New Mexico Bingo
New Mexico has a bitter gaming background. When the IGRA was passed by Congress in 1989, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the American Indian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in 1990 to discuss a compact with New Mexico American Indian bands. When the panel came to an accord with two prominent local tribes a year later, the Governor refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Amerindian gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the compact with the American Indian bands, anti-gaming forces were able to hold the accord up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the deal, thereby denying the government 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 Native bands. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has grown since 1999. That year, New Mexico non-profit game operators acquired only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have grown steadily since then. 2005 witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is clearly beloved in New Mexico. All kinds of providers look for a bit of the pie. With hope, the politicos are through batting over gaming as a key matter like they did in the 90’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.