New Mexico has a bitter gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Native casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a task force in Nineteen Ninety to draft an accord with New Mexico Native bands. When the working group came to an agreement with two important local bands a year later, the Governor refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Native wagering in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the accord with the American Indian tribes, anti-gaming forces were able to tie the contract up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, therefore denying the state of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the Compact Negotiation Act, passed by the New Mexico government, to get the ball rolling on a full contract between the Government of New Mexico and its Native bands. A decade had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, including American Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico charity game operators brought in only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have increased steadily since that time. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the owners.
Bingo is categorically beloved in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a slice of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting over gaming as a hot button factor like they did back in the 1990’s. That is without doubt wishful thinking.