Staggering deficits in state and local budgets have taken their toll, resulting in the demise of a couple of film commissions and hiring freezes and/or staff and program cutbacks for others. Several months ago, the St. Louis Film Commission closed despite having helped to generate a considerable amount of filming revenue. Now the Boston Film Office has ceased operations, and the Massachusetts Film Office (MFO) is in jeopardy (see story, p. 1) as the state faces an estimated shortfall of some $2 billion in the upcoming fiscal year 2003 (July 1, ’02-June 30, ’03).
While there’s still a chance to save the MFO, the fact that its very existence has been threatened is dismaying. No funding is provided for the state film commission in the fiscal year ’03 budget proposed by the Massachusetts Senate’s Ways and Means Committee. MFO executive director Robin Dawson was surprised by the Committee’s decision to deny funding. For the current soon-to-expire fiscal year, the film office operated on a budget slightly in excess of $600,000.
In sharp contrast to the Senate’s Ways and Means Committee, the Massachusetts House of Representatives allocated nearly $500,000 for the MFO in fiscal year ’03. Ultimately the Senate and House will have to get together and agree upon an overall budget—and with it, an allocation, or lack thereof, for the MFO—that will be presented to Governor Jane Swift.
Our hope is that the MFO will be retained, as the powers that be in Massachusetts learn from history—recent history, for that matter, in that the State of Washington grappled with the same situation earlier this year. Washington Gov. Gary Locke initially proposed a ’02-’03 budget that called for the elimination of the Washington State Film Office, among other assorted programs (SHOOT, 1/11, p. 1). Locke’s cutbacks were in response to the prospect of a $1.2 billion deficit in the overall state budget.
Ultimately, though, the Washington State Film Office was preserved, as Gov. Locke and state legislators agreed that saving a film commission budget of $375,000 would in the big picture be penny-wise and pound-foolish, translating into potentially tens of millions of dollars in lost revenue (SHOOT, 4/26, p. 1). Indeed, the Washington State Film Office helped to generate film industry spending of some $55 million in the state during the past full fiscal year. For every dollar in its budget, the Washington State Film Office has generated in excess of $100 on average over the past 10 years, as computed by the state’s Office of Trade and Economic Development. To have eliminated the film office would have made no fiscal sense whatsoever, especially during a time when the runaway production issue is at the industry forefront, underscoring the value of local and state film commissions.
While the budget crunch in states and municipalities across the country is real, so, too, is the need for viable film commission operations as a means to help bring about economic recovery. Now more than ever, film commissions are vital to fiscal health. And that argument extends well beyond state and local borders. Some make the case for creating a federal film commission, the U.S. being one of the few major countries not to have such a national operation designed to promote and encourage filming, as well as to push for measures that will help retain and attract more business.
