This is just all too predictable.
The Wilmington Star-News (courtesy of news aggregator Carolina Plott Hound) today features an article discussing how three state legislators who support tax credits for Hollywood production are personally benefiting from the film production in their district.
A warehouse on U.S. 421 owned by state Rep. Danny McComas has been converted into a studio for the new NBC TV series “Revolution,” which recently began filming in the Wilmington area.
McComas is one of three area state lawmakers receiving money from the surge in the film and television industry in Southeastern North Carolina. The legislators have all supported the state’s film incentives package, which reimburses production companies for 25 percent of their expenses in North Carolina.
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State Rep. Susi Hamilton, D-New Hanover, and state Sen. Bill Rabon, R-Brunswick, also are doing business with film companies. Hamilton is renting her house in downtown Wilmington to an employee of “We’re the Millers,” a New Line Cinema comedy starring Jennifer Aniston that is filming in the Port City. Hamilton’s father, Jim Holladay, owns a company in Wilmington that rents equipment to the film industry.
Another display of home-cooked crony capitalism. Politicians use their power to dispense political privilege to specific companies, and then turn around and benefit from those companies.
The rest of us get to pick up the tab. For an excellent in-depth article on NC’s film incentives scam, see this John Locke Foundation Report.
When will citizens demand that this unjust shift of power away from citizens and into the hands of the political elites come to an end?
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