New Mexico has a complex gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the American Indian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in Nineteen Ninety to negotiate a contract with New Mexico American Indian bands. When the task force came to an accord with two big local bands a year later, Governor King declined to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it seemed that Native gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the contract with the Amerindian bands, anti-gambling forces were able to hold the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, thereby denying the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the Compact Negotiation Act, passed 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 lost for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Indian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has increased since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game owners brought in only $3,048. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in 2001. Non-profit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since that time. 2005 witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is apparently popular in New Mexico. All kinds of providers look for a piece of the pie. With hope, the politicians are done batting around gambling as a hot button issue like they did back in the 90’s. That’s without doubt wishful thinking.