New Mexico Bingo
Thursday, 21. February 2019
New Mexico has a stormy gaming history. 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 Native casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that would not be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a panel in Nineteen Ninety to draft an accord with New Mexico Indian bands. When the working group came to an agreement with 2 big local bands a year later, Governor King refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it seemed that Indian wagering in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the contract with the Amerindian tribes, anti-gambling groups were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore costing 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 legislature, to get the ball rolling on a full contract amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Native bands. A decade had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has grown from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico charity game operators brought in just $3,048. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have grown constantly since that time. 2005 saw the greatest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the owners.
Bingo is certainly favored in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a bit of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting over gambling as a key matter like they did in the 1990’s. That’s without doubt hopeful thinking.
Posted in Bingo by Taryn