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

The New Mexico governor Bruce King appointed a working group in Nineteen Ninety to create a contract with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the task force came to an accord with 2 big local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the agreement. He held up a deal until Nineteen Ninety Four.

When a new governor took office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Indian betting in New Mexico was a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the compact with the American Indian tribes, anti-gambling groups were able to tie the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing the compact, thereby denying the government of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.

It required the CNA, passed by the New Mexico house, to get the process moving on a full compact between the State of New Mexico and its American Indian bands. A decade had been burned for gaming in New Mexico, including Native casino Bingo.

The non-profit Bingo industry has gotten bigger since Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico charity game providers acquired only $3,048. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Non-profit Bingo revenues have increased steadily since that time. Two Thousand and Five saw the biggest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the owners.

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