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New Mexico has a rocky gaming background. When the IGRA was signed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Native casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in Nineteen Ninety to draft an accord with New Mexico American Indian bands. When the panel arrived at an accord with two big local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until 1994.

When a new governor took over in Nineteen Ninety Five, it appeared that Native gaming in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the compact with the Indian tribes, anti-gaming groups were able to tie the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing a deal, thus denying the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.

It took the Compact Negotiation Act, passed by the New Mexico government, to get the process moving on a full compact amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. A decade had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, including Indian casino Bingo.

The not for profit Bingo business has grown since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game operators acquired only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since then. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the owners.

Bingo is apparently favored in New Mexico. All sorts of operators try for a piece of the pie. With hope, the politicos are through batting over gaming as an important matter like they did in the 1990’s. That is most likely hopeful thinking.