New Mexico has a stormy gaming past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the American Indian casino craze. Politics guaranteed that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a task force in 1990 to draft a contract with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the task force arrived at an agreement with 2 prominent local tribes a year later, Governor King refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that Indian gambling in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the compact with the Amerindian tribes, anti-gambling groups were able to tie the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the deal, thereby denying the government of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico house, to get the ball rolling on a full compact amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian bands. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Amerindian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has increased from 1999. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game providers brought in only $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have grown constantly since that time. 2005 witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the owners.
Bingo is categorically favored in New Mexico. All types of owners try for a piece of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting over gambling as a hot button matter like they did in the 1990’s. That is without doubt hopeful thinking.