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New Mexico has a bitter gaming history. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress in 1989, it seemed like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the Amerindian casino craze. Politics guaranteed that would not be the situation.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a task force in Nineteen Ninety to create a compact with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the task force arrived at an agreement with two important local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the bargain. He would hold up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.

When a new governor took office in 1995, it seemed that Indian wagering in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the accord with the American Indian tribes, anti-gambling forces were able to hold the contract up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had out stepped his bounds in signing the accord, therefore costing the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.

It took the Compact Negotiation Act, signed by the New Mexico government, to get the ball rolling on a full accord between the Government of New Mexico and its Amerindian bands. 10 years had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, which includes Indian casino Bingo.

The non-profit Bingo business has grown from 1999. In that year, New Mexico charity game operators acquired just $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and passed one million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo revenues have grown constantly since that time. Two Thousand and Five saw the biggest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.

Bingo is apparently beloved in New Mexico. All types of operators look for a bit of the pie. Hopefully, the politicians are through batting around gambling as a key factor like they did in the 1990’s. That is probably wishful thinking.