New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez’s office recently announced Taos, Isleta, Zuni and Ohkay Owingeh pueblos have signed a compact extending their right to operate casinos for two more decades. Previously the Navajo Nation, the Mescalero and Jicarilla Apache nations and Acoma and Jemez pueblos agreed to the new compact. The U.S. Department of Interior Department granted final approval for those agreements last month.
Talks still are ongoing with Tesuque and Santa Clara pueblos. Several other tribes have contacted the governor’s office about joining the new compact, which was negotiated over three years and approved by the legislature in the last session.
The Pojoaque Pueblo has not signed the agreement and in fact Pojoaque Governor Joseph Talachy recently stated the compact’s revenue-sharing requirement was an illegal tax that would hurt the tribe, casino workers and the surrounding community. He added the tribe feels it has been bullied by the state. “After hundreds of years of poverty, abuse and oppression, and the loss of land and water rights, we cannot continue to be taken advantage of by a state administration bent on wringing out more from our tribe,” Talachy said.
In addition to ending revenue sharing with the state, Talachy said the tribe wanted the gambling age to be lowered from 21 to 18 and alcohol to be allowed on the casino floor. Also, the tribe wanted permission for its casinos to cash payroll, Social Security, pension and government assistance checks and allow welfare recipients to use their electronic benefit cards at automated teller machines.
Jeremiah Ritchie, Martinez’s deputy chief of staff, responded, “We did everything we could to make this compact as reasonable and as favorable to the tribes as we could while still protecting the state’s interests.” He said the provisions desired by the tribe would go against the state’s attempts to create a more socially responsible system that would provide stability for New Mexico’s gambling market in the future.
Pojoaque’s gambling compact expired last month. However, U.S. Attorney Damon Martinez (no relation to the governor) said he would allow the tribe to continue to operate its casinos, pending the outcome of the pueblo’s case before the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver, seeking to allow the Interior Department to approve a gambling compact instead of the state.
In exchange for remaining open, the tribe agreed to follow the provisions of the expired compact and to place in escrow revenues that would have been paid to the state, specifically, 8 percent of its net winnings, amounting to more than $60.7 million in 2014. Martinez recently said gambling occurring at Pojoaque casinos is illegal everyone associated with them–including players, vendors, banks and others—could face problems in the futures.
