New Mexico has a bitter gaming background. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Native casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a working group in Nineteen Ninety to negotiate a compact with New Mexico Indian tribes. When the working group arrived at an agreement with 2 prominent local bands a year later, the Governor refused to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it appeared that Native betting in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the accord with the American Indian bands, anti-gaming groups were able to hold the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the deal, thus denying the state of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the ball rolling on a full compact amongst the State of New Mexico and its Indian tribes. A decade had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has grown since 1999. That year, New Mexico charity game operators brought in just $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is apparently popular in New Mexico. All types of owners look for a bit of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting around gaming as a key issue like they did back in the 90’s. That is probably hopeful thinking.
