Bingo in New Mexico
New Mexico has a complex gaming past. When the IGRA was signed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Indian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a panel in Nineteen Ninety to discuss a contract with New Mexico Native bands. When the panel arrived at an agreement with 2 prominent local tribes a year later, the Governor declined 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 Amerindian gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the accord with the American Indian bands, anti-gaming groups were able to tie the deal up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, thus denying the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the CNA, passed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full accord between the Government of New Mexico and its American Indian bands. A decade had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, which includes American Indian casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo business has grown since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico non-profit game owners acquired just $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since that time. Two Thousand and Five saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is apparently beloved in New Mexico. All types of providers try for a slice of the action. With hope, the politicians are done batting over gaming as an important issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That is probably wishful thinking.