New Mexico has a rocky gaming past. When the IGRA was passed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Indian casino craze. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in 1990 to negotiate an accord with New Mexico Native tribes. When the task force came to an agreement with two important local tribes 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 gambling in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the contract with the Amerindian bands, anti-gaming forces were able to hold the contract up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, therefore costing the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Indian tribes. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has gotten bigger since 1999. That year, New Mexico charity game providers acquired only $3,048. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo earnings have increased constantly since then. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is apparently beloved in New Mexico. All kinds of operators look for a bit of the action. With hope, the politicos are done batting over gaming as an important issue like they did back in the 90’s. That’s most likely wishful thinking.