Our Mexican correspondent, Daniel Villarreal, is at the Austin SXSW Film Festival covering as many queer films as he can find. While downing filets at the Film Florida Fish Fry, Daniel ran into Graham Winick, President of the Florida Film Commission. Daniel asked Graham to explain the back-asswards Florida bill that would deny LGBT films a tax credit for filming in Florida. Graham says the story got blown out of proportion because of the ambiguous “family friendly” terminology in House Bill 697 — language they’re now seeking to remove.
“The intent of the bill was never to be discriminatory,” says Winick. “This is a bonus on top of the main incentive.”
Law
We all know all to well -especially those of us with legal education – that legislatures intentionally have “innocent ambiguous” language and claim, “Oh, it won’t have that affect.” As soon as it becomes law they immediately claim “that falls under the language of the bill and is forbidden.” Similar to the amendments passed in many states (MI and FL being two) that prohibits the state from recognizing same-sex couples in any legal capacity (property, monetary, etc.). They claimed it wouldn’t take away anything from anyone and as soon as it passed they demanded government and state schools stop offering same-sex partner benefits.
dfrw
Florida is an awful state.
romeo
@DFRW #2: I agree. Some of the worst abuse thrown at us comes from there. It’s hot and sticky besides. Why do so many of us hang out there? Went there once, other than some of the art deco buildings, I thought it sucked big time.
romeo
Maybe because, like Homer Simpson pointed out, it’s America’s pee-pee.
zenflo
Oh, the two of you, now pretty please, don’t savage our state with your razor-sharp wit and penetrating insights.
romeo
@ Zenflo #5: pee-pee! pee-pee! pee-pee!
zenflo
Now Romeo, since when was the pee-pee a bad thing on this site?
D’oh!
romeo
I just like saying it.
zenflo
R, I certainly can’t fault you for that.
To put the thread slightly back on track, to live in Florida is to live in an uneasy truce between two mini-states. The more progressive half is where we gays tend to live/visit — such coincidence!
The other half, less economically and educationally developed, still hangs on to a thin political majority when it comes time to vote on state laws and policy.
Trends (including actuarial tables) being what they are, gay Floridians have reason to hope for legislative victories during this decade. And less of this type of film tax-credit nonsense.
And yes, it’s damn hot down here in the summer. I could go on, but I’ve got to get some laps done in my pool. Which is outdoors. And although it’s March, I won’t even freeze my
(“drumroll, crescendo…”)
pee-pee.
romeo
@Zen: LOL !
BTW, we have a lot of the same problem in California.
terry
no he skirted around the 2 gay mommies question and lumpt in gayness with alcoholism, and said g rated gay film would be in tilted to the content neutral bonus