When Peter Stockton began working in the film industry in Houston in the mid-1990s, there were ample television, commercial and feature productions to pay the bills. Blockbusters from “Urban Cowboy” to “Reality Bites,” plus countless other commercial jobs, had provided the city with a large and competent work force.

By the mid-2000s, it all went south — or, rather, the jobs went east and west.

Houston lost big-budget projects to states like California and New York that offer more attractive tax incentives to steer studio decision-making. Currently, the big-screen adaptation of Nic Pizzolatto’s novel “Galveston” is being filmed on a barrier island near Savannah, Ga.

Efforts to lure major productions back may be about to get even more difficult. Two years ago, the Legislature slashed funding to the Texas Film Commission to $35 million from $95 million in the previous biennium. Conservative lawmakers again have filed bills this session to eliminate the commission, and the taxpayer-funded incentive system, altogether.

These moves could in turn complicate Mayor Sylvester Turner’s newly launched initiative to create a city incentives program to attract feature film projects. Turner wants to showcase the city’s workforce, diversity of filming locations and high-end hospitality options to satisfy Hollywood A-listers.

The mayor and local industry supporters say the payoff for a Houston-specific tax incentive program is worth it. The film business brought more than $1.2 billion into the state economy over the past decade, reports the Texas Motion Picture Alliance. The group also cites figures that show each $1 in incentive yields $5.55 in economic impact.

The Houston Film Commission last year provided assistance, though not tax incentives, for 271 film and video projects with more than 1,000 days of filming. The productions generated an estimated $57 million in economic impact for the Houston area, according to the mayor’s office.

Local tax incentives would boost that number.

“It’s going to create jobs and change Houston in a positive way,” said Preston Middleton, a former Texas Southern University instructor and a self-described entertainment activist.

City officials recently have indicated a new incentive package that could include free use of city-owned property and an expansion of Houston’s database of production resources.

Middleton, who helped develop Destiny’s Child and now produces specials for comedy acts such as Mo’Nique, recently joined local film workers in organizing a three-day Houston Film and Entertainment Summit to highlight the city’s potential.

Executive producers such as Lynn Birdwell lamented that Houston lacks resources, such as sound stages of more than 200,000 square feet in which multiple projects can be produced at the same time, that are found in cities like Atlanta. Yet she believes Houston still offers several promising film locations currently being overseen, and big-budget productions can spur creation of needed infrastructure.

“We have more residential areas that fit so many more demographics than Atlanta will ever have,” Birdwell said.

‘Migrant film workers’

For now, locally based workers like Stockton, a professional key grip who oversees cameras, lighting and rigging equipment, have two options: move or commute, either out of state or, for now at least, to more film-friendly Texas cities like Austin and Dallas.

“We’re migrant film workers,” Stockton said recently from Austin, where he is on set. “We’re just running around trying to find jobs.”

Yet lawmakers such as state Sen. Bob Hall, R-Edgewood, who represents an area east of Dallas, contend the economic investment isn’t enough to justify state and city incentives programs. Hall criticized the vulgarity and “gore” of some Texas-made films as well as incentives that went toward making a Wal-Mart commerical.

Hall’s bill would shut down the Texas Film Commission and the Texas Music Office and would end state film incentives. At least two other bills with similar goals have been filed by state Sen. Konni Burton, R-Colleyville, and state Rep. Matt Shaheen, R-Plano.

Hall said he welcomes economic development from the film industry, but he thinks the best way to attract the business is by lowering taxes, reducing regulations and improving roads and other infrastructure.

Incentives, Hall and other conservatives say, amount to the government giving preferential treatment to one industry at the expense of another.

“It’s not proper use of taxpayer money,” he said.

As the fiscal and cultural debate continues, several Texas cities have been going it alone. Houston hopes to join them soon.

Austin offers a “creative content incentive program” that returns up to 0.75 percent of local workforce spending to the studios. Over the last three years, the city has disbursed about $60,000 in incentives.

San Antonio recently tripled the size of its incentives offering tax rebates up to $250,000 based on such measures as days of filming and local workers hired.

Dallas provides incentives on a case-by-case basis with the help of the Dallas Film Commission.

Texas should learn from Florida not to leave incentives strictly to cities, said John Lux, executive director of the nonprofit Film Florida trade association.

The state was once ranked as the third-best for film production, behind New York and California, generating $1.2 billion in spending between 2010 and 2016. Since ending its incentive program, the state is not ranked at all, Lux said.

Though Florida cities and counties have begun creating their own incentive packages, he added, the state has lost about $875 million in projects since 2013, when the state’s incentives program ran out of funds.

“If you want to be part of the industry, you have to compete for it,” Lux said. “We all work in a business, and businesses will go where they will get the best value.”

Small perks help

Where businesses go, workers like Stockton follow. He’s currently at Austin’s ATX studios working on “Alita: Battle Angel,” with Hollywood heavyweights James Cameron, who directed “Avatar” and “Titanic,” and Robert Rodriguez, the San Antonio-born director whose credits include “El Mariachi” and “Spy Kids.”

Stockton’s wife and kids remain in Houston. He tries to find work as close to home as possible, but he rarely spends time with his family during the week. He believes the mayor’s proposal for a city incentives package, even for perks as small as offering discounted hotel rates to crews, could bring projects that, in turn, will attract others.

“You have to make it desirable,” he said.

Debra Martin Chase, a Houston lawyer in the 1980s who now works in the entertainment business, said the city has a lot to offer the film industry — if it can get the message out.

“With the new Houston,” said Chase, who counts “The Princess Diaries” and “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” among her production credits, “the city can do a better job in marketing what you have here. It’s incredible.” ileana.najarro@chron.com cindy.george@chron.com