New Mexico has a rocky gaming history. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Indian casino craze. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a task force in Nineteen Ninety to negotiate a compact with New Mexico American Indian bands. When the panel came to an agreement with 2 prominent local bands a year later, Governor King declined to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it appeared that American Indian gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the compact with the Amerindian bands, anti-gaming groups were able to hold the deal up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing a deal, thus 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 legislature, to get the ball rolling on a full accord amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Indian tribes. Ten years had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Native casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has gotten bigger from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game providers acquired just $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded one million dollars in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have grown steadily since that time. Two Thousand and Five saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is certainly beloved in New Mexico. All sorts of providers try for a piece of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are through batting around gambling as a key factor like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s most likely wishful thinking.