New Mexico has a bitter gaming history. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a task force in Nineteen Ninety to draft a compact with New Mexico Native bands. When the task force arrived at an accord with 2 prominent local tribes a year later, the Governor refused to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it appeared that American Indian betting in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the accord with the American Indian tribes, anti-gambling forces were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the deal, therefore denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It required the CNA, passed by the New Mexico house, to get the ball rolling on a full contract amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Native bands. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, which includes American Indian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico non-profit game providers acquired only $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo earnings have grown steadily since that time. 2005 witnessed the biggest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is certainly popular in New Mexico. All kinds of providers try for a bit of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gambling as an important factor like they did back in the 90’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.