New Mexico has a bitter gambling past. When the IGRA was signed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a task force in 1990 to draft an accord with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the task force arrived at an accord with 2 big local bands a year later, Governor King declined to sign the bargain. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it seemed that Indian gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the contract with the Amerindian bands, anti-gaming groups were able to tie the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, thus denying the state of New Mexico 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 Government of New Mexico and its American Indian tribes. A decade had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico charity game providers acquired just $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since that time. 2005 witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the providers.
Bingo is certainly favored in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a bit of the pie. With hope, the politicos are done batting over gaming as an important issue like they did in the 1990’s. That’s most likely hopeful thinking.