August 27, 2014      4:14 PM
Texas incentives for filmmakers are defended in House hearing
Texas Enterprise Fund continues to draw fire
A Hollywood executive and others
told Texas lawmakers on Wednesday that the state is doing the minimum right now
to be competitive in the film industry. Economic incentives for filmmakers who
ply their craft here were the focus of hours of testimony Wednesday during a
House select committee meeting, the latest in a series of hearings about Gov. Perry’s prized Texas
Enterprise Fund and Emerging Technology Fund, as well as
other programs designed to lure business.
Heather Page,
the Director of the Texas Film
Commission, said $128 million has been rebated to companies over the last 7
years through the Moving
Image Industry Incentive Program and those companies have injected
about $958 million into the state’s economy. It’s also created about 15,000 fulltime
jobs in that time, she said. Meantime states like New York, Michigan, and
Louisiana have gotten much more aggressive in recent years with their incentive
programs for filmmakers, Page said.
As of last fiscal year, the
program had a 657 percent rate of return, Page said. "That number is
determined by the documentation that we receive from the applicant, how much
money they spent, of which we will incentivize a percentage of that," she
said and added that unlike the Texas Enterprise Fund – which grants money to
companies up front after they’ve agreed to certain terms – the film incentives require
private investment first. "They have to spend in the state well before
they see a rebate from us," Page said.
The fund has been
criticized by some self-identified Tea Party lawmakers and others as unnecessary
and “outside the core functions of government.”
By Scott Braddock
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