New Mexico has a bitter gambling history. When the IGRA was passed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the American Indian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a panel in 1990 to draft a compact with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the task force came to an agreement with two big local bands a year later, Governor King refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that American Indian gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the contract with the Indian bands, anti-gaming groups were able to hold the deal up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the deal, therefore costing the government 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 legislature, to get the process moving on a full contract amongst the State of New Mexico and its American Indian tribes. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico charity game providers brought in just $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have increased steadily since that time. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is apparently favored in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a piece of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gaming as a key factor like they did in the 1990’s. That is probably wishful thinking.
