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New Mexico has a bitter gambling past. When the IGRA was passed by the House in 1989, it seemed like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Indian casino craze. Politics assured that would not be the situation.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a task force in Nineteen Ninety to negotiate a contract with New Mexico Indian 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 would hold up a deal until 1994.

When a new governor took office in 1995, it seemed that Amerindian wagering in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the compact with the Amerindian tribes, anti-gambling forces were able to hold the contract up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the deal, thus denying the government of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.

It took the Compact Negotiation Act, passed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full accord between the Government of New Mexico and its Native bands. A decade had been lost for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Native casino Bingo.

The nonprofit Bingo business has gotten bigger from 1999. In that year, New Mexico charity game providers acquired only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five saw the biggest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.

Bingo is categorically beloved in New Mexico. All sorts of providers look for a piece of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gambling as an important factor like they did in the 1990’s. That’s most likely hopeful thinking.

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