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New Mexico has a stormy gambling past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to get on the Indian casino craze. Politics guaranteed that would not be the case.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a panel in 1990 to discuss an accord with New Mexico Indian bands. When the panel came to an accord with 2 prominent local bands a year later, the Governor refused to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until 1994.

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

It required the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the ball rolling on a full accord amongst the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. Ten years had been lost for gaming in New Mexico, including Indian casino Bingo.

The nonprofit Bingo business has increased since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. That year, New Mexico non-profit 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 increased constantly since that time. 2005 witnessed the biggest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.

Bingo is clearly favored in New Mexico. All sorts of providers look for a bit of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are through batting around gambling as a key matter like they did in the 90’s. That’s most likely hopeful thinking.