New Mexico has a stormy gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Indian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in Nineteen Ninety to draft an accord with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the task force arrived at an accord with 2 big local bands a year later, the Governor refused to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that Indian gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the contract with the Indian bands, anti-wagering groups were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, thus denying the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full compact between the Government of New Mexico and its Native tribes. A decade had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Indian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has grown since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico charity game providers brought in just $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is certainly beloved in New Mexico. All types of operators look for a piece of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting over gambling as an important issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s most likely hopeful thinking.
August 6th, 2024
Simone
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