The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday, April 29, unanimously approved a motion that aims to reverse a sharp decline in film and television production across the city by cutting the red tape that makes it harder for productions to stay in town.

Supporters said the motion, introduced by Councilmember Adrin Nazarian and seconded by Councilmembers Hugo Soto-Martinez and Nithya Raman, was not just about keeping blockbuster films in L.A., but about protecting workers–ranging from costume designers to carpenters–who depend on local shoots. Productions have increasingly moved to other states and countries in recent years, lured by lower costs and fewer bureaucratic hurdles.

The City Council chamber was packed with about 50 crew workers, union members and advocacy groups who held signs reading, “Support our entertainment industry laborers.” Many cheered and applauded when the motion passed. After the vote, the groups gathered on the steps outside City Hall for a rally, calling for action to stop the loss of local production jobs.

Among those who spoke was Marie Dunaway, a Los Angeles freelance producer who has produced commercials, music videos and other projects. She said the industry’s struggle stems not just from rising costs, but also from a permitting process that has become slow and burdensome.

“We are suffocating from Los Angeles’ rigidity, slowness, endless staffing mandates, special talent requirements, and most of all, costs,” she said. “Other states are saying ‘yes,’ and rolling out red carpet. We are only rolling out red tape.”

The motion directs city staff to return within 30 days with a series of recommendations to make the city’s filming process faster, cheaper and more competitive with rival areas.

Among the proposed changes are reducing filming fees, streamlining the permitting process, reducing security requirements for location shooting, offering discounted or waived fees for city-owned property use, and investigating inflated costs for crew parking and staging areas.

“Simply put, this is about protecting middle-class workers, and also the very industry that established Los Angeles on the world map and made us into the filming hub of the world,” Councilmember Nazarian said.

In recent years, the City of Angels has seen a steady decline in on-location filming as studios increasingly opt for cities including New York, Atlanta, Vancouver and Toronto, drawn by faster permitting timelines and generous tax incentives.

The downturn comes after years of disruption to the industry, including the pandemic, a strike by writers, a strike by actors, layoffs, and growing uncertainty over artificial intelligence’s impact on jobs and storytelling.

Between January and March this year, shoot days in Los Angeles dropped more than 22% compared to the same period last year, according to FilmLA, the official film office for both the city and county. Television production–widely seen as the backbone of the local industry–has been hit especially hard, falling nearly 60% since its 2021 peak.

Although Los Angeles experienced devastating wildfires in January, FilmLA said the wildfires had “only a small effect” on production levels.

“Our industry has lost more than a third of its work in the last half decade,” said Paul Audley, president of FilmLA. “We have 120 other jurisdictions offering money to take the film industry all over the world and all over the country, and California simply has not been competing with that.”

He pointed to global decline in production and fierce competition from Europe, Canada and other U.S. states offering generous financial incentives that California has struggled to match.

“Most of our major studios film all their feature production in Britain now because of the amount of money they’re offered,” Audley said. “A lot of our scoring is now done in Eastern Europe instead of here in L.A. … L.A. really is suffering right now.”

He said the city could take steps to reverse the trend, but it would require adjusting both staffing and fee structures.

“So that’s what they’re looking at: Is there a way for the city to pull back on the fees they charge, and perhaps add staffing in certain (city) departments to move things more quickly,” Audley said. “That’s really the heart of this motion.”

At the state level, Gov. Gavin Newsom last fall proposed expanding the California Film & Television Tax Credit Program from $330 million to $750 million annually. Lawmakers have since introduced several bills aimed to make the program more competitive on a global scale.

In neighborhoods where film crews are part of daily life, some community leaders are backing the city’s push to keep production local.

“We are smack dab in the center of all the studios, Warner Brothers Studios, NBC Universal,” said Tess Taylor, president of the Greater Toluca Lake Neighborhood Council. “There’s so much history here, there’s so much talent here, and this is where the world comes. The world beats a path to Hollywood’s door, and we want to keep it that way.”