Amid mounting pressure from Hollywood to bring production and entertainment jobs back to California, Gov. Gavin Newsom unveiled plans Sunday to significantly raise the annual cap on the state’s film and TV tax incentive program. During a news conference held at Hollywood’s Raleigh Studios and attended by Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, as well as several entertainment union officials, Newsom declared his intent to increase the yearly limit to $750 million from $330 million.
Pending legislative approval, that number would surpass all other capped film and TV tax credit programs around the country. But will it be enough to prevent film and TV shoots from fleeing the state, restore the entertainment job market and solve California’s worsening production crisis? Many in the industry welcomed the announcement as a significant move in the right direction, while acknowledging that there is more work to be done. “It’s a start,” said Lindsay Dougherty, principal officer of Teamsters Local 399, which represents studio drivers, location workers and other Hollywood crew members.
“For California to be competitive with these other countries, we might need more money down the road. But this is ..
. good news in a very bad time in a for our members that are not working and haven’t been working for quite some time.” Rebecca Rhine, western executive director of the Directors Guild of America, agreed that raising the limit “may not be the entire solution, but it is a very, very.
