New Mexico has a bitter gaming background. 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 Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in 1990 to draft a compact with New Mexico American Indian bands. When the panel arrived at an accord with two prominent local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that American Indian gambling in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the compact with the Amerindian bands, anti-gaming forces were able to hold the deal up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing the deal, thereby denying the state of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full contract between the State of New Mexico and its Amerindian bands. 10 years had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has gotten bigger since 1999. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game owners brought in only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have increased constantly since that time. 2005 witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is certainly favored in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a bit of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are through batting over gambling as an important issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That is without doubt hopeful thinking.
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