FilmL.A. Helps L.A. “Get Noticed”

Some days, it seems like everyone in L.A. is hoping to get noticed by someone in the film industry.  At FilmL.A., we’re not in the business of helping you to sell a screenplay, find an agent or land an audition, but every day, we still help thousands of locals “get noticed” by film professionals.

One of the many services FilmL.A. provides is the advance distribution of Notices of Filming to area neighborhoods.  Our familiar blue Notices provide working details about upcoming productions and act as a vehicle for requesting community input.

FilmL.A. introduced our notification service in 2001. Before then, production companies seeking permits were on their honor to notify communities of their intentions.  Standardization was lacking (to community members’ frustration) and too often, filming caught neighbors unawares.

Today, between 600,000 and 800,000 of our uniform Notices of Filming are delivered each year to area single-family homes, multi-unit dwellings and businesses throughout Los Angeles.  It takes a team of 25 FilmL.A. staffers — many of whom are bilingual — three daily shifts and hundreds of hours per week to visit local communities, answer the questions of local residents and hand-deliver our Notices door to door.

Because the service carries a high cost in paper consumed and miles driven, strict internal controls govern the process from start to finish.  In-office staff members monitor closely how permit details are condensed and reported, as well as how Notices are readied for delivery.

Our staff members are assigned multiple jobs within the same general vicinity in an attempt to keep vehicle miles down.  We also keep track of how many Notices are distributed per location to monitor and reduce the amount of paper consumed.

“One of the biggest challenges we face with notification is getting the word out to gated multi-tenant buildings,” admits Krishna Asani, FilmL.A.’s Manager of Field Services. “We have had to adapt our process specifically to serve those residents.”

FilmL.A.’s eNotification program offers one helpful workaround.  The service is now available in ten neighborhoods popular for filming.  Within sixty days, the number of eNotices delivered through the program is expected to hit the one million mark.

“I often get calls from residents who are thankful for the presence of our notification staff in their neighborhoods,” Asani notes. “It’s nice to see support for our efforts translate into support for filming.”