New Mexico has a rocky gaming past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a panel in 1990 to create an accord with New Mexico Indian bands. When the panel arrived at an accord with 2 important local bands a year later, the Governor declined to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Indian gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the compact with the Indian tribes, anti-gambling forces were able to tie the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, therefore denying the state of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the CNA, passed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Indian bands. 10 years had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, which includes Amerindian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has grown since 1999. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game owners acquired only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have increased steadily since that time. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is apparently popular in New Mexico. All sorts of providers try for a piece of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting around gaming as an important issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That is without doubt wishful thinking.