New Mexico has a bitter gambling past. When the IGRA was signed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics assured that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a task force in 1990 to draft a compact with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the task force arrived at an agreement with two prominent local bands a year later, Governor King declined to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that Indian betting in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the compact with the Indian bands, anti-gaming forces were able to hold the accord up in 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 Compact Negotiation Act, passed by the New Mexico house, to get the ball rolling on a full compact amongst the State of New Mexico and its Native bands. A decade had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has increased since 1999. That year, New Mexico not for profit game owners acquired just $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since then. Two Thousand and Five saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is certainly favored in New Mexico. All types of operators look for a bit of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting over gambling as an important issue like they did back in the 90’s. That’s without doubt hopeful thinking.