New Mexico has a complex gaming background. When the IGRA was signed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Native casino craze. Politics guaranteed that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in Nineteen Ninety to draft a compact with New Mexico Indian tribes. When the working group came to an accord with two big local bands a year later, Governor King refused to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that Native gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the compact with the Native bands, anti-gaming forces were able to tie the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, thereby costing the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It required the CNA, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full compact between the Government of New Mexico and its Native bands. 10 years had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, including American Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has grown from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico not for profit game providers acquired only $3,048. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since that time. 2005 saw the biggest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is categorically popular in New Mexico. All kinds of providers look for a bit of the pie. With hope, the politicians are done batting around gaming as a key factor like they did in the 90’s. That’s most likely hopeful thinking.
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