Bingo in New Mexico
Posted in Casino on 12/06/2015 04:21 pm by Esperanza
New Mexico has a rocky gambling background. When the IGRA was passed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might 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 announced a task force in Nineteen Ninety to draft an accord with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the task force arrived at an agreement with 2 big local tribes a year later, the Governor refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.
When a new governor took over in 1995, it seemed that Indian gambling in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the accord with the American Indian tribes, anti-gaming forces were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, therefore denying the state of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the CNA, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full compact amongst the State of New Mexico and its Native tribes. A decade had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, which includes Amerindian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo business has gotten bigger from 1999. In that year, New Mexico charity game operators acquired only $3,048. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in 2001. Non-profit Bingo revenues have grown constantly since that time. 2005 saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is categorically favored in New Mexico. All kinds of operators look for a piece of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting around gaming as a hot button factor like they did in the 1990’s. That’s without doubt wishful thinking.