New Mexico has a complex gaming background. When the IGRA was signed by the House in Nineteen Eighty Nine, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Indian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a working group in 1990 to discuss an accord with New Mexico Indian tribes. When the working group came to an accord with two prominent local bands a year later, Governor King declined to sign the bargain. He held up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that American Indian gaming in New Mexico was a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson signed the accord with the Indian tribes, anti-gambling groups were able to tie the contract up in the courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, therefore denying the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full compact between the Government of New Mexico and its Indian tribes. 10 years had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including Indian casino Bingo.
The non-profit Bingo industry has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game providers brought in only $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo earnings have increased constantly since that time. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the providers.
Bingo is clearly favored in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a piece of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting over gaming as an important factor like they did back in the 1990’s. That is without doubt wishful thinking.
This entry was posted on December 21, 2019, 10:25 am 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.