New Mexico Bingo

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New Mexico has a stormy gambling background. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Indian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the situation.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a working group in Nineteen Ninety to discuss a compact with New Mexico Native bands. When the panel arrived at an accord with 2 important local tribes a year later, Governor King declined to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.

When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that Amerindian gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the contract with the Indian tribes, anti-wagering forces were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore costing the government 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 process moving on a full contract between the Government of New Mexico and its Indian bands. A decade had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, which includes American Indian casino Bingo.

The nonprofit Bingo business has gotten bigger from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico charity game owners brought in only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the owners.

Bingo is clearly popular in New Mexico. All kinds of owners look for a piece of the action. With hope, the politicos are done batting around gaming as a key issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s most likely wishful thinking.