New Mexico Bingo
New Mexico has a rocky gaming past. When the IGRA was passed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics guaranteed that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in 1990 to discuss an accord with New Mexico American Indian bands. When the panel came to an accord with two prominent local bands a year later, Governor King refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that American Indian betting in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the compact with the Native bands, anti-wagering groups were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing a deal, thereby costing the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the ball rolling on a full contract amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Native bands. Ten years had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Amerindian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has grown from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico charity game owners acquired only $3,048. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have grown constantly since that time. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the owners.
Bingo is certainly beloved in New Mexico. All kinds of providers try for a bit of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting over gambling as a key issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That is most likely hopeful thinking.