It is a shutime for Hollywood in Capitol California.
The state’s entertainment industry spent months of begging for help from Sacramento to stop the decrease in film and television production and provide thousands of jobs.
This week, after months of speeches and promises from public officials, two draft laws aimed at strengthening the besieged actions by surveying their first legislative obstacles.
The bills aim to make the California film and television incentive in the states and other countries and other countries Increased tax credit up to 35 % of qualified expenses And expand the types of products that will be eligible.
It is a possible lifeline for the entertainment industry, which He was beaten in recent years due to slow production By the epidemic, double book strikes and actors in 2023, a decline in studios, forests and products in southern California that escape from Golden State.
“We do not want to become the auto industry in Detroit or a space in California,” said Rebecca Ryan, president of the Entertainment Union and Western Executive Director of the American Managers Syndicate. “When our industry flourishes, we believe that California thrives.”
The bills were unanimously won by the Senate Revenue and Tax Committee and the Association and Entertainment Arts Committee.
But though The initial call to the ruler Gavin New Year last year For more than twice the funds allocated to the state’s tax and television credit program, the approval of the two draft laws is far from a deal to be taken.
Critics have been skeptical of the tax and television tax credit program since it was presented in 2009 under the leadership of former state governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Some say that tax credits are corporate gifts and do not provide much economic value as supporters claim.
“The economy is working better when the government does not choose the winners and losers,” said Wayne Winjenn, a senior business and economy fellow at the Pacific Research Institute, a California -based research center calling for free markets. “This is not the correct way to get a financial business environment in support of growth that speeds the growth of jobs.”
In addition, California is now facing a difficult economic view, as officials are preparing for potential discounts in federal financing, as well as pressures related to the tariffs on state revenues and stock market fluctuations that can reduce tax groups that finance state programs.
All forces are difficult for legislators on financing priorities.
In a modern post on xKorean Jackson’s assembly member said that Democratic voters in California “should be angry because we are not spending more on housing, allowing the elderly to fall homeless, and allow many children to live in poverty. In the tax breaks of companies and cinema.”
It was accessed over the phone, and Jackson said that despite the expansion of the tax credits of films and television is a worthy policy, legislators in the state must think about what they must sacrifice for them, especially since the state budget is under pressure.
Jackson said: “If we go back in the period when we have more money than we can spend, this will be irrational,” Jackson said. “But it is time to return people to reality. This should not be just a peace for people.”
Hollywood workers argue that expanded tax credit for films and television will generate economic returns beyond the industry, with the presence of Ripple effects that touch tourism as well as small companies such as dry cleaning workers, flower ingenuity, and supplies that depend on entertainment spending. After years of struggles, the workers say Industry at a turning point.
This has led to the main pressure effort by Hollywood.
More than 100,000 messages were sent to individual legislators in the states to support bills, with 22,000 additional letters to the Senate Revenue and Impose Committee.
Dozens of representatives from all the main unions in the entertainment industry moved to Sacramento to support the legislation, as did executive managers in the studio, their pressure groups and the movement of the movement. Trade Group.
It is a kind of Senator Bin Allen’s offer and association member Rick Chavez Zorus, two sponsors of the participants in the draft law, called for this when they spoke to a crowd of people last week at the Green Studios recordings facility in Borbank and urged entertainment workers to contact their representatives.
“It will be a battle to accomplish this due to the opposite wind,” Allen told the crowd, noting that there are many competing priorities at the state level. The mere mentioning of the legislation was sufficient to devise applause and chants from the public.
The insiders and legislators in this field, including in the Burberk town hall, have tried to give criticism that this is a gift to companies.
They described them as jobs that will reward products that generate the largest number of employment and will not allow companies to use tax credits even after the conclusion of production.
California currently provides 20 % to 25 % of tax credit to compensate for qualified production expenses, such as money spent on films and building groups. Production companies can apply credit to any tax obligations they have in California. Supporters say that the credit to 35 % is important. Fire projects elsewhere in the state can get 40 % credit.
Legislation also expands the types of products that will qualify, including animated films, short pants and series, as well as competition offers on a large scale. Independent products will be allocated by 10 % of the total amount in the program, up from the current 8 %.
“In some respects, the opposite winds in fact strengthened the draft law,” Allen told the Times newspaper. “They forced cautious, intense and thoughtful talks and negotiations.”
President Laureena Gonzalez said the bills enjoy the support of the California Labor Union, which voted unanimously to support the legislation in February.
Although the organization does not always support tax credits, the Federation always supports the cinematic and television program.
“The truth is the unique situation with the fact that Hollywood is a very union,” said Gonzalez. “In order to maintain these good functions of union and the life of the middle class that was developed as a result, we would like to maintain these functions here.”
The pressure efforts led to unusual alliances, especially in the wake of the strikes, with the mobilization of both studios and Hollywood unions on the same side. However, both groups have worked together on the previous tax credit suggestions and television.
In a letter to the leaders of the Assembly Committee concerned with revenue and taxes, Motion Picure Assn. CEO Charles E wrote. Revkin said that the changes in the tax credit program for films and television “will help attract more products and jobs in California.”
If the bill is enacted, as written, studios will submit more requests to the California Film Committee, “which leads to the location of more of its productions in California, which will establish good jobs for California and keep them.”
But even in the comprehensive batch of Hollywood, there are different priorities among stakeholders. During the Burbank Town Hall meeting, post -production workers and professionals called for the registration of music to decline, noting that other countries and countries are now providing specific discounts for this work.
This has led to a sharp decrease in production of these workers. Peter Rart, the founder of the “Innnes” company that helped organize the city hall, said that the average number of registration days is reserved to take samples from the stages of registration in Los Angeles is now 11 days so far, and it is far from 127 days throughout 2022 during the peak of the broadcast mutation.
Many registration work has moved to Europe or even Nashville, while some post -production work has been transferred to places such as Canada and London.
“It will take a village.” “We have one shot in this now.”
