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July 31, 2005

La Corrección Política

S
omebody once mocked the then-liberal coverage of the New York Post with the phony headline: "Record Cold Hits City: Jews, Blacks Suffer Most."

I think of this every time I see the way my town newspaper, The Chapel Hill News, covers the Latino community.

Today's example: There are huge problems at El Centro Latino, a community resource center for Latino immigrants. This past week, the Centro's five main financial supporters (Orange County, the towns of Chapel Hill and Carrboro, and two private granting organizations) sent a public letter to the Centro, asking for a meeting to voice concerns about the Centro's viability.

What are the problems? Well, let's see: Untrained staff. Grant moneys applied to unauthorized purposes. Inadequate record-keeping. High staff turnover. Budget problems. Excessive overhead, necessitating an emergency move to downsized quarters. And a director who (surprise!) "announced last week [the week that the funders delivered their letter] that she would be leaving the organization in the fall."

And what's the headline on the The Chapel Hill News's story?

"El Centro Planning Big Move."

Now that's what I call tough investigative reporting.

Posted by Eric at July 31, 2005 11:06 AM

Comments

um.... "the political correction"?

Posted by: jenny at July 31, 2005 8:32 PM

"Correccion" can also mean politeness or courtesy.

Posted by: Eric at August 1, 2005 6:32 AM

Now Eric,

It's Chapel Hill... everybody make nice-nice.

Posted by: John A at August 1, 2005 9:19 AM

Now Orange Politics - scions of community leadership - have taken your words and weighed in on the El Centro situation with a middle-of-the-road "bonne chance"?

Talk about yer wet handshakes...

Posted by: John A at August 1, 2005 3:54 PM

"Early in life I had noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper."

--George Orwell

Posted by: David Marshall at August 2, 2005 7:06 PM