New Mexico has a stormy gaming past. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed 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 situation.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a panel in Nineteen Ninety to negotiate an accord with New Mexico Indian tribes. When the panel came to an accord with 2 prominent local bands a year later, Governor King refused to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.

When a new governor took office in 1995, it seemed that Native wagering in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the contract with the American Indian tribes, anti-gaming forces were able to tie the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the accord, thus 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, passed by the New Mexico government, to get the ball rolling on a full compact between the State of New Mexico and its Native bands. A decade had been squandered for gaming in New Mexico, including Indian casino Bingo.

The non-profit Bingo industry has gotten bigger from 1999. In that year, New Mexico non-profit game operators brought in just $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo revenues have grown constantly since that time. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the biggest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the providers.

Bingo is categorically favored in New Mexico. All sorts of owners look for a bit of the pie. With hope, the politicos are through batting over gaming as a hot button factor like they did back in the 90’s. That’s probably wishful thinking.