New Mexico has a rocky gaming background. When the IGRA was passed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the American Indian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a task force in Nineteen Ninety to draft a contract with New Mexico Amerindian tribes. When the panel came to an agreement with two big 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 Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Amerindian betting in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the contract with the Indian bands, anti-gambling groups were able to hold the deal up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing a deal, thus denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the ball rolling on a full compact between the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian bands. A decade had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Native casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has gotten bigger from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico not for profit game operators acquired just $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since that time. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is apparently favored in New Mexico. All sorts of operators try for a slice of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting around gaming as a key matter like they did in the 90’s. That is most likely wishful thinking.