06
February
Written by Gordon.
Posted in: Bingo
New Mexico has a stormy gaming past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in 1990 to draft an accord with New Mexico Native bands. When the working group arrived at an agreement with two important local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the bargain. He held up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Indian gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the contract with the Native tribes, anti-gaming forces were able to hold the contract up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, thereby denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Indian tribes. Ten years had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, which includes Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has increased since 1999. In that year, New Mexico non-profit game owners brought in just $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since that time. 2005 saw the biggest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is certainly popular in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a piece of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting over gambling as an important matter like they did in the 90’s. That is without doubt hopeful thinking.
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