NAHJ and The E.W. Scripps Company Launch Joint Effort
To Improve Newsroom Diversity and News Coverage of Latinos
WASHINGTON – The National Association of Hispanic Journalists and The E.W. Scripps Company announced today a new joint effort to improve news coverage of Latinos and to dramatically increase the number of qualified Latino journalists employed at selected Scripps’ newspapers around the country.
The new initiative, called "Sí Se Puede," will be launched April 22 in Denver, Colorado, at a community forum sponsored by NAHJ and the Rocky Mountain News. The forum’s theme will be: "How is the Rocky Mountain News Covering the Latino Community and What Can We Do to Improve That Coverage?" It will take place from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Mountain News, located at 400 West Colfax in Denver.
E.W. Scripps, based in Cincinnati, is the first media company to partner with NAHJ in its new Parity Project. The project is the centerpiece of NAHJ’s five-year strategic plan, which seeks to double the percentage of Latinos in the nation’s newsrooms by 2008.
NAHJ will work with Scripps to rapidly improve the hiring of Latinos and news coverage of the Latino community in selected cities that have Scripps newspapers. The first three papers participating in the project are the Rocky Mountain News, the Ventura County Star and the Naples Daily News. In each city, NAHJ will co-sponsor community forums with the management of the local paper and work with local Scripps staff to improve diversity initiatives. The community forums will bring together various industry stakeholders and create local task forces to monitor the improvement of diversity in hiring and in news coverage.
"I can’t tell you how excited I am about this partnership," said Mike Phillips editorial development director for the E.W. Scripps Company Newspaper Division. "NAHJ’s proposal is, in essence, that the newspaper industry get strategic about diversity. I believe it is the insight we all needed to help us pick up the pace on our diversity efforts."
NAHJ President Juan Gonzalez said, "We are proud to be working with Scripps, one of our nation’s first newspaper chains, in this historic effort. With the Parity Project, NAHJ is raising the bar for diversity. We hope this will be the first of many partnerships with other media companies."
Celebrating its 125th anniversary, The E.W. Scripps Company is a diverse media concern with interests in newspaper publishing, broadcast television, national television networks, interactive media and television-retailing. Scripps operates 21 daily newspapers, 10 broadcast TV stations, four cable and satellite television programming services and a home shopping network. Scripps also operates Scripps Howard News Service and United Media.
Founded in 1984, NAHJ is based in Washington, D.C., and is the nation’s largest professional organization for Latino journalists, with nearly 2,000 members in print, broadcast and new media. For more information about NAHJ, visit the association’s Web site at www.nahj.org or call 202-662-7145.
