New Mexico Bingo
New Mexico has a bitter gambling history. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics assured that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a panel in Nineteen Ninety to discuss a compact with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the working group arrived at an accord with two 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 over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Native betting in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the contract with the Native tribes, anti-wagering forces were able to tie the accord up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing the compact, thus denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the CNA, passed by the New Mexico government, to get the ball rolling on a full accord between the State of New Mexico and its Amerindian bands. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has gotten bigger from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico not for profit game providers brought in just $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since then. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is certainly beloved in New Mexico. All sorts of providers try for a bit of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting around gaming as a key matter like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.
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