New Mexico has a stormy gambling background. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Native casino bandwagon. Politics assured that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in 1990 to discuss a contract with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the working group arrived at an accord with 2 big local bands a year later, Governor King refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it appeared that American Indian gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the compact with the Amerindian tribes, anti-gaming groups were able to tie the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had out stepped his bounds in signing a deal, therefore 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, passed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian bands. A decade had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, which includes American Indian casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo business has grown from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico not for profit game owners acquired 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 grown constantly since that time. 2005 saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is categorically favored in New Mexico. All sorts of operators look for a bit of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gambling as an important matter like they did back in the 1990’s. That is most likely hopeful thinking.