New Orleans — This week I’ve been in the Big Easy as part of the L.A. Times’ delegation for the National Assn. of Hispanic Journalists’ annual conference.Every year Latino journalists from all over the country come together to learn some new reporting skills, court potential employees, show off new products and give out an appalling amount of tote bags.Day One of the conference was unfortunately a bit muted this time around as Tropical Storm Bertha ripped across the Gulf Coast, unleashing its power across the Louisiana bayou. Flights were delayed and a mild sense of tension was in the air.That pressure mirrored the underlying stress that’s currently enveloping the journalism world. Staffs are diminishing as layoffs in the industry remain rampant, as was seen in the ESPN firings this week, and reporters are being tasked with juggling several responsibilities at once.Unfortunately, Latino journalists and journalists of color have been disproportionately affected by downsizing initiatives throughout the media world in recent years.At this conference I’ve spoken with journalists of all ages and experiences who haven’t been able to find steady jobs in months or even years.It’s a reality that’s all too real for me as someone who was part of a mass layoff that happened at the L.A. Times in early 2024.It took me nearly a full year to find another full-time job in journalism, but in many ways my relationship with the industry has forever changed. It’s hard to believe in job security and the pressure of feeding the content machine is constant. So many people advised me to seek jobs in a new industry. Journalism is dying. “Everyone is overworked and underpaid” is what I’d constantly hear.Emerging journalist Lizbeth Solorzano expressed some of her anxieties about the state of the industry when I spoke with her Wednesday night.“I’m both excited and afraid to attend this conference,” the 24-year-old recent USC graduate said. “I know that there are a lot of opportunities here waiting, but I also know that there were a lot of people attending, or even not attending, that were laid off. So I want to be excited, but it’s sometimes a little bit hard for me.”Currently working as an investigative intern at L.A. Taco, Solorzano was also nervous about her own job prospects as someone seeking a job in the L.A. area.“It is very congested and difficult to find work, especially for us recent graduates,” she said. “Everyone emphasizes networking and I really think that’s probably the key to securing a job, and you don’t even know if that’s promised to you. I want to stay in L.A. and work, but I also know that it can be a little bit risky and it might not be what I hope for it to be.”Sophia Rentschler echoed some of Solorzano’s reservations about the state of the industry, especially from the lens of a science reporter.“It’s really tricky right now because I applied to graduate programs in science journalism and it didn’t work out financially and I was stressed because you need or it would be beneficial for one to have a graduate degree, “ the 22-year-old journalist said. “[A lot of] people getting internships tend to have graduate-level experience at local publications internships that were once attainable just by having an undergraduate degree. I know I still want to do this, I’m still passionate about it, but I know it’s going to take a lot of work.”Rentschler talked about the difficulties she’s had acclimating to newsrooms as a Latina in a predominantly non-Latino industry.“I feel like at newsrooms that I’ve been at previously, it’s been hard because I stick out a little bit and people don’t understand my style as a person,” she said. “Also, being a queer Latina, it’s really hard to fit into those spaces. And that intersection of identities sticks out like a sore thumb in a predominantly white space and a predominantly heterosexual space.”However the recent University of Missouri graduate remained “optimistic” about her prospects as a Latina in the journalism business.“The more that I embrace [my Latinidad], it’s come to return in my favor like threefold,” Rentschler said. “I think the more I embrace it … the more organizations actually value me and see this as an asset. That’s something that everyone should be able to feel.”The most optimistic of the people I spoke with was actually the person with the most experience in the news world.Maria Elena Fernandez, a former L.A. Times reporter and the current Report for America regional manager, told me that she was very hopeful about the future of Latino media.“What we do is we recruit newsrooms that have gaps in communities that are underserved or topics that are underserved, and we help place the journalists there, and we help pay their salary, and we offer a lot of support and training,” the industry veteran said. “Because I’m involved in that space, I am very optimistic because I’m constantly meeting independent people that are creating new news outlets in their communities, and it seems like local news is in a more robust and exciting place.”Fernandez noted that she had become a bit jaded after spending decades in large newsrooms where reporters and editors frequently came and went.“I have worked for many big companies that have gone through rounds of layoffs and buyouts and all of that, and I know how tough that is,” she said. “It’s hard when you survive those cuts to keep your head up and do the work. So I really understand and have empathy for people that are more stressed out than I am about it. But I get to see the people that are excited and being entrepreneurial about news.”One particular aspect of her job that fills Fernandez with positivity is how young Latinos in her organization have empowered themselves to highlight the difficult realities of the community.“In terms of Latinos, we have a lot of people covering really tough topics in relation to ICE and immigration and everything that’s happening,” she said. “But it’s very heartening to know that we’re helping to place people of that identity who can relate and understand and just see the story from a different perspective.”It’s hard to get rid of the journalism bug — this conference is proof of that. Journalism is often characterized as a job for the cold and objective, but really it’s a career for the dreamers who believe that their next story is always worth telling and look for ways to elevate the voices of the voiceless.I’m just glad there’s people who still believe in the power of those stories.Good Immigrant, Bad Immigrant: When our teen idols lean right Julio Salgado is a visual artist based in Long Beach. His work has been displayed at the Oakland Museum, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and Smithsonian American Art Museum. (@juliosalgado83)Stories we read this week that we think you should readUnless otherwise noted, stories below were published by the Los Angeles Times.Politics and immigrationArts and entertainmentSouthern California
