New Mexico has a rocky gaming history. When the IGRA was signed 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 bandwagon. Politics assured that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in 1990 to discuss an accord with New Mexico Native tribes. When the working group arrived at an agreement with two prominent 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 seemed that Amerindian betting in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the accord with the Amerindian tribes, anti-gambling groups were able to tie the deal up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, therefore denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the CNA, passed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full contract between the Government of New Mexico and its Native bands. Ten years had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, which includes American Indian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game owners acquired only $3,048. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and passed a million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo earnings have increased constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is certainly popular in New Mexico. All kinds of operators look for a piece of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gaming as a hot button matter like they did back in the 90’s. That is most likely wishful thinking.