New Mexico has a complex gambling background. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in 1990 to draft an accord with New Mexico American Indian bands. When the task force came to an agreement with two important local tribes a year later, Governor King refused to sign the bargain. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it seemed that Native betting in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the contract with the Indian bands, anti-gambling forces were able to hold 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 state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the State of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. A decade had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, which includes American Indian casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo business has gotten bigger since 1999. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game owners brought in only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have grown steadily since then. 2005 witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is categorically beloved in New Mexico. All sorts of providers look for a piece of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting over gaming as a hot button issue like they did in the 90’s. That is without doubt hopeful thinking.
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