Movie Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Revamped Film Tax Credit Expected To Create Mountain State Movie Mecca

After repealing state filming policies in 2018 that failed to provide a positive return on investment, the Office of Economic Development has re-established the WV Film Office with a revamped State Film Tax Credit now in play.

Randy Yohe talked with state business development manager Meghan Smith and workforce developer Dave Lavender. They say film production companies bringing in new revenues and jobs may soon be calling out lights, camera, action – at a location near you.

Randy: How does the tax credit work, Meghan?

Smith: When a production company comes to West Virginia, they would be eligible, depending on certain parameters in state code, to get back up to 31 percent of direct expenditures in West Virginia. There is a base of 27 percent of those direct expenditures but there’s also a possibility of getting extra percentage points. So they can get up to 31 percent if they hired 10 or more West Virginia residents full time as part of that production.

Randy: Are there already projects in the West Virginia Film Office pipeline?

Smith: There’s a lot of interest. We’ve seen projects that will be on Lifetime, projects that will be on Fox nation. Last week, we had the opportunity to talk to folks at the Motion Pictures Association. Folks were on that call from HBO, Paramount, Disney, Netflix. It’s something really special and something that has a lot of momentum right now. And that is not going to stop anytime soon.

Randy:The film tax credit has no cap and it’s transferable and sellable. What does that mean? And how do those two points give West Virginia a competitive advantage over other states already rolling with their film offices.

Smith: No cap on the credits is a big deal. It’s very attractive to production companies. It also makes us more competitive, because some of our surrounding states like Maryland and Pennsylvania, do have caps on their credit. So what happens is with production companies, those states may run out of credits, and then they look immediately to West Virginia, because we have the ability to not only accommodate their production, we can also double as Maryland if we need to or double as Pennsylvania, the geography and the landscape can be similar, but we also have a lot of really great and unique locations. The companies can use those credits against their corporate net income or personal income taxes. They often have the ability to sell those to a third party or someone else so they can get a good return on their investment.

Randy: Describe an eligible project.

Smith: To be eligible, a project would need to have at least $50,000 in direct expenditures in West Virginia; it can be a feature length film, it can be a TV series, TV pilot program, anything like that. As long as they’re distributed in at least one other state than West Virginia. We’re really looking for impactful significant projects that are going to be seen beyond the Mountain State.

Randy: You have 5000 locations already charted in West Virginia? What would be an example Dave of some of those locations?

Lavender: Randy, somebody said, either be first, best or original, and definitely West Virginia’s original. And that’s what Hollywood is looking for – some of these original locations. Places like the Trans-Allegheny Asylum, Moundsville Prison, these are kind of amazing places to film. Places in each corner of the state. But anything can be a location. As Megan was alluding to, West Virginia can serve as a backdrop for Maryland or Pennsylvania. We’re really a geographical chameleon.

Randy: Talk about the expected community economic benefits that are expected from West Virginia film productions.

Lavender: Most shoots are probably more than a few days, and sometimes weeks and can be into months and all of that money is circulating in your community. People need places to stay, they need catering, they need costuming, they may need horses, they may need classic cars. The film industry is one of those really interesting, economic octopi, its tentacles go way out into a community and touch a lot of different parts that you wouldn’t necessarily think would be. And so that’s the exciting, immediate economic benefit.

Lavender: And of course, putting people to work. Last year, according to the Motion Pictures Association, we had $120 million in wages, just with eight TV series here in West Virginia, stuff like Barnwood Builders. And that was equivalent to 1980 jobs directly. And then 3880 jobs, indirect, like the service providers that I was talking about. We’re hoping to really bring in a lot more folks to West Virginia, because we think that West Virginia has got a story to tell with its mountains and its people, and we want to share that with the world.

Smith: We have a really great tool on our newly launched webpage that allows productions and companies to look at the various locations around West Virginia. Folks in the industry here can even upload their own locations, as well as search through the crew and services directory. That’s all at westvirginia.gov/wvfilm.

Revised W.Va. Film Tax Credit Has Hollywood Calling

As part of our ongoing, occasional series "Effective from Passage," we take a closer look at a bill that reinstates West Virginia’s film tax credit. House Bill 2096 creates a filmmaking incentive that is expected to put thousands to work and bring millions into the state economy.

As part of our ongoing, occasional series “Effective from Passage,” we take a closer look at a bill that reinstates West Virginia’s film tax credit. House Bill 2096 creates a filmmaking incentive that is expected to put thousands to work and bring millions into the state economy.

Del. Dianna Graves, R-Kanawha, sponsored House Bill 2096 that reinstated a film tax credit that was repealed back in 2018. Graves said as the revised legislation was moving through the West Virginia Senate, she was getting calls and emails from Hollywood.

“Paramount, Comcast, Netflix, Amazon, their lobbyists were reaching out to me to say, do we think the governor’s gonna sign this,” Graves said. “Is this going to actually happen in West Virginia? And the fact is, those big giants were following this closely and were worried the Governor might veto it.”

Gov. Jim Justice signed the bill on March 28, 2022. Department of Economic Development Director Mike Graney will lead the Film Development Office. Graney said revisions highlighting no cap on the 27 to 31 percent tax credit will give the Mountain State an advantage over other surrounding states that already offer film tax credits.

”We certainly want to compete with other states for this economic activity,” Graney said. “And because the credit has no cap, we’ll be able to compete for really big projects, and not just some small documentary, but Paramount, or you name it, some filmmaker doing a major motion picture.”

Graves said the changes in the revised law on qualifying for the film tax credits also offer a competitive advantage.

“Our threshold for qualifying, in terms of the initial expenditure, is the lowest in the nation,” Graves said. “So you can come here and you can almost immediately qualify. But the fact that it’s an unlimited cap means that people can spend tons of money in West Virginia, and that money goes directly into the pockets of West Virginia people.”

Diana Sole is the CEO of Motionmasters, a West Virginia film production company with more than 30 years in the business. Sole said the reinstated film tax credit will bring in national and global producers along with benefits to companies like her own that are already in the state.

“It’s an incentive to attract television production, theatrical production movies, to the state of West Virginia,” Sole said. “Our industry is small, but it was growing here in years past and the fact that we’ve now reinstated that tax credit, it’s very exciting.”

Sole said independent filmmaking has its financial risks. Often, filming has to start even before there’s guaranteed funding.

“We have to go out and raise money to produce those documentaries, to get enough of a budget to put my staff to work on it,” Sole said. “For us it’s always a multiple year project to produce those titles. This allows us to utilize the tax credit, which we would fund about a portion of each production. So that’s going to mean that documentaries become more financially possible again.”

From 2016 to 2018, Sole said more than 5,900 West Virginia businesses were utilized in state film productions and more than 2,100 residents were hired to work on those films. Graves believes the economic benefits with the new film tax credit system will increase several fold.

”You’re purchasing lumber from West Virginia foresters, you’re purchasing fabric from West Virginia fabric stores, you’re buying groceries at West Virginia grocery stores, patronizing local restaurants, and sleeping in local hotels,” Graves said. “You have to do all of these things here. And all of that is money going into the pockets of West Virginians.”

Sole points to an example of a filmmaker’s spending volume and the financial benefits gained by the state.

“At one point the Convention and Visitors Bureau in the Eastern Panhandle was estimating up to 10,000 heads in beds,” Sole said. “This was a direct result of the film industry shooting there. That’s a lot of hotel rooms, right? And that’s a lot of tax revenue going back into those communities.”

The reinstated law prohibits using tax credits for films containing obscene matter or sexually explicit conduct and any content that negatively portrays the state of West Virginia. Graves thinks these apparent negatives will turn into positives.

“West Virginia is full of really bright, intelligent, caring people,” Graves said. “And we’d like to break that stereotype that may have been accurate in the past to some degree, but is no longer in West Virginia today. So you have to portray us accurately or you won’t get our money.”

Lawmakers constantly look to keep people from leaving the state. Sole said this film tax credit does just that.

“I’m hopeful that it will also bring back to West Virginia some of our indigenous filmmakers who left the state because there wasn’t enough of a volume of work here to keep them home,” Sole said. “This is going to change that.”

The law has a sunset provision to give lawmakers the opportunity to review its performance again. Many believe those reviews will only fine tune these incentives to produce films in West Virginia.

“Effective from Passage” is West Virginia Public Broadcasting’s ongoing, occasional series that explores the greater impact of bills passed by the West Virginia Legislature and signed by the governor. Check out more of these stories here.

Monster Movie Camp Comes to Pocahontas County

For many, summer is often associated with camp and quintessential camp activities like swimming, making s’mores and telling ghost stories.

Last week, a group of nine students in Pocahontas County took telling ghost stories a step further, by learning how to make short, animated films at Monster Movie Camp.

On the last day of Monster Movie Camp, the students were standing at their workstations, hurriedly putting the final touches on the illustrations for their film. Molly Cook was drawing the shape of a funny looking monster with a magic marker.

“I just like drawing. I’m only 10. I’m the youngest person in this class,” she said. She made a short, animated film, about a legendary cryptid from Braxton County, known as the Flatwoods Monster.

After drawing the images, or creating a set with sculpture, the students used iPads to film their movies. They spent days working on their small sets and filming their stop-action animation.

Many of the students said they signed up partly because they like to draw. Jesse Kelly said he likes theatre, and performing, and he wanted to learn to make movies as another creative outlet.

One of the students’ sketches from Monster Movie Camp.

“I think I surprised myself on some of the things that I did because I didn’t think I could do it that good,” Kelly said. “Like, once I watched it, it was better than I thought it would be.”

The Pocahontas County Opera House hosted the five-day Monster Movie Camp. Artist Bryan Richards and writer Howard Parsons also helped teach the students how to animate stories.

On the final day of camp, the students showed their parents their films, which were projected on a big screen inside the Pocahontas Opera House.

In the interest of full disclosure, Roxy Todd, who reported this story, is friends with Brooke Shuman, who organized the camp.