Latest news with #CaliforniaFilm&TVJobsAct
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Gavin Newsom Meets Privately With Trump Ambassador Jon Voight in LA
Gov. Gavin Newsom and Jon Voight, one of President Donald Trump's three Hollywood ambassadors, met in Century City on Thursday to discuss the actor's 'Make Hollywood Great Again' proposal. A Newsom aide and a representative for Voight confirmed the meeting to Politico. 'They shared a commitment to working together to help to build up the film industry in the U.S. — particularly California and Los Angeles,' the outlet reported. Former Warner Bros. executive DeeDee Myers, who is director of the Governor's Office of Business and Economic Development, was also present. The meeting came as California's $750 million film tax credit plan remains in the air as state budget cuts have weighed down the process. The pair of California Film & TV Jobs Act bills passed their first floor votes in Sacramento this week, though it's unclear if Trump's tariffs and/or Los Angeles wildfire recovery efforts could impact the outcome. If successful, the bills would expand the types of productions that are eligible for tax incentives, offer a 35% tax rate to L.A.-based productions and increase the program's cap from $330 million to $750 million. Newsom also previously suggested a $7.5 billion film and TV national tax incentive program last month. 'The governor is fully committed to this proposed $750 million investment in California's film and television industry, which will protect good-paying jobs and support the workers who power the state's creative economy,' a spokesperson for Newsom said in a statement. The Oscar-winning actor's May proposal includes a carrot-and-stick approach, mixing tax incentives, foreign film tariffs and co-production treaties to encourage U.S. movie production. Mel Gibson and Sylvester Stallone are Trump's other two Hollywood ambassadors. TheWrap has reached out to Newsom and Voight's teams for further comment. The post Gavin Newsom Meets Privately With Trump Ambassador Jon Voight in LA appeared first on TheWrap.
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Timing of California's $750 Million Film Tax Credit Plan in Doubt as State Budget Cuts Weigh Down Process
As a pair of bills to expand California's film tax credit passed their first floor votes in Sacramento this week, confidence is high that the much-touted $750 million benefit will soon be on the way for productions that will keep jobs for entertainment workers in Hollywood. But there isn't a clear answer on what 'soon' means, as the co-authors of the California Film & TV Jobs Act are racing to get their bill past the remaining legislative hurdles and get funding approved. The budget process has been thrown into uncertainty by factors ranging from the Trump Administration's tariffs to Los Angeles wildfire recovery efforts that have left lawmakers unclear on whether the full amount — about double the current tax credit — will be funded. State Assembly members Isaac Bryan and Rick Chavez Zbur, two co-authors of the Jobs Act, told TheWrap on Wednesday they are very confident that the bills that would expand the types of productions eligible for tax incentives and offer a 35% tax rate to Los Angeles-based productions will pass, along with the proposed increase of the program's cap from $330 million to $750 million. 'Our colleagues know we can't let this industry slip,' Bryan said, adding: '$750 million, while it's a lot of money and a desperately needed amount of money to keep the jobs that this industry is producing, is a small fraction of our overall budget.' Language that called for that cap increase was removed from the two Jobs Act bills during budget committee hearings prior to their nearly unanimous floor vote passage this week. But the lawmakers said the language was ultimately unnecessary as the cap increase is still included in Gov. Gavin Newsom's revised budget proposal released last month. Despite Bryan's remark, the local industry has already slipped significantly. Only about 20 percent of US movie and TV production is now made in California, a steep slide over the past 20 years, according to industry studies. FilmLA, which tracks production in Los Angeles, has said that 2024 was the worst year on record for local filming, with the first quarter of 2025 declining another 22% year over year. The state's film commission says that between 2020 and 2024 California lost an estimated $1.6 billion in production spending due to limited tax credit funding. But despite the urgency, apparently nothing in government is easy. Newsom first threw his support behind the cap increase in October and has repeatedly expressed his support for it, including after President Trump knocked Hollywood for a loop last month floating the possibility of levying tariffs against productions shot outside of the U.S. The question is when exactly that money earmarked for the tax incentive program will get final approval in Sacramento and give the California Film Commission the green light to begin the process of implementing the new program. That timetable is unclear because the tax credit legislation, while widely supported, is one of dozens of budget items that Sacramento has to get through, some of which are still the topic of protracted debate. California is in a race against time as other states and overseas locations update their own programs to stay ahead in a global competition for production money. Last week, Louisiana's legislature, months after lowering the cap of its program to $125 million, passed a bill that raised the base tax rate for productions that shoot there to 25%, with an additional 15% credit available towards labor costs if Louisiana residents are hired. Last month, New York raised its program cap to $800 million amidst increased competition for local productions from New Jersey. Bryan explains that the main budget bill that state law requires the legislature to pass and for the governor to approve by June 15 is followed by a period in which the legislature handles 'trailer bills,' which work out the finer details on certain areas of state spending.'The first stab at the budget on the deadline is the bigger, overarching framework of how we're spending the biggest resources to uplift and protect Californians,' Bryan explained, adding that previous changes to the state production tax incentive got final approval through trailer bills passed after that main deadline. The challenge for Bryan, Zbur and other legislators trying to keep Hollywood a major priority is that the trailer bill process is expected to be even more complicated than it usually is, and it's not clear at this time when exactly the trailer bill for the incentive program could come up for a vote. That's because a lot of the guidance that lawmakers have on how much revenue and federal funding it will have for the year has been upended by uncertainty on Wall Street over Trump's tariffs – which affects state capital gains taxes – and suspension of property taxes in parts of Los Angeles affected by January's wildfires, among other factors. Newsom's revised budget projected a $12 billion deficit, leading the governor to call for cuts in a wide range of areas outside of Hollywood, including changes to Medi-Cal that could result in millions of residents, including those who are undocumented, losing coverage. As the larger budget debate plays out over the coming month, the Jobs Act co-authors say they are meeting with legislative leaders, including Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas and Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire, to discuss ways to expedite the bills as they head to opposite houses following their first floor votes. If the Jobs Act goes through the usual legislative process of waiting for committee and floor votes, it is likely they would not reach Newsom's desk for signature until the end of the legislative session in September, meaning that the expanded incentive program might not get into full swing until early 2026. While the co-authors haven't settled on a course of action, one option would be to try to make the bills an 'urgency measure,' which would require a two-thirds majority vote to pass but would mean that the bills could take effect immediately once passed rather than on Jan. 1 of the following year. Given that both the Assembly and Senate bills only received one vote against on their first floor votes, the Jobs Act has the support to be enacted faster if this option is taken. 'Bottom line, we are working with the leadership to ensure that the incentive program changes are passed this summer, and come into effect this summer,' Zbur said. The faster Sacramento gives the green light, the better. Once that happens, the California Film Commission still has months of work ironing out how the expanded program will be implemented, including how that $750 million is allocated to different parts of the entertainment industry ranging from feature films to prestige TV dramas and indie productions, as well as new categories like animated projects and half-hour live-action programs that would become eligible with the expansion. For now, the next round of applications for the tax credit program, which opens later this month, will operate under the existing rules and with the current benefit of a 20% tax rate on eligible spending. The post Timing of California's $750 Million Film Tax Credit Plan in Doubt as State Budget Cuts Weigh Down Process appeared first on TheWrap.
Yahoo
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
California Assembly Passes Film Tax Bill to Expand Production Incentives
The California State Assembly has overwhelmingly passed a bill that would overhaul the state's production tax incentive program, a key step in legislators' efforts to provide support to struggling Hollywood workers. The vote on Assembly Bill 1138 was 73 in favor and one against, and comes a day after a similar bill, SB 630, passed 34-1 out of the state senate. The bills now head to the opposite houses as its co-authors say they are looking to expedite the committee vote process so that they can be passed by the legislature, signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, and implemented by the California Film Commission all ideally before the legislative session ends for the year in September. 'We are in an emergency, given the unemployment levels and the loss of business in California due to the film industry, so we are working with the legislative leadership to find ways to have the bill go into effect this summer,' said Hollywood Asm. Rick Chavez Zbur, who is one of the co-authors on the bills. The two bills had language removed that calls for the program's cap to be increased from $330 million to $750 million, though that increase is still included in Gov. Gavin Newsom's revised proposed budget for the coming fiscal year. Zbur says that there is high confidence among supporters of the program expansion that the cap raise will be approved in the final budget. 'The structural support that we are receiving from all of the entertainment unions, all of the studios, independent producers, the sound stage managers and owners is uniform, and I've never seen anything like it,' he said. The two bills, known together as the California Film & TV Jobs Act, would expand the types of productions eligible for the tax credit, including animated productions and TV shows with a half-hour runtime. The bill also allows productions that shoot in Los Angeles County and other select nearby shooting locations in Southern California to be eligible for an increased tax writeoff of 35% of all eligible spending. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of film and TV production jobs in California in 2024 fell by approximately 40,000 from the all-time high recorded in 2022, when ongoing demand for streaming shows and a need to catch up on projects delayed by the 2020 pandemic helped fuel a surge in productions. But a variety of factors led to production jobs dropping not just in California but in other major American production hubs like Georgia and New York in 2024. Among them was an industry-wide cutback in production spending as media companies looked to make their streaming services profitable, as well as increased competition from other countries with their own production tax incentives. The combination of that drop in jobs and the loss of work caused by the 2023 strikes that shut down productions for 191 days has led to thousands of entertainment workers in California facing serious financial struggle and has called the future of a cornerstone of the state's economy into question. The post California Assembly Passes Film Tax Bill to Expand Production Incentives appeared first on TheWrap.
