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Water price hikes, the end of federal relief; what’s driving houselessness and food insecurity in 2023, and what’s life like for pregnant, LGBTQ and trans people in Ron DeSantis’s Florida? Our monthly Meet the BIPOC Press roundtable looks at the “undercover stories” likely to dominate the year ahead. How will our partners be reporting the stories that others don’t? Laura is joined by Mitra Kalita, the publisher of Epicenter-NYC, a newsletter based in Queens, New York, and the co-founder of URL Media, a network of Black and Brown community news outlets; Alexandra Martinez, Senior Reporter with Prism, whose reporting on such topics as immigration and the affordable housing crisis also appears in VICE, CNN, and other outlets; and Malak Silmi, the local government reporter for Outlier Media, a Detroit-based service journalism organization with a mission to empower Detroit residents to hold landlords, municipal government, and elected officials accountable for longstanding problems. What are some of their stories?
“This is the year that much of mainstream America is accepting that we are either in or about to enter our recession. For communities of color, we’ve been there for the last year.” – S. Mitra Kalita, Epicenter NYC
“ Prism, we are a BIPOC-led newsroom . . . That allows us to bring nuance to the reporting that we do. Without that nuance, you really can’t have honest, truthful storytelling.” – Alexandra Martinez
“We employ citizens from across the city and the state to go into local meetings.. and simply document . . . This has helped serve a lot of reporters as well as a lot of citizens.” – Malak Silmi, Outlier Media
Guests
- S. Mitra Kalita: Co-Founder, URL Media; CEO & Publisher, Epicenter-NYC
- Alexandra Martinez: Senior News Reporter, Prism
- Malak Silmi: Reporter, Outlier Media
Portions of this interview are featured in our episode “Undercovered Realities / Innovative Reporters: BIPOC Media in 2023“.
