California On Location Awards honors Film Location Professionals and Public Employees for excellence while filming in the Golden State.
Curtis Markloff accepting his COLA Award for County Employee of the Year
Curtis Markloff, Fire Prevention Specialist for the San Bernardino County Fire Department, took the top award at this year’s 20th Annual California on Location Awards for Public Employee of the Year – County. He received this honor after competing with numerous county employees throughout the state for his professionalism and integrity when working with film production companies. He was recognized for his professional treatment of all types of film productions coming into the County of San Bernardino from the smallest student filmmaker to the largest studio feature. “to have beat out others from Counties like Los Angeles is huge” said Dan Taylor, Deputy Director of the Inland Empire Film Commission. “This is a tough category, but Curtis work ethic and knowledge of the film industry gave him an edge. We are excited that he won.”
This year’s awards were presented to individual location professionals and the location teams in various diverse categories for outstanding professional performance. Public employees from the city, county, state and federal governmental sectors across California were also honored for excelling in their service to production projects.
The tradition of the COLA program continued on Sunday, November 9, 2014. This internationally recognized awards program celebrated an historic two decades of recognizing and supporting excellence when the 20th Annual COLA reception and ceremony was hosted by the Beverly Hilton hotel, legendary crossroads of the entertainment industry. There over 500 entertainment industry executives, producers, directors, location managers and other production professionals gathered along with distinguished community leaders in the International ballroom, home of the Golden Globes, to celebrate this state’s signature industry. This ceremonial event salutes the location professionals whose behind the scenes work helps bring to life the motion pictures and television shows seen on screens across the globe.
What started 20 years ago with the seed of a singular idea for a unique awards event became apivotal moment in the entertainment industry. It sparked a movement to focus long needed recognition on the previously unsung world of location professionals whose work plays a vital role in the production of motion pictures and television programs. With that one idea from the vision of Sheri Davis, director of the Inland Empire Film Commission grew the California On Location Awards (COLA), a one of a kind premier awards program saluting location professionals and production companies for exemplary professional excellence while filming on location In California. In addition, as location managers constantly interact with government sectors in the course of their work, federal, state and local public employees are recognized for their valuable services in going above and beyond to facilitate filming in their individual jurisdictions.
Please visit www.californiaonlocationawards.com for more details about the COLA Awards.
20th Annual California on Location Awards
Congratulations to Curtis! I attended the COLA Awards and it was amazing! The recognition for his hard work was well deserved.