Vancouver: The B.C. Council of Film Unions has three productions working under a new contract that caters to low-budget productions even though its 3,500 members have yet to ratify it.

The Council – comprising the memberships of IATSE Local 891, IATSE Local 669 and Teamsters Local 155 – has worked out a ‘modified master’ which discounts up to 30% the rate cards created under the exclusive master collective agreement for larger budget shows.

Productions with labor costs of $4 million or more fall under the regular master, while smaller productions that fall below the thresholds of the Council’s exclusive niche can apply to work under the modified master.

In most cases, low-budget productions will get either a 10% break or a 15% break on the regular rate cards, with the bonus going to Canadian versus non-Canadian productions. However, the discounts slide to 30% for the very small-budget Canadian shows.

‘This agreement can apply to any low-budget production that can justify and demonstrate how they are financially constrained,’ says Council business agent Tim Hiltz.

As a kind of test case, Vancouver’s Crescent Entertainment is before cameras with series The Crow: Stairway to Heaven and the series pilot Shadow Warriors (for Alliance) and series Night Man (for Atlantis) and using the modified master.

These shows will likely be the last to work under the modified, low-budget master until the contract is ratified, says Hiltz. The vote probably won’t take place until June since the final details are still being worked on.

However, the new low-budget contract will potentially cause some disruption to the shows that use it. Four series including The X-Files and Millennium have wrapped production in the past month and have flooded the market with available crew members. But scant new bigger-budget productions – such as the large studio features expected this summer – have begun.

Therefore the low-budget shows are crewing up with experienced people who might jump ship when the shows paying better rates start hiring.

And the new iatse low-budget contract is not expected to create more problems for rival union ACFC West, which has rekindled its viability by servicing the low-budget series such as Dead Man’s Gun, Cold Squad, First Wave, Addams Family and other shows that fall below the Council’s exclusive contract parameters.

Business agent Connor O’Sullivan says that ACFC West has as much business as it can handle. ‘We’re almost booked to the teeth,’ he says, adding that he has 200 acfc members and 200 permittees working.

A recent merger with cep gives ACFC West a new level of protection from raiding (since cep and the Council members are affiliated with the B.C. Federation of Labour) and also gives ACFC West a better perception of stability.

He says the shows that went with the Council’s modified master also shopped ACFC West, but that was before the cep merger last month. ‘There was a definite fear or concern prior to the merger that acfc would not have any members,’ says O’Sullivan. ‘It’s a totally different picture now.’

He says that because of last year’s membership drive by IATSE Local 891, up to 50% of ACFC West members also have ia cards.

And while he admits that it looks like the Council is trying to sew up the production market, ACFC West has contracted loyal customers who are paying, in some cases, 35% more than what ACFC West was charging about three years ago.

A rigging grip, best boy and second assistant at ACFC West will each cost producers $1,250 per week. Under the Council’s modified master, discounted by 15%, the same crew members cost $1,275.