Louisiana Economic Development may have overstated the economic impact of the Motion Picture Tax Credit program, and did not provide sufficient documentation to support the program’s forecasted credits and expenditures for 2017, according to an audit released this morning by the Louisiana Legislative Auditor.
Auditors questioned the reliability of LED’s forecasted credits issued and qualified expenditures for fiscal year 2017 for the film tax credit program—as well as the Sound Recording Investor Tax Credit and the Musical and Theatrical Production Income Tax Credit programs—because LED could not provide adequate documentation to support its calculations for nine out of the 15, or about 60%, forecast data elements.
The audit also says LED may have overstated the film tax credit program’s economic impact in its annual Unified Economic Development Budget Report because LED used only the upper estimates from a contracted study in its budget report and did not included the accompanying lower estimates.
