Troubling Times For Creative Iowans

Our experience at the Iowa Statehouse brings to my mind the following passage from A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens:
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only."

The best of times ended a few years ago when a handful of greedy scoundrels ruined it all for the rest of us who were just gaining momentum in the movie business. The worst of times began with those misdeeds and continues even now as Iowa legislators seem uninterested in supporting creativity in this state. The spring of hope emerged with each of the last three Iowa legislative sessions as Jay Villwock and I received supportive comments from senators and representatives but nothing seemed to take root when those sessions ended and now during the third session since the film office collapsed we learn that the Iowa House tea party-types are turning their collective backs on we actors and crew.

They voted for zero funding for the film office and now they will enter a conference committee with members of the senate to decide the fate of Governor Branstad's budget recommendation of a $400,000 allocation to fund the Iowa film office. We did have everything before us: movie crews, trucks, cameras and lights and the prospects of many movies slated to film here. Then we went the other way, thanks to deeds of evil.

Today Jay and I were joined by Dave Thrasher, who delivered documents containing useful talking points for a few of the Iowa House members, namely Ako Abdul Samad, Ruth Ann Gaines, and Dan Kelley. These rep's intended to use these points to support an amendment they planned to submit to the house but this plan unraveled as follows in this message from Rep. Kelley today: "Reps Abdul-Samad, Gaines and I left the meeting (with Senator Dotzler) this morning with a positive outlook. Sen. Dotzler is a strong supporter of a film office. finding the funding is an issue. Rep. Gaines and I withdrew our amendment. If we had allowed it to be voted on yesterday, this would have given too many Reps in both parties to go on record to opposition to full-funding of the office. This would have been detrimental to those in the conference committee who are supportive of the office. Conference committee on the bill is the most effective route to follow. Our amendment would have complicated the matter."


We did speak with an ally from the Iowa senate, Senator Jack Hatch, who hoped the governor would use his influence to gather more support for funding the IFO. He added that Senator Bill Dotzler, Jr. is one of the most important key players in all of this. We were also welcomed into the office of the director of the Department of Management, David Roederer. Mr. Roederer urged us to continue the fight and not to give up hope.

Gene L. Hamilton