New Mexico has a rocky gaming past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by the House in 1989, it seemed like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Indian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a panel in 1990 to discuss a contract with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the task force arrived at an agreement with 2 prominent local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the bargain. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it appeared that Native betting in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the contract with the Indian tribes, anti-gambling forces were able to tie the accord up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing the compact, thus denying the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It required the CNA, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full contract between the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian bands. A decade had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has grown from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game providers brought in only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since that time. 2005 witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is categorically favored in New Mexico. All types of providers try for a bit of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting over gambling as an important matter like they did in the 1990’s. That is probably hopeful thinking.