New Mexico Bingo
Sunday, 8. January 2017
New Mexico has a stormy gambling background. When the IGRA was passed by the House in 1989, it looked like New Mexico would be one of the states to cash in on the Amerindian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that would not be the case.
The New Mexico governor Bruce King announced a working group in Nineteen Ninety to discuss a compact with New Mexico American Indian tribes. When the task force came to an agreement with two 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 office in Nineteen Ninety Five, it seemed that Amerindian wagering in New Mexico was a certainty. But when Governor Gary Johnson passed the accord with the Amerindian tribes, anti-wagering forces were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court ruled that Governor Johnson had overstepped his bounds in signing a deal, thereby denying the state of New Mexico many hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing revenues over the next several years.
It required the CNA, passed by the New Mexico house, to get the ball rolling on a full accord amongst the State of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. Ten years had been squandered for gambling in New Mexico, including American Indian casino Bingo.
The nonprofit Bingo industry has gotten bigger from 1999. In that year, New Mexico not for profit game operators acquired just $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in 2001. Nonprofit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since that time. Two Thousand and Five saw the biggest year, with $1,233,289 grossed by the operators.
Bingo is certainly popular in New Mexico. All sorts of owners try for a bit of the action. With hope, the politicians are done batting around gaming as a key issue like they did back in the 1990’s. That is probably wishful thinking.
Posted in Casino by Dayana