Whose $80 million?

So-called economic impact numbers are basically useless as anything besides PR tools. Even if the advertised figures are not exaggerated (which they almost certainly are) all they tell us is how much money was theoretically put into motion by a specific event without regard to where any of it ended up.

We can estimate the volume of water and sediment carried by the Mississippi River through South Louisiana.  But if we are indifferent to how that load is dispersed across the delta, then how does that help us rebuild the deteriorating coastline? 

The same problem applies to the supposed economic impact of filming. 

How is a site awarded and thereby closed? How do they estimate the $80 million, and does the production achieve this estimate?

How are uniformed NOPD officers compensated? Who are the 600 locals employed by a film featuring Gary Oldman?

With New Orleans increasingly the backdrop for big films, we would all benefit from a line-by-line analysis of the expenditures credited to a single one of these productions.

If the state issues a tax credit, can the city also — simply for the sake of study — collect receipts and explain the film’s impact against the impact on residents in terms of resources and time diverted?

That's from a letter to The Advocate by Brian Boyles. He's referring specifically to work downtown on the new "Planet Of The Apes" movie.  Here's a sorry phone pic of the production blocking my progress up Common Street last week.



And here's another one I took this morning of Carondelet Street.



I assume this is the same production because they've dressed up the street to look all overgrown and decayed the way the scene downtown was constructed.  Of course, that doesn't take all that much work around here where signs of decay and neglect exist in abundance.  Had they just scooted a few blocks down the street, for example, our beloved three year old overgrown sinkhole was already prepared for its close-up.