New Mexico has a rocky gaming history. When the IGRA was signed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Indian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a task force in Nineteen Ninety to discuss a contract with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the panel came to an agreement with 2 prominent local bands a year later, Governor King refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it appeared that American Indian gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the accord with the Amerindian bands, anti-gaming groups were able to hold the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore denying the state of New Mexico many 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 process moving on a full contract amongst the State of New Mexico and its Native tribes. A decade had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, including American Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has grown since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico charity game providers acquired just $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have increased steadily since that time. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is apparently favored in New Mexico. All kinds of providers try for a piece of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting over gambling as a key issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.