolling on a full accord between the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has grown since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico charity game providers brought in only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and passed a million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since then. 2005 saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the providers.
Bingo is certainly beloved in New Mexico. All kinds of owners look for a piece of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting over gambling as a hot button matter like they did in the 1990’s. That is without doubt hopeful thinking.