New Mexico Bingo
New Mexico has a rocky gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Indian casino craze. Politics assured that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a panel in Nineteen Ninety to negotiate a contract with New Mexico Native tribes. When the task force came to an accord with two big local tribes a year later, the Governor refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it seemed that Native betting in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor signed the accord with the Indian tribes, anti-gambling forces were able to tie the contract up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, thereby costing the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It took the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full accord between the State of New Mexico and its Amerindian bands. A decade had been squandered for gaming in New Mexico, including Indian casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo industry has grown since 1999. That year, New Mexico charity game operators acquired only $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have increased steadily since then. Two Thousand and Five saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is apparently popular in New Mexico. All types of owners try for a piece of the pie. With hope, the politicos are done batting around gambling as a key matter like they did back in the 1990’s. That’s without doubt wishful thinking.