New Mexico Bingo
Posted in Casino on 06/27/2020 03:25 am by Dakota
New Mexico has a rocky gaming history. When the IGRA was passed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a task force in 1990 to negotiate a compact with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the panel came to an accord with two prominent local bands a year later, Governor King refused to sign the bargain. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it seemed that Native gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the accord with the American Indian tribes, anti-gambling groups were able to tie the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the deal, 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, passed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full contract amongst the State of New Mexico and its American Indian bands. A decade had been squandered for gaming in New Mexico, which includes Indian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has gotten bigger from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico non-profit game operators brought in just $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have increased constantly since that time. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.
Bingo is clearly beloved in New Mexico. All sorts of providers try for a slice of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting around gaming as an important factor like they did in the 1990’s. That’s probably hopeful thinking.