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New Mexico has a stormy gambling history. When the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was signed by Congress in 1989, it looked like New Mexico might be one of the states to get on the American Indian casino bandwagon. Politics guaranteed that would not be the case.

The New Mexico governor Bruce King assembled a panel in 1990 to discuss a compact with New Mexico Amerindian bands. When the panel arrived at an agreement with 2 big local tribes a year later, the Governor declined to sign the agreement. He would hold up a deal until 1994.

When a new governor took office in 1995, it appeared that Native gambling in New Mexico was now a certainty. But when the new Governor passed the compact with the American Indian tribes, anti-gambling groups were able to hold the deal up in courts. A New Mexico court found that the Governor had overstepped his bounds in signing a deal, thereby denying the state of New Mexico hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees over the next several years.

It required the Compact Negotiation Act, passed by the New Mexico legislature, to get the ball rolling on a full contract between the State of New Mexico and its Amerindian tribes. Ten years had been burned for gambling in New Mexico, including Indian casino Bingo.

The nonprofit Bingo business has gotten bigger from Nineteen Ninety-Nine. In that year, New Mexico charity game providers brought in only $3,048 in revenues. That climbed to $725,150 in 2000, and exceeded a million dollars in revenues in 2001. Not for profit Bingo earnings have grown constantly since that time. Two Thousand and Five saw the largest year, with $1,233,289 earned by the operators.

Bingo is apparently popular in New Mexico. All sorts of operators look for a slice of the pie. With hope, the politicos are done batting over gambling as an important matter like they did in the 1990's. That is most likely hopeful thinking.