New Mexico has a stormy gambling past. When the IGRA was passed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in Nineteen Ninety to negotiate a contract with New Mexico Amerindian tribes. When the working group arrived at an accord with 2 prominent local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that American Indian gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the accord with the Native bands, anti-gambling forces were able to tie the contract up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, thereby costing the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the ball rolling on a full compact amongst the State of New Mexico and its Indian bands. Ten years had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has grown since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game owners acquired just $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have increased steadily since that time. 2005 witnessed the biggest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the owners.
Bingo is certainly popular in New Mexico. All kinds of providers try for a slice of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gambling as a key matter like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s without doubt wishful thinking.
