title
Motion of the Council of Allegheny County expressing County Council’s full support of the Pittsburgh Film Office’s efforts to seek an increase in the cap on the Pennsylvania Film Tax Credit Program to $300 million annually to ensure that Pennsylvania remains competitive in attracting and retaining film and television production projects to the Commonwealth.
body
WHEREAS, the Pennsylvania Film Production Tax Credit was established in 2004 to support the production of film and television production in Pennsylvania; companies can receive a transferrable 25% tax credit (an additional 5% is available for productions that meet the minimum state filming requirements at a qualified production facility) if it has incurred 60% of its total production expenses within Pennsylvania; and
WHEREAS, the cap, or maximum amount, of the tax credit available each fiscal year has changed over the years, but is currently at $100 million; the Commonwealth competes with a variety of other municipalities, states, and even other countries that have continually increased the incentives available to them, or have uncapped their tax credits; and
WHEREAS, the Pennsylvania program is oversubscribed and underfunded; because film and production work does not wait, work in this region is drying up because funding is not available to new productions considering the state or the region; and
WHEREAS, in the southwestern Pennsylvania region alone, the film industry has had an economic impact of $2.5 billon with more than 200 feature films and TV productions shot here since the inception of the Pittsburgh Film Office in 1990; these projects have created thousands of jobs and countless business opportunities; a review of the program with a statewide lens shows that film projects utilizing the tax credit have spent $895 billion in the state, have paid PA residents $287 million in salary and wages, and has employed an average of 4,000 people a year; productions also spend money in hotel and...
Click here for full text