New Mexico has a bitter gambling background. When the IGRA was passed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Native casino bandwagon. Politics assured that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a panel in Nineteen Ninety to draft a contract with New Mexico Amerindian tribes. When the panel came to an accord with two important local tribes a year later, Governor King declined to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Native gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the accord with the Amerindian bands, anti-wagering groups were able to hold the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, thus costing the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico house, to get the ball rolling on a full compact between the Government of New Mexico and its Indian bands. A decade had been squandered for gaming in New Mexico, including Indian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has increased since 1999. That year, New Mexico charity game operators acquired just $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have grown constantly since that time. 2005 saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is certainly popular in New Mexico. All sorts of providers try for a piece of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting around gaming as a hot button factor like they did back in the 90’s. That is most likely hopeful thinking.