New Mexico has a rocky gaming past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by the House in 1989, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the American Indian casino craze. Politics assured that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in 1990 to discuss a compact with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the panel came to an agreement with 2 big local bands a year later, Governor King refused to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it seemed that Native wagering in New Mexico was a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the contract with the Native tribes, anti-wagering groups were able to tie the deal up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing a deal, thus costing the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico house, to get the ball rolling on a full compact amongst the State of New Mexico and its Indian tribes. A decade had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has increased since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico non-profit game owners acquired 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 revenues have increased constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five saw the biggest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is clearly beloved in New Mexico. All sorts of operators try for a slice of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting around gaming as a hot button factor like they did in the 1990’s. That is probably wishful thinking.