New Mexico Bingo
New Mexico has a stormy gambling background. When the IGRA was signed 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 guaranteed that wouldn’t be the situation.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a task force in Nineteen Ninety to discuss an accord with New Mexico Native bands. When the working group came to an agreement with 2 big local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until 1994.
When a new governor took office in 1995, it appeared that Indian gambling in New Mexico was a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the accord with the Native bands, anti-gambling forces were able to hold the accord up in the courts. A New Mexico court found that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, thus denying the government of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.
It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full accord between the Government of New Mexico and its Native tribes. Ten years had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo business has gotten bigger from 1999. In that year, New Mexico charity game operators brought in only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed a million dollars in 2001. Non-profit Bingo earnings have increased steadily since that time. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the greatest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the owners.
Bingo is certainly popular in New Mexico. All kinds of operators look for a piece of the pie. Hopefully, the politicos are through batting over gambling as a key matter like they did back in the 90’s. That’s probably hopeful thinking.
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