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New Mexico has a stormy gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Indian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that would not be the case.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a panel in 1990 to create a contract with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the task force came to an accord with two important local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.

When a new governor took office in 1995, it seemed that Indian gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the contract with the American Indian bands, anti-gaming groups were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, thereby costing the state 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 legislature, to get the process moving on a full contract between the Government of New Mexico and its American Indian tribes. A decade had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, including Indian casino Bingo.

The non-profit Bingo business has increased since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico charity game owners brought in only $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have increased constantly since then. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the biggest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.

Bingo is apparently beloved in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a slice of the action. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting around gambling as a key issue like they did back in the 90’s. That’s without doubt wishful thinking.

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