Chamber Asks 2 Cities and County to Underwrite Film Commission : Conejo Valley: The agency would help filmmakers with locations and permits. It could also boost local economies.

Douglas Fairbanks swashbuckled and Elvis rocked in movies shot in the Conejo Valley, and now there is a proposal to set up an east county film commission to keep the cameras rolling.

The Conejo Valley Chamber of Commerce is encouraging officials of Thousand Oaks, Moorpark and Ventura County to underwrite the film commission, which would help filmmakers scout out locations and garner necessary permits.

“We have an image in Ventura County, that the film industry does not relish working out here because we’re so uncoordinated,” Barbara Gilmore, chairwoman of the chamber’s Film Commission Committee, told the Thousand Oaks City Council on Tuesday.

A film commission could ease problems for movie makers by streamlining procedures for obtaining permits and working with local merchants and fire and police agencies.

Gilmore, a former producer of educational documentaries, said a commission would also boost local economies by attracting more productions to the region. She said her group would ask Thousand Oaks, Moorpark and Ventura County officials to share start-up costs of up to $20,000 for the commission’s first year and agree to provide continued support afterward.

The council agreed to consider the request in budget hearings beginning next month.

She suggested that the commission raise funds by staging a festival of movies filmed in the region. Those range from Fairbanks’ 1920s version of “Robin Hood” to “Friday the 13th Part IX: Jason Goes To Hell”--part of which was filmed this fall in a vacant tire store in Thousand Oaks.

The commission would have an executive director and an administrative assistant, Gilmore said. The chamber has agreed to provide an office and access to telephones and fax machines worth about $15,000 a year.

The commission would be partly funded by a surcharge on filming permits issued by the cities and the county. But she said that city and county governments would need to provide direct funding as well.

That financial support is important, said Melissa Higgins, deputy director of the California Film Commission.

“It does show a legitimacy, that the city acknowledges it wants to promote movie making. If you don’t have the support of your community, there’s not going to be any success in this,” Higgins said.

Higgins said that no Ventura County communities now belong to her agency’s network of local film liaisons.

She said Ventura County is an attractive location for many movies because it offers many areas of open space relatively close to Hollywood studios. But filmmakers often shy from working in the county, especially in unincorporated areas, because of problems getting county permits.

For the Dustin Hoffman movie “Hero,” she said, movie makers staged a plane crash near Piru. “They had to pull permits as if they were building a shopping center,” Higgins said.

Producers of a Mel Brooks spoof of Robin Hood, “Men Who Wear Tights,” decided not to film in Lake Sherwood--where Fairbanks had worn tights as Robin Hood in the 1920s--because of the extra cost of obtaining permits. Higgins said the producers saved several thousand dollars by using a Los Angeles County location.

A film commission can also help communities attract attention in an increasingly competitive market, Higgins said.

“All 50 states, 22 countries and every major metropolitan area now has a film commission. We are competing with all of these people to keep the business that is generated in California,” Higgins said.

Some Ventura County communities have film liaisons, but none have offices that would be as well-financed as the one that Gilmore proposes for Thousand Oaks.

Carolyn Bowker, community liaison of the Santa Paula Chamber of Commerce, is also her town’s film liaison. Santa Paula is a popular filming location but has rebelled against what townspeople see as the demands of film crews.

“It’s worked out fine,” said Bowker, who visits all store owners whose locations will be used in a film.

Fillmore appointed a volunteer film commission this spring and has cut its high permit fees to be more amenable to film crews, City Clerk Noreen Withers said. She said the commission has smoothed relations between movie makers and merchants.

“They’re in a more open mood now and they’re ready to be more cooperative,” she said.