New Mexico has a rocky gaming past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics assured that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a task force in 1990 to negotiate an accord with New Mexico Indian bands. When the working group came to an accord with two big local bands a year later, the Governor refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that Indian betting in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the compact with the Indian bands, anti-gaming groups were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, therefore denying the government of New Mexico 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 ball rolling on a full compact between the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. A decade had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo industry has increased since 1999. That year, New Mexico not for profit game operators acquired only $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since then. 2005 witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is clearly popular in New Mexico. All sorts of operators look for a bit of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting over gambling as an important matter like they did in the 90’s. That’s most likely hopeful thinking.