The New Jersey Motion Picture and Television Commission (NJMPTVC), in partnership with the South Jersey Film Office Cooperative invites representatives of municipalities in Atlantic, Burlington, Camden, Cape May, Cumberland, Gloucester and Salem Counties to attend the Film Ready New Jersey Workshop on Friday, September 29, from 9 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at Camden County College in Blackwood.
The workshop will also feature Film Ready Police + Fire, designed to educate and train police and fire chiefs in safety measures for crew members and the public. Police and fire representatives will train from 11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. and are not expected to attend the full-day workshop.
Counties and municipalities interested in attending must pre-register through Eventbrite at eventbrite-film-ready-september29.
Film Ready New Jersey is a five-step certification and marketing program that enables cities and towns to effectively accommodate on-location filming and market their communities as filming destinations. As an entity that now falls under the New Jersey Economic Development Authority (NJEDA), the Commission is focused on ensuring that New Jersey’s downtowns and municipalities in general are prepared to reap the economic benefits of film and television industry growth and interest in locating their projects in New Jersey.
The September 29 workshop is the first step towards certification. At the workshop, participants will learn about the economic benefits of hosting on-location filming. Training and guidance will be provided by industry professionals as well as NJMPTVC staff members and commissioners.
The workshop will cover ordinances, permitting, opportunities for small businesses and other facets of on-location filming. Participants will walk away with a toolkit to attract and welcome productions to their community and learn about the necessary steps required to become a certified Film Ready Community.
Since the revival and enhancement of New Jersey’s tax credit program in 2018, which offers eligible production companies a transferable tax credit of up to 35 percent on qualified film production expenses, plus an additional 2 percent or 4 percent diversity bonus for qualified productions, the state has attracted hundreds of feature films and television shows, generating close to $1.5 billion in spending. New Jersey has experienced a constant flow of filmmaking across every county, hastening the demand to prepare municipalities for an influx of film and television production.
