Posted on 04/25/2022 6:27:13 AM PDT by poconopundit
The corruption is never ending. From Florida to Georgia
and states in between. Be it government, business, a great
deal of time and effort has been put forth to fleece the
taxpayers. And to think this is more than likely duplicated in every state of the union....over and above the massive fraud of the DC beast.
I am afraid that the visibility of movie making in Georgia is well-liked by Georgians even if it doesn’t make money. I lived in Columbus, and a lot of people talked about “The Walking Dead” and locally a lot of home-schoolers got to be extras in the Christian movie “Overcomer” (including my daughter). That’s an intangible perk to many.
Deal let the Hollywood-Sports axis dictate a lot of things in Georgia, and when Kemp ran, I asked him point blank about Hollywood and the NFL dictating policy to Georgians. He gave a red meat (but unspecific) answer. Kemp did stand up to Major League Baseball when they pulled the All-Star game over a voting bill that was passed.
I lived in Columbus, and a lot of people talked about “The Walking Dead” and locally a lot of home-schoolers got to be extras in the Christian movie “Overcomer” (including my daughter). That’s an intangible perk to many.
* * *
Thanks, Dr. Sivana. Great testimonial to how Hollywood likes to pull heart strings to get what they want.
But every other state has bailed out of the big incentives.
Georgia voters may be the most gullible.
... a great deal of time and effort has been put forth to fleece the taxpayers. And to think this is more than likely duplicated in every state of the union....over and above the massive fraud of the DC beast.
* * *
So true, V. K. To me, this state-driven fraud around “economic development” opens up a mostly neglected chapter in the Save America agenda.
Excellent presentation.
It illustrates how Georgia Republicans are just Assistant Democrats.
Thanks. I will read it later.
Bkmk
movies are being shot in GA because the taxes in CA are prohibitive, ie they don’t want to pay their fair share...
This was Georgia’s plan since I left, back in 2009.
Import hollywood and we expected hollywoods politics to stay in CA.
GOP Establishment in GA’s end goal is obviously to turn the state Democrat again, and they’re succeeding sadly.
Good work on the research!
A few years back I happened to review a drug test as the MRO at the hospital, of a cameraman working on a set in Georgia who had allegedly injured his back while working. He went to the emergency room was evaluated and released on Oxycontin.
The drug test came back positive for opioids and also marijuana.
I dutifully contacted his company that happens to be in Hollywood to notify them of one of their employees testing positive for marijuana.
The woman on the other end of the phone was not only rude to me asking why was I bothering her with the results of a drug test, but she also informed me that 90% of the cast and crew we’re probably going to test positive for marijuana anyway.
I brought to her attention the fact that this guy was on opioids for a chronic backbcondition. Apparently he had been taking the opioids ongoing around the clock for the past five years.
I suggested that she might want to look in to this employee to see if he was abusing medication and obtaining the medication by filing work injuries to his back. she said that’s what my Worker’s Compensation insurance is for thank you doctor goodbye and “click” she hung up on me.
Kemp Is well liked by a lot of establishment Georgia Republicans. The guy however is a meatball and an idiot. Georgia and the surrounding communities in particular that service and support the film industry get nothing.
Most of these employees including the cameraman don’t even live in Georgia.
One more reason I'm happy to live in Florida with DeSantis at the helm...
Great Research - nicely put together - and could be a three part series. First then a recap and second - then a recap of the first two parts and the third. This is quality work pundit. You might be able to sell this to a medium sized paper. Have you been published before?
Probably all of them Numerous Marvel/Disney productions have been made here. I don’t know a single person employed in the GA film industry.
Good to hear this personal testimony, nikos1121.
What you say makes sense. If you’re directing a film shoot, you have certain cameramen you trust and who understand what you want to accomplish.
So if that’s true, there are limited opportunities for inexperienced Georgians to get the work they need to grow a career in the field.
Ralston is a snake. Let’s not forget this:
State Rep. Alleges Georgia House Speaker David Ralston ‘Lied to Trump’ About Following Through on Efforts to Convene a Special Session
https://georgiastarnews.com ^ | December 20, 2020 | Chris Butler
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3917648/posts
According to many Ga reps, they were threatened by Ralston not to sign the petition for a special session to examine the fraud in 2020. There was a news story about it too but I can’t find at the moment
Thanks poconopundit.
Impressive package of work, even with a quick end-of-work-day skim.
Sounds like a money laundering operation run for the benefit of the political in-crowd and perhaps whoever they owed money. Hope you had a few specific recipients of the report in mind by the time you were finished.
...there's no accountability: the sale of credits is done anonymously. You can't get a list of the people who cashed in film credits because that would violate their tax priiiiiivacy.
My guess is since the credits involve tax monies otherwise due, the initial entities of record that qualified for the credits could be made to account for any disposition to third parties??? (Assuming, of course, a dedicated GA law enforcement agency was involved.)
But it's under Kemp's watch that the Hollywood subsidies have skyrocketed.
Such assertions, associated evidence and half-truths could be a small part of what Abrams and Biden will use to defeat Kemp.
How many jobs were created? …….
Interesting question. They say that 92,000 were created.
Yet, only 2 or 3 weeks ago there was a story about a State House Rep wanting to cap the subsidy, Ralston and others having a baby over the proposed bill, and they were all complaining about the state losing 10,000 jobs.
Quite the difference between 92,000 and 10,000.
And I think just as importantly, how much tax revenue is generated from all of this. It’s insanely easy for companies to cook the books, with a 70k page tax code and an army of bean counters, lawyers and accountants. It’s funny to read and hear folks complain about Amazon, GE and other companies not paying taxes. Most folks are incapable of grasping tax deductions and business expenses.
Oh…..they made a movie in Georgia. Great. Georgia should be getting all sorts of tax revenue. NOPE. After our calculations we’ve learned that our expenses were actually slightly more than what we expected and therefore we need some Georgia taxpayer money. Otherwise we’re leaving.
So, some homeowner gets a break and they use the house for 5 days of filming. Homeowner gets paid. Homeowner has to report the income and pay taxes. Movie company writes off the business expense and pays no taxes on anything. Gets the tax money that the homeowner paid, back with the tax credit.
Great work if you can get it.
And Ralston already tossed it to the scrap heap. He’s such a POS. As bad, or worse, than Kemp Duncan Miller Raffensberger Williamson and so many others.
What’s happening to Georgia is the same thing that is happening to Texas and Tennessee.
It all started with Rick Perry....Texas is Open For Business. He was all over the globe. Slickly said that anyone that moved there would become Texans.
Yeah....not so much. With the sprawl in the big Texas cities, just like the sprawl in the Atlanta Metro area, it seems like the ONLY folks that are moving here are liberals.
There was a concerted effort, even had a Facebook page devoted to it, about the 6th US Congressional district....Flipthe6th. Well, they did it. Of course, it’s the typical upper middle class and above, Liberals that love all the liberal causes, but are completely insulated from the consequences of them.
At the end of the day, this and many others are all about the politicians finding other income streams to get rich on. No more do they have to rely solely on the farmers, developers slamming up homes wherever they can find enough space, or the chicken plant owners. Now they have the movie industry, electric cars that no one buys, Microsoft, and Facebook.
Kemp stood up because of the lost revenue. Nothing more.
Revenue that was so completely overstated, it was ridiculous even for Kemp. Over $100,000,000 for a 3-day event that most folks could care less about.
Celebrity Softball Game .... Home Run Derby .... All-Star Game
And, contrary to other stadiums that are in neighborhoods in cities, everything in Georgia is enclosed into the park itself. So, the cops have folks roaming the parking lots for bootleg shirts, hats, jerseys. Everything is in the park with EVERYTHING so overpriced you have to take out a loan....$14 for a domestic beer.
You’re right about the visibility. I live in Newton County. The Vampire Diaries, no longer on tv, is an industry in Covington. Folks come from all over the world to walk around and see where Act 5, Scene 6, Episode 31, Season 5 was filmed. No biggie. But, go talk to the business owners who don’t get much, if anything, when the square is shut down for filming. And the folks working these productions are, more or less, gypsies from out of town.
And, on top of all of the amazing research done by, poconopundit, lets not forget about Georgia’s Right To Work laws and how the companies, all Liberals/Democrats, can so easily take advantage of the workers. Let the companies be forced to start paying union wages, under union contracts and we’ll see how long they stay in Georgia.
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