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New Mexico has a stormy gambling history. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the American Indian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a panel in Nineteen Ninety to create an accord with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the working group arrived at an accord with 2 prominent local bands a year later, the Governor refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it seemed that Native gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the accord with the Indian bands, anti-gambling forces were able to tie the contract up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, therefore costing the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the ball rolling on a full accord amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Native bands. Ten years had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, including American Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has grown from 1999. In that year, New Mexico non-profit game owners brought in only $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is apparently beloved in New Mexico. All sorts of operators try for a slice of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are through batting over gaming as an important issue like they did in the 1990’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.
June 6th, 2019
Francesca
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