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New Mexico has a stormy gambling past. When the IGRA was signed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics assured that wouldn’t be the case.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a working group in 1990 to discuss an accord with New Mexico Indian bands. When the task force 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 Nineteen Ninety Four.

When a new governor took over in 1995, it appeared that Native betting in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the contract with the Native tribes, anti-gambling forces were able to tie the accord up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled 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 revenues over the next several years.

It took the CNA, signed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the process moving on a full accord amongst the State of New Mexico and its American Indian bands. 10 years had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, including Amerindian casino Bingo.

The not for profit Bingo industry has grown from 1999. That year, New Mexico charity game operators acquired just $3,048 in revenues. This number grew to $725,150 in 2000, and surpassed a million dollars in 2001. Non-profit Bingo revenues have grown steadily since that time. Two Thousand and Five witnessed the biggest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.

Bingo is apparently popular in New Mexico. All kinds of owners try for a bit of the action. Hopefully, the politicos are done batting over gambling as a key matter like they did in the 1990’s. That’s most likely hopeful thinking.