New Mexico has a bitter gambling past. When the IGRA was passed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics assured that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a panel in 1990 to create a contract with New Mexico Amerindian tribes. When the task force came to an agreement with 2 big 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 1995, it appeared that Native gambling in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the compact with the Native bands, anti-wagering groups 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 deal, therefore denying the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full contract between the Government of New Mexico and its Native tribes. A decade had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has increased since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico not for profit game operators brought in only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo earnings have increased constantly since then. 2005 witnessed the biggest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the providers.
Bingo is clearly favored in New Mexico. All kinds of providers try for a bit of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gambling as a hot button matter like they did in the 1990’s. That’s without doubt hopeful thinking.
