Ideas. Stories. Community.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Donate during KSJD's Spring Fund Drive and you could win a Super73 E-Bike! Click here to donate NOW.

New Mexico Will Launch Statewide Gambling Study

John Phelan
/
Creative Commons

The first major study of problem gambling in New Mexico since 2006 is set to be launched. The Santa Fe New Mexican reports that the nearly $300,000 study is being financed by an association created by several American Indian tribes. The nonprofit Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation will conduct the research. The New Mexican reports that the project will examine gaming behavior statewide, with a particular focus on racial and ethnic groups, members of the military, college students, and several other groups. It is scheduled to be finished by early 2020. A little over a decade ago, the last major study of problem gambling in New Mexico found that some 29,000 individuals had the compulsive psychiatric disorder, with tens of thousands more at risk. New Mexico has a state lottery and horse-racing tracks, and gambling is legal at casinos on Indian reservations.

Gail Binkly is a career journalist who has worked for the Colorado Springs Gazette and Cortez Journal, and was the editor of the Four Corners Free Press, based in Cortez.