New Mexico Bingo
New Mexico has a complex gaming history. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed 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 bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a working group in Nineteen Ninety to create a contract with New Mexico Indian tribes. When the panel arrived at an agreement with 2 prominent local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it seemed that Native wagering in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the accord with the Amerindian bands, anti-gaming forces were able to tie the accord up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had out stepped his bounds in signing the deal, thus costing the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the CNA, passed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full accord between the State of New Mexico and its Indian tribes. A decade had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has grown since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game operators brought in just $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded one million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since that time. 2005 witnessed the biggest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is clearly popular in New Mexico. All sorts of operators look for a bit of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are through batting over gaming as a hot button factor like they did in the 90’s. That is most likely wishful thinking.