Our film industry is booming; let’s keep it that way
There’s little doubt the film and media business is booming in New Mexico. Productions can be seen everywhere you look — from
Dark Winds in Tesuque Pueblo to The Locksmith in Las Cruces, to Netflix doubling its footprint with 10 additional stages at Albuquerque Studios and starting production on a new miniseries that will provide jobs to 4,000 New Mexico cast and crew members.
New Mexico has become known internationally, not just for its red or green chile and the Balloon Fiesta, but as the home for productions including
Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul and Stranger Things.
The film industry has generated $1.5 billion in direct spending into New Mexico over the last two years. We continue to receive national recognition, the latest just a month ago when
MovieMaker ranked three New Mexico cities as top 10 places to live and work in the film industry.
All of this is not an accident. New Mexico’s film industry is flourishing. More New Mexicans are working in this industry than ever before, earning higher wages and coming back to the state to advance their careers.
In 2002, the state first enacted its Film and Television Production Tax Credit to take advantage of our stunning locations, the open and clear blue skies, our local talent, and New Mexico’s proximity to Hollywood.
The tax credits have been amended nine times since — the latest in 2019 when Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and the New Mexico Legislature established greater incentives for rural productions, increased the annual cap to $100 million, paid off the outstanding backlog in film credits and incentivized capital investment into the state with the film partnership initiative, a major reason we are seeing new studio and stage construction in New Mexico.
The newly proposed Senate Bill 12 sponsored by Sen. Nancy Rodriguez, D-Santa Fe, continues the path of modernizing the film initiatives to meet an evolving industry. This is more important than ever to create good-paying jobs and diversify the economy. This is why Arizona, Texas, Colorado, Utah and Oklahoma all want a piece of the pie as they work to attract the production business now coming to New Mexico.
SB 12 will increase the incentives for rural productions, doubling the rural uplift to 10%. It will prudently adjust the cap by $10 million a year over a decade to allow for inflation and the growth of the industry. The bill also encourages more post-production work to stay in New Mexico and adjusts benchmarks for A-List talent that now push these productions to film elsewhere.
Bringing billions of dollars into New Mexico from out of state and making sure productions that film here hire New Mexico workers and purchase goods and services from local businesses have been the strategic linchpin for maintaining the incentive. But SB 12 goes further — it invests in our workforce.
The industry now supports 8,000 jobs in New Mexico — from film grip workers and makeup artists to casting agents, carpenters and hardware store owners. The average wage for a full-time film crew worker in New Mexico is now $32 an hour.
Anyone with a streaming account sees how media production is changing. SB 12 will future-proof New Mexico so we can continue to grow a robust and highly paid workforce where employees, small businesses and families who depend on this industry can thrive.