New Mexico has a complex gaming past. When the IGRA was passed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a task force in 1990 to discuss a contract with New Mexico Native bands. When the working group arrived at an agreement with 2 important local bands a year later, Governor King declined to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it appeared that Native gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the contract with the Amerindian bands, anti-gambling forces were able to hold the accord up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing a 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 legislature, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the State of New Mexico and its Indian bands. A decade had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has gotten bigger from 1999. In that year, New Mexico non-profit game owners acquired only $3,048. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since then. 2005 witnessed the biggest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is apparently popular in New Mexico. All sorts of operators try for a slice of the action. With hope, the politicos are done batting over gambling as an important issue like they did back in the 90’s. That’s most likely hopeful thinking.