New Mexico has a rocky gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Native casino craze. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a working group in 1990 to create a contract with New Mexico Indian tribes. When the task force came to an accord with two important local tribes a year later, Governor King refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that American Indian betting in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the contract with the Native bands, anti-wagering forces were able to tie the contract up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing the deal, therefore denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the CNA, passed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the State of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. A decade had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, including Indian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has grown since 1999. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game providers acquired only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo earnings have increased constantly since that time. Two Thousand and Five saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is clearly favored in New Mexico. All sorts of owners look for a slice of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gaming as a key factor like they did in the 1990’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.
This entry was posted on January 15, 2016, 3:21 pm and is filed under Bingo. You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.