New Mexico has a rocky gaming past. When the IGRA was signed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in 1990 to create a compact with New Mexico Indian tribes. When the working group arrived at an accord with two big local tribes a year later, Governor King refused to sign the bargain. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Native gambling in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the contract with the Native tribes, anti-gambling groups were able to tie the contract up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had out stepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore costing the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full contract amongst the State of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. A decade had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Native casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo business has increased since 1999. In that year, New Mexico charity game operators brought in only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have grown steadily since then. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the providers.
Bingo is certainly favored in New Mexico. All kinds of providers try for a bit of the pie. With hope, the politicos are through batting over gambling as a key factor like they did in the 1990’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.