Film industry advocates are once again defending a film tax credit after Gov. Ned Lamont proposed cutting it down from 30% to 25% in his annual budget proposal. A previous effort to eliminate the credit altogether petered out in 2024.
Russ Martin, a film producer based in New Haven, recently testified at the state Capitol. Martin said even a small cut could impact his ability to film certain sequences.
“So I can film, knowing I have 30% more to film in Connecticut. And that allows me to do more, that allows me to get the one day of helicopter shots, that allows those other things.”
While advocates say the credits are necessary to nurture the state’s relatively new media production industry, opponents have criticized it due to lost tax revenue, as reported by CT Mirror in 2024.
Lamont’s office released a fact sheet which claimed reducing the tax credit this year would yield an extra $9.2 million for fiscal year 2026 and over $17 million for 2027, in tax revenues, and that along with other adjustments and eliminations such cutting the Digital Animation Tax Credit, would go towards increasing the general fund’s revenue by over $368 million.
Since then, other advocates have pointed out that parts of New York and New Jersey have increasingly become more attractive to production companies, pointing out new production facilities which opened over the last few years or are in progress.
Patrick O’Brien, research and policy director at CT Voices for Children, supports the cuts.
“The film production tax credits may help to create jobs, those jobs that are often temporary and project based offering little long term economic stability,” O’Brien said.
O’Brien doesn’t just think the tax credit doesn’t offer long term growth. He pointed to a report released by CT Voices for Children in 2024, which stated the credit led to a loss of $60 million a year in tax revenue and $900 million from 2007 to 2023.
The money, he said, could have helped families with a state child tax credit, targeting lower and middle class families.
Jonathan Black, co-founder of the Connecticut Film and TV Alliance, pushed back against those criticisms.
“To say that the money goes into the big Hollywood studios, and the money goes into the pockets of these producers, it does not,” Black said.
Black said the credit is a tool helping companies hire more staff and spend their budget in Connecticut leading to economic growth. The proposed cut, he said, means it would lead to a loss of production work because of the competitive production landscape in the tri-state area, where other states offer tax incentives.
New York is offering a 45% tax credit, and New Jersey is offering a tax credit of 37%.
O’Brien countered by saying much of the money is going to big production companies and studios from NBC to others.
O’Brien says such arguments actually work against advocates, since if the industry needs constant state support to function, then it isn’t a viable industry.
Industry advocates may just need to do a little more convincing, according to Black.
“I would love to see the film commission come back, or a task force created so that we can study this and we can actually give answers to some of the people there, maybe think this is not a workable tax credit, because it is a very, very successful Tax Credit. It's just, we need to show people how it is successful,” Black said.
