Roman Bittman, senior administrator of the Nova Scotia Film Development Corporation, has been placed under temporary suspension. As well, the nsfdc has announced it will not be involved in the construction and operation of a long-debated soundstage on the Halifax waterfront.

Marie Comeau, chair of the nsfdc board, says the board is not releasing reasons for Bittman’s suspension, however is reassuring the film community that it will continue the nsfdc’s investment activities.

An impromtu group of Nova Scotia’s producers has been formed to protest the suspension of Bittman. The group, comprised of executives from Salter Street Films, Citadel Productions, Charles Bishop Productions, Imagex Films and Cochran Entertainment are calling for the resignation of Comeau and the board of directors.

As for the soundstage, Comeau says the board was not satisfied with environmental reports on the site, and that an analysis presented to the board on March 26 indicated there ‘wasn’t a strong enough business case’ to warrant public investment in a soundstage at present.

Comeau says her decision regarding environmental issues stemmed from concerns over the long-term air quality in the proposed site.

‘For me, if you’re not 100% sure that the air quality won’t be at good levels for a long period of time, it’s not acceptable,’ says Comeau. ‘This isn’t to say that the environment couldn’t have possibly been made safe, but it’s not a sure thing; unless you can guarantee it, it’s not acceptable.’

Comeau says while the industry is healthy and the corporation has received a record number of requests for financing, there hasn’t been a demand for additional facilities and the soundstage is not necessary for the growth of the industry.

The soundstage, which was to be located in a decommissioned power plant on the Halifax waterfront, has been discussed for over a year and a half and was to be built and administered by Electropolis, an alliance of Halifax-based Salter Street Films, Citadel Communications and Cochran Entertainment. An estimated $1.6 million was to be injected into the project, with monies coming from the Department of Economic Renewal, the federal government, Heritage Canada, the City of Halifax, the nsfdc and private sources.

Barry Cowling, president of Citadel, says the Electropolis partners will be unable to go forward without government support. Cowling says the inability to agree on a business structure resulted in the board’s decision. ‘Simply, they had a different view about how it should be governed than we did.’

Cowling says the Electropolis group has long identified the creation of a soundstage as a sparkplug to increased activity in the provincial film industry.

Tony Foster of Halifax production company Screenstar, who has opposed the soundstage initiative from its inception, has called the soundstage plans ‘absurd’ from both a business and an environmental standpoint.