Bingo My Bingo Blog

Read more about the
Las Vegas 2024 Super
Bowl Streaker!

New Mexico has a rocky gaming past. When the IGRA was passed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn't be the situation.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a panel in Nineteen Ninety to draft an accord with New Mexico Native bands. When the panel came to an accord with two big local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the bargain. He held up a deal until 1994.

When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Native gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the accord with the Amerindian bands, anti-wagering groups were able to tie the deal up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing a deal, thus costing the government of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.

It took the CNA, passed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the ball rolling on a full compact amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Indian bands. A decade had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, which includes Native casino Bingo.

The non-profit Bingo business has increased from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico non-profit game providers brought in only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since then. 2005 saw the biggest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.

Bingo is apparently favored in New Mexico. All kinds of providers try for a slice of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are done batting over gaming as a key matter like they did in the 1990's. That is most likely hopeful thinking.