New Mexico has a bitter gaming background. When the IGRA was signed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Indian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in 1990 to negotiate an accord with New Mexico Indian tribes. When the task force came to an agreement with 2 prominent local bands a year later, Governor King declined to sign the bargain. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Native wagering in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the contract with the Indian bands, anti-wagering forces were able to tie the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, thus costing the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the CNA, signed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full contract amongst the Government of New Mexico and its American Indian bands. A decade had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico not for profit game operators brought in just $3,048. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since then. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the owners.
Bingo is apparently popular in New Mexico. All kinds of providers look for a slice of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting over gambling as an important factor like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s probably hopeful thinking.