New Mexico has a complex gambling background. When the IGRA was signed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the American Indian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a task force in Nineteen Ninety to draft an accord with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the working group arrived at an agreement with two important 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 office in 1995, it appeared that Indian gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the accord with the Amerindian bands, anti-wagering forces were able to hold the deal up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had out stepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore denying the government of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It required the CNA, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full contract amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo business has grown from 1999. That year, New Mexico not for profit game operators brought in only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and passed a million dollars in 2001. Non-profit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since then. 2005 witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is categorically favored in New Mexico. All kinds of providers try for a slice of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting over gaming as a hot button matter like they did back in the 1990’s. That is most likely hopeful thinking.