NAHJ Director: “It’s Definitely Good News for Us”
Elizabeth Vargas and Bob Woodruff today were named co-anchors of ABC-TV’s “World News Tonight,” ABC News President David Westin announced, in a move described as “good news for us” by the executive director of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.
Vargas, 43, was raised by a Puerto Rican father and Irish-American mother, according to a June 2004 profile by Liz Llorente in Hispanic magazine.
Though Vargas is not a member of his organization, “It’s definitely good news for us,” Iván Román, executive director of NAHJ, told Journal-isms. “She’s there; she’s visible. Her last name is Vargas. It’s important for people to see ‘Elizabeth Vargas’ at the end of the newscast. She worked hard to get there.”
[Added Dec. 6: Vargas said she brings a different mix of views to the job because “I’m a woman, I’m a working mother, I’m a minority. Being a mom is the biggest, most important role in my entire life. . . . Especially as a woman, I really, really want to do this well. It’s important to have a woman be successful in this role,” according to Howard Kurtz, writing in the Washington Post.]
“I’ve had the opportunity to work with the World News Tonight team over the past years and have been inspired by their professionalism and dedication. Their ability to put on a first rate broadcast night after night throughout months of sadness and grief has been nothing short of amazing,” Vargas said in a news release. “Bob and I are surrounded by a broadcast team and a news organization that is second to none. I am honored and excited by the opportunity to help lead World News Tonight into the future.”
She and Woodruff, 44, have been among the show’s substitute anchors since Peter Jennings, who died Aug. 7, announced in April that had lung cancer.
“Beginning Monday, January 2nd, when Vargas and Woodruff debut together as co-anchors, ‘World News Tonight’ will become the first evening newscast to broadcast a live version to the West Coast each night. World News Tonight will also make various versions of its reports available over the Internet throughout the afternoon and evening,” the news release continued.
“Elizabeth and Bob together will be the anchors for this new broadcast and digital age of World News Tonight. Their experience as journalists, their familiarity to our audiences, and their commitment to gathering and delivering the news anywhere, anytime and in every way make them the right team to take us forward for the next generation,” said Westin in the release.
“Vargas will remain co-anchor of ABC News’ ’20/20′, ABC said.
“The decision will make Woodruff and Vargas the first co-anchors of an evening newscast since Dan Rather and Connie Chung briefly worked together at ‘CBS Evening News’ in the 1990s,” David Bauder reported today for the Associated Press.
“ABC’s ‘World News Tonight’ is ranked second in the Nielsen Media Research rankings, and has been fading a bit lately to NBC’s first-place ‘Nightly News,’ anchored by Brian Williams. CBS is still searching for its replacement for Rather, who left in March, amid reports that it is seeking NBC’s Katie Couric for the job.”
“For the past several years,” Vargas “has also been a regular substitute anchor of ‘World News Tonight,’ and, since April 2005, has filled in on the broadcast a part of each week. She was also the anchor of ‘World News Tonight Sunday,'” where she succeeded Carole Simpson, the veteran African American broadcaster who was forced to step down in 2003. “As an award-winning anchor and correspondent, Vargas has traveled the world covering breaking new stories, reporting in-depth investigations and conducting newsmaker interviews,” ABC said.
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National Editor Ken Cooper Leaving Boston Globe
Kenneth J. Cooper, the Boston Globe’s highest ranking African American line editor, is leaving the paper after the national news department he heads was abolished to help meet cost reductions mandated by the parent New York Times Co., he said tonight.
The decision at a paper that once had an African American managing editor in Greg Moore, now editor of the Denver Post, left some of the remaining black journalists – and some white colleagues – saying they felt the paper was moving backward in providing opportunities for journalists of color.
“My plan is to look for opportunities in newspapers, magazines and academia to return to writing and pursue thoughtful journalism about the serious issues of the day,” Cooper told Journal-isms.
The New York Times Co. announced Sept. 20 that it planned to undertake staff reductions that would affect approximately 500 employees, about 4 percent of its total workforce.
The Globe decided to close its six-person national news department, but not its Washington bureau, to help achieve its share of the cost reductions. Cooper was offered jobs as an op-ed editor and as a writer in the cultural section, but sought the job of columnist in the Globe’s Washington bureau when, as various news outlets reported Dec. 1, Tom Oliphant took the buyout.
However, the paper isn’t filling that job, Cooper said. “Basically, we’ve got an agreement in principle on my separation agreement,” he said tonight.
Black journalists at the paper said they were dismayed.
“He is the highest ranking black person involved in the content of the newspaper. He brought a perspective that not everybody has,” said Ann Scales, deputy living arts editor. “The paper was richer for having someone like him in the position he was in.”
“I remember how excited I was when Ken decided to return to the paper from the Washington Post five years ago,” metro columnist Adrian Walker said. “As excited as I was then, that’s how disappointed I am now. It’s a real loss.”
“If you count not only the loss of newsroom folks here, but people on the business side as well, we’re losing a good number of people of color,” business reporter Keith Reed said. “But beyond the numbers, the institutional knowledge walking out the door is irreplaceable. When you lose the level of experience Ken represents, you lose your mentors in the newsroom as well as a skilled and respected editor. He’s helped me a lot since I’ve been here.”
Columnist Derrick Z. Jackson said, “It has always been tough getting veteran African American talent to come to the Globe, given Boston’s history and its lingering national image that it is an exceedingly difficult town for a black person to crack. It is even more rare to recruit black talent from major media cities that black people perceive to be more hospitable.
“Thus, it was a major coup to get a Pulitzer team winner, an India bureau chief and nationally respected education writer to come back to Boston from the Washington Post,” Jackson continued. “His possible departure is likely to make the quest of diversity both locally and nationally that much more difficult. If someone of that caliber can lose his position, a lot of other African American journalists are likely to think, ‘Why should I bother?’
“The sad part for me personally is that Ken and I share the same optimistic spirit about Boston. He wrote a piece in 2001 titled, ‘Being Black and Back in Boston – Without Fear.’ He wrote that the ‘relaxation in Boston’s racial climate has astonished me since I returned to the city early this year after 15 years away.’
“That makes the current situation all the more ironic, if not tragic for those who care about diversity. His departure will mean that the Boston Globe, for now, will be without a black person physically at our news meetings who is a department head who actually runs reporters. That is unacceptable in the 21st century.”
As stated in a previous post, Cooper, 49, was the first African American national correspondent of the Knight Ridder newspaper group, covering major political stories, including the 1988 presidential campaign of Democrat Michael S. Dukakis. He returned to the Globe in 2001 after being a national reporter and India correspondent for the Washington Post. In a previous stint at the Globe, Cooper shared in a 1984 Pulitzer Prize as part of a team that examined race relations in Boston, “a notable exercise in public service that turned a searching gaze on some the city’s most honored institutions including the Globe itself,” the Pulitzer board said.
Editor Martin Baron and Globe spokesman Al Larkin could not be reached tonight for comment.
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Sun’s Penn Takes Buyout; Distressed by Tribune Co.
Are buyouts and cutbacks hurting diversity? If Ivan Penn, reporter for 12 years at the Baltimore Sun, is any indication, the answer is yes. Penn, a 36-year-old black journalist on the paper’s investigative team, told Journal-isms today that he will not return to the paper after he completes his Knight fellowship at Stanford University. “I’ve been concerned about the direction that Tribune has gone with the Sun,” he said of the paper’s parent Tribune Co.
Penn was the only African American reporter among 17 newsroom employees who took voluntary buyouts. The Sun said Friday that 70 employees participated in the companywide program, eliminating the need for layoffs.
“Being on this fellowship” has reignited “my passion for being a reporter,” he said. “The larger question is the where – where to go and what kind of assignment. When you’re looking at the landscape, when they’re closing foreign bureaus and reducing the staffs in Washington, you start wondering about what will be available to you.” He said he regretted “the loss of what a lot of young reporters saw as an opportunity” to do the big story overseas or in Washington, “at some paper other than the [Washington] Post or the [New York] Times. Why go to a place like the Baltimore Sun where the peak may be at the state level, as opposed to being in Washington, London or Beijing?”
Penn worked at the Miami Herald for a year before joining the Sun, where he covered government and politics. At Stanford, he is studying African American entrepreneurship before and after the civil rights movement, as well as golf and acting.
He said he was seeking another journalism job.
- Jeff Jacobs, Hartford Courant: No Glossing Over It: Paper Cuts Dig Deep
- Jeremy Mullman, Crain’s Chicago Business: MoveOn.org mobilizing to stop cuts at Tribune papers
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Chicago Station Drops Ed Gordon’s NPR Show
“News and Notes With Ed Gordon” has lost its Chicago public radio outlet, an National Public Radio spokeswoman confirmed today.
Ron Jones, vice president of programming for WBEZ-FM, said in the Chicago Defender that the one-hour show lost listeners after “The Tavis Smiley Show” left NPR’s schedule, and “News and Notes” replaced it on Jan. 31.
Jones did not return telephone calls from Journal-isms, but he hinted in the Nov. 24 Defender story that the station planned to produce its own local show instead. At the moment, the public radio show “The World” fills the 2 p.m. time slot.
Jones, who is African American, was quoted as saying, “By ghettoizing an audience with a particular show, we aren’t serving that audience very effectively. We can have the African American hour or the Haitian hour, but by doing that, we’re not reaching the people we need to reach.”
“So, Jones said the best way to reach audiences of color is to learn more about those communities and to identify local talent that can relate those stories and talk about issues throughout the programming day,” the story by Karen E. Pride continued. “I don’t have a name yet or a fully developed concept, but we’re looking to cover issues important to the communities we serve,” he said. “We have to do a better job of serving the African American, Latino, Asian and non-English-speaking audiences. And we think we will with the new and returning shows.”
Andi Sporkin, spokeswoman for NPR, said, “every public radio station is independent licensed and managed, which means that each has the right to choose what programming is most effective for its listeners.
“While we’re sorry to see News & Notes no longer available to listeners in Chicago, the series is doing well otherwise. It is currently carried by 80 stations across the country.” She noted that both Smiley’s show and “News and Notes” were “created jointly by NPR and the African-American Consortium (a group of public radio stations specifically serving African-American audiences, including those with licenses held by the historically black colleges and universities) to serve their listeners.”
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Thomas, Kanemura, Pacheco in “20 Under 40”
Wendi C. Thomas, metro columnist for the Commercial Appeal in Memphis; and two newspaper Internet specialists, Chris Kanemura, online content manager for the Honolulu Advertiser, and Dan Pacheco, senior product manager for the Bakersfield Californian, are among those included in Presstime magazine’s annual “20 Under 40” awards.
“Newspapers must build new audiences, both demographically and geographically,” wrote the guest editor, Marty Petty, publisher and executive vice president of the St. Petersburg Times.
“The individuals we recognize in PRESSTIME’s annual 20 Under 40 issue are the ones who can guide us to those audiences.”
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Miss. Editor Has Credibility With Blacks, Whites
“Forty miles north and east of Rolling Fork, Indianola, the seat of Sunflower County, lies in the heart of the Delta and was a fountainhead of Southern opposition to integration and black empowerment,” Julia Cass writes in the December/January issue of the American Journalism Review, discussing four Mississippi weeklies.
“The White Citizens Council was formed here in 1954, the beginning of a movement of ‘massive resistance’ to school desegregation that spread throughout the South. Sunflower County is also where Fannie Lou Hamer sharecropped until she was kicked off the land for trying to register to vote and where Emmett Till was brought to be killed after whistling at a white female store clerk in a neighboring county.
“. . . In describing the Enterprise-Tocsin as one of the state’s exceptional weeklies, Ralph Braseth, assistant journalism professor and director of student media at the University of Mississippi,” said that its editor, Jim Abbott, “‘has to walk a lot of tightropes’ as the white owner of a newspaper in a majority black county (70 percent) with a repressive racial history. ‘I don’t know how he does it, but he has developed credibility with both races,’ says Braseth, who has visited the newsrooms of almost every newspaper in the state.”
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Glenn Proctor Aims to Turn Around Richmond Paper
Glenn Proctor, first African American editor of the Richmond (Va.) Times-Dispatch, told F. Finley McRae of BlackAmericaWeb.com Sunday that its Southern location “had nothing to do with my decision” to accept the challenge in Richmond.
“I view this challenge as a leadership opportunity,” said Proctor, who is also a board member at the Maynard Institute. “He said that, ‘like a professional football coach who sees a team he believes he can take to the Super Bowl, I saw a newspaper where I believe we can turn situations around and produce very good quality.'”
Ray Boone, the founder, publisher and editor of the Richmond Free Press, a black weekly, told McRae that, “at best, Proctor is a token there. Media General is in charge, not Proctor. They just want to put him out front for image purposes.”
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Malnourished African Refugees Escape Media Notice
“Malnutrition is almost becoming a way of life for Africa’s poor. These are not isolated pockets of undernourished people but large portions of the Sahel, East and Southern Africa and the Horn of the continent,” according to an “analysis” piece Friday in the Nation in Nairobi, Kenya.
“In the belly of the continent, there are an estimated 41,450 Central Africans living in refugee camps in Chad. Several thousands of them have run away from a new wave of fighting in northern Central African Republic (CAR).
“Their plight has received virtually little international media attention and thus about 13,000 of them are threatened with hunger when relief food supplies are scheduled to run out within the next couple of months.”
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Showtime Horror Flick Bashes Bush on Iraq
“He’s the first horror director to take the bits of media flotsam and jetsam that have been drifting around — the flag-draped coffins at Dover Air Force Base, the talking-head cable shows, the internment camps, the Ohio and Florida recounts, the ‘Mission Accomplished’ banners – and make something electrifying out of them,” Grady Hendrix wrote in Slate magazine Friday. He was discussing “Joe Dante’s Homecoming,” a one-hour movie made for Showtime’s “Masters of Horror” series that airs throughout December.
“Homecoming kicks off when the flag-draped coffins of soldiers killed in Iraq burst open and the reanimated corpses of dead veterans hit the streets, searching for polling places where they can pull the lever for ‘anyone who will end this evil war.’
“His characters seem like people we’ve just watched on MSNBC. There’s David Murch, a political consultant for an unnamed Republican president who sounds exactly like President Bush. His new girlfriend, Jane Cleaver, is a bullying pundit cloned from Ann Coulter’s DNA. There’s also a James Carville look-alike and a Jerry Falwell doppelgÀnger, complete with quivering jowls.”
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Short Takes
- “A tribe’s right to determine its citizens, either through degrees of Native blood or cultural and community ties, has always been a controversial subject. But in recent years, a political and legal battle has been brewing around Natives with black ancestry,” Jodi Rave, columnist for the Missoulian in Montana, wrote today.
- By reader request, “Stories relating to crime and violence will not be published on the front page of The Jamaica Gleaner and The Sunday Gleaner for the month of December,” the newspaper announced in its Sunday editions.
- “The Atlanta market is getting its first local Hispanic newscast. Through a deal with WAGA (Fox Television’s owned-and-operated station in the market), Atlanta Hispanic Broadcasting (the operators of Georgia TeVe) will debut the market’s first 30-minute Spanish-language newscast on Monday, Dec. 5,” Katy Bachman reported Friday in Mediaweek. “The newscast will be called Georgia Teve Noticias and be co-produced by WAGA and Georgia TeVe.”
- “I find it useful to have a half-dozen opinion columnists digest the day’s offerings for me so I get a sense, from several points of view, of what is worth spending my time thinking about,” syndicated columnist William Raspberry wrote in the Washington Post today. “I deplore those members of the craft who write (or so it seems to me) as political propagandists. I don’t need a political-operative-by-stealth using valuable op-ed space to promote partisan interests.”
- Eric Ture Muhammad, a former staff writer at the Nation of Islam’s Final Call who is son of the late Kwame Ture, formerly Stokely Carmichael, has relaunched his Internet publication, BlackHealthToday.Org.