New Mexico has a rocky gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics guaranteed that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in Nineteen Ninety to create a compact with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the task force arrived at an agreement with two prominent local tribes 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 1995, it appeared that Native gambling in New Mexico was a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the contract with the American Indian bands, anti-gambling groups 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, thereby denying 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, passed by the New Mexico house, to get the ball rolling on a full compact between the State of New Mexico and its American Indian tribes. A decade had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, which includes American Indian casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo industry has grown from 1999. That year, New Mexico non-profit game owners brought in just $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded one million dollars in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since then. Two Thousand and Five saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is apparently popular in New Mexico. All kinds of operators try for a bit of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are through batting over gaming as a hot button issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s without doubt hopeful thinking.
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