New Mexico has a stormy gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Native casino craze. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a task force in 1990 to negotiate an accord with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the panel arrived at an agreement with two big local tribes a year later, Governor King refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it seemed that American Indian gambling in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the compact with the Indian tribes, anti-gaming groups were able to tie the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the Compact Negotiation Act, passed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full contract amongst the Government of New Mexico and its American Indian tribes. A decade had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Amerindian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has increased from 1999. That year, New Mexico not for profit game owners brought in just $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since then. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is categorically popular in New Mexico. All types of owners try for a slice of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gambling as a key matter like they did back in the 1990’s. That is most likely wishful thinking.