A Queenstown Lakes District Council-prompted review brought film advisory board Film Otago Southland to the Waitaki District Council this week during this year's annual plan submissions.
Despite Film Otago Southland having promoted the Waitaki district on its website, and claiming it received funding from the council, that funding had been "lost in transition'' and had not been received for several years, executive manager Kevin Jennings said.
With Film Otago Southland in a restructuring phase, the request to the council was to financially contribute to the organisation for filming managed by it in the Waitaki district.
Mr Jennings said the film advisory board planned to expand its budget to $298,000 to allow him to work full-time and also to hire a junior staffer to allow for succession planning.
The request for funding from the council was for 4% of that budget, or about $12,000 a year, for three years.
The majority of filming facilitated by Film Otago Southland over the past three years had been commercials, with 249 television commercials among the 663 productions, but there were also 11 feature films filmed in Otago and Southland during that period, including one of the Hobbit series, Pete's Dragon and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny.
The new funding proposal would reflect the amount of filming done in each of the southern areas.
Film Otago Southland's primary backer, the Queenstown Lakes council, would be asked to provide 68%; the Southland council 14%, the Dunedin council 10%, Waitaki 4%, Central Otago 3% and Clutha 1%.
The proposal had not been put to the other councils yet as the Waitaki council's annual plan process was the first to happen this year.
