New Mexico has a bitter gaming past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it seemed like New Mexico might be one of the states to cash in on the American Indian casino craze. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a panel in 1990 to create a contract with New Mexico Indian bands. When the panel arrived at an agreement with 2 important local bands a year later, the Governor declined to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that American Indian gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the accord with the Indian bands, anti-gaming groups 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 state of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full contract amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Native bands. A decade had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The not for profit Bingo business has increased from 1999. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game operators brought in only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo earnings have increased constantly since that time. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is clearly favored in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a piece of the pie. With hope, the politicos are done batting around gaming as an important matter like they did back in the 1990’s. That is probably hopeful thinking.
This entry was posted on May 31, 2017, 2:25 pm and is filed under Casino. You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.