UPDATE:
Due to the expected snow-mageddon this weekend, we are moving the press conference originally scheduled for Monday to the morning of the hearing, Wednesday, January 27.
New Date for press conference:
- Date Wednesdy, January 27th 2016
- Time 9:30 am
- Location: Steps of City Hall
Jesus Sanchez
NewsGuild of New York
C: 917-545-2017
O: 212-730-1509
The Campaign
to Save El Diario
As the op-ed below by NYC Councilmember Menchaca of Sunset Park, Brooklyn explains, the NYC Council will be holding a public hearing on the state of the city's ethnic media that will be sponsored by Lower East Side Councilmember Rosie Mendez. This hearing is scheduled for Wednesday, January 27th. The union and staff will be holding a news conference on the steps of City Hall on W\Monday, January 25th at 1pm to announce the hearing. The purpose of the hearing: How can the City support ethnic media to ensure that immigrant communities receive information on local matters?
Will this Council meeting provide pressure on the management of El Diario to be more responsive to the community it is supposed to be serving? Will the City Council consider providing economic incentives to the paper to maintain its print edition and strengthen its local coverage, like it has provided subsidies to other media companies to remain in the city? Will the Council provide incentives to El Diario management to work more closely with Latino community leaders? Can the Council put pressure on impreMedia to sell El Diario by providing a package of incedntives to local Latin\tino community-based investors? Can the Council develop an ethnic media stabilization fund, like they have done for nonprofits of color?
As Jesus Sanchez of the NewsGuild informs us:
We can make a difference today in the lives of every member not only of the Guild but of all Hispanic readers out there. The community needs to be heard. Please invite your members to attend.
When the right buyer comes along La Nacion would be happy to sell. I can hear it in their voices. When we have our meetings with management, it is clear they don't understand the markets where they have properties and are drowning. They are looking for an out.
Let me know if you feel it would be helpful for us to host a meeting to discuss this option further
Last week, we posted an article on the El Diario situation that appeared in the Huffington Post. Its basic argument was the paper's problems stem from poor circulation (the same as the Portada article below argues). However, as one veteran Latino journalist wrote to us about this argument:
Interesting piece, much true. But his analysis on the causes for decline in circulation is weak: yes the numbers dipped at the same time Internet started impacting print in the English media. But EDLP's horrible pages were not the reason. As you well know, they had no consistent coverage of the city's policies, government and life. They ignored significant issues and covered pet projects of their former publisher, Rossana Rosado, who was guided more by personal politics, or about things close to former boricua editor's lefty heart. They had walked away from being El Campeon De Los Hispanos. Their coverage went downhill and readers split.
For further information on the campaign to save El Diario, contact:
Jesus Sanchez
NewsGuild of New York
Local 31003, CWA
1500 Broadway, Suite 900
New York, NY 10036
C: 917-545-2017
O: 212-730-1509
---Angelo Falcón
CONTENTS
* "Defending the voice of New Yorkers: Ethical media are key to addressing the relevant
issues of communities" By NYC Councilmember Carlos Menchaca, El Diario (January 18, 2015)
* "impreMedia's El Diario Dismisses 13 Employees in New Cost Cutting Round" By Editorial Staff, Portada (January 18, 2016)
Defending the voice of New Yorkers
Ethical media are key to addressing the relevant
issues of communities
By NYC Councilmember Carlos Menchaca
translation from Spanish by CJ Macklin of BerlinRosen
This month I plan directing the first public hearing of the Municipal Council of the City of New York on the crisis faced by ethnic media: who is thriving, who did not and how these dynamics affect immigrant communities. All voices should be heard.
We are a city founded on the power and promise of immigrants with a rich history in culture and language. And have done for over 100 years, our new Yorkers seeking help navigating the complicated system of city services in ethnic newspapers and in foreign languages. True, our city needs to provide more funding for English learning programs in our neighborhoods. New Yorkers still learning English born abroad depend news media in the most comfortable language and which reflects their lives and experiences.
In 2014
New York Magazine reported that ethnic newspapers in New York, with a combined circulation of 2.9 million, exceeding the range published in
The New York Times,
The Wall Street Journal, the
Daily News and The Post. However the bleak future of our oldest newspaper,
El Diario, is a barometer that deserves the attention of all to examine ethnic newspapers.
Despite the growing Latino presence in New York, which now accounts for nearly 29% of the population,
El Diario onlyhas a dozen journalists after the latest cuts. It is a tragic fall after employing a newsroom of over 25 journalists only 2 years ago. No doubt there are only continue if paper
El Diario, the cuts will leave the site with less original local reports and more generic content from other media. If the printed edition is lost, thousands of Spanish-speaking New Yorkers who do not have daily access to the Internet will be without news they need and less ability to understand the issues that affect their community.
These newspapers in foreign languages such as Urdu, Mandarin, Spanish or any other language, share a similar mission: to cover issues of different communities and have as thorough an approach on issues not seen in mainstream media of interest to immigrant communities. These newspapers have a particular confidence with the public and the responsibility to publish stories that no one else is telling.
We focus our thoughts and find a way to ensure that all New Yorkers have access to all available media today: printed, digital, radio, and beyond.
Carlos Menchaca is Councilmember and Chairman of the Committee on Immigration
impreMedia's El Diario
Dismisses 13 Employees
in New Cost Cutting Round
By Editorial Staff (@portada_online)
What: New York's
El Diario, an ImpreMedia newspaper, dismissed 13 employees last week of which 6 belong to the Editorial Team.
Why it matters: The new cost cutting round reflects costs pressures that are faced by newspapers in large U.S. cities. Smaller market community newspapers have been a bit more shielded from the heavy downfall in ad revenues. Impremedia's new CEO Gabriel Dantur acknowledged that the company has lost money in each of the 4 years since the Argentinean Group La Nacion bought ImpreMedia.
New York City's largest Spanish-language newspaper
El Diario last week dismissed 13 employees, of which 6 belong to the editorial team. Manuel Avendano, Night Editor of
El Diario, told NY1 that "out of 100 employees
El Diario used to have, only 35 remain." NY1's Joaquin Inoa reports that some employees think that
El Diario will cease publication in print. impreMedia's new CEO Gabriel Dantur notes that the paper will continue to be printed, but that measures will be taken to put more emphasis on digital, mobile and social network communications. In mid 2014
El Diario went through a redesign led by Juan Varela, the VP of Content at the time, Varela noted that the idea was to redefine the concept of a quality popular newspaper.
While many Spanish-language newspapers have strong community newspaper features and have been somewhat shielded from the heavy decline in ad-revenue -community newspapers in smaller markets have held relatively strong compared to large metropolitan dailies-, in large cities like New York and Los Angeles the environment has been much more challenging.
The overall company now brands itself as a "marketing solutions company with the soul of a publisher.
Agency Approach
ImpreMedia last year also introduced IM Studio ñ-an in-house Marketing Solutions division. The unit develops brand-centric, "customized opportunities through own-able & shareable content to meet the needs of clients looking to reach the evolving US Hispanic audience." The overall company now brands itself as a "marketing solutions company with the soul of a publisher."
In addition to
El Diario , impreMedia publishes
La Opinion in Los Angeles, also a daily, as well as weeklies La Raza (Chicago),
La Opinion de la Bahia (San Francisco, formerly called
El Mensajero) and
La Prensa in Orlando. The group also publishes
ESPN Deportes La Revista under a license from ESPN and digital properties
Rumbo (Houston, formerly also a print newspaper), ParaTiMujer.com, gossip site Flashpik.com as well as soccer site QuieroMasFutbol. National Magazine
Vista, which mas mostly distributed as an insert into newspapers, was discontinued last year.
About Editorial Staff (@portada_online)
Portada is the leading source of news and analysis on the Latin Marketing and Media space. Credibility is our biggest asset: The Portada team is very passionate about producing high-quality independent content that helps drive forward the Latin Marketing and Media space.