Bingo in New Mexico
New Mexico has a rocky gaming history. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Native casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a panel in Nineteen Ninety to create a contract with New Mexico American Indian bands. When the task force came to an accord with 2 big 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 office in 1995, it appeared that Amerindian gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the contract with the Amerindian bands, anti-gambling groups were able to hold the contract up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore costing the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the CNA, signed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Native tribes. Ten years had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, including American Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has increased from 1999. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game owners acquired only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have grown constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the owners.
Bingo is clearly popular in New Mexico. All types of operators try for a slice of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting over gambling as a hot button matter like they did in the 90’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.