Join the hundreds of talented and innovative team members who are making an impact every day at California Times, incorporating Los Angeles Times and San Diego Union-Tribune, two of the most iconic media brands in the nation. Whether you love to tell compelling stories or want to drive our award-winning powerhouse in new directions, the Los Angeles Times team is the place to be.
Job Description Summary
The Los Angeles Times is seeking an innovative reporter to join our award-winning Metro section as we launch an initiative exploring the California divide, the reality of a majority of Californians trying to navigate life in a land of extreme wealth and extreme poverty.
Job Description
Never has there been greater inequity in Southern California. There are high-paying jobs and enormous wealth for those with specialized skills and the education to back them up. This segment of our population can afford to live a Golden State lifestyle largely protected from pollution, crime and traffic. They have bountiful food, beautiful houses, good schools and even better healthcare.
The greatest employment growth in the region, however, comes from low-paying service sector jobs. Affordable housing is hard to find and far-flung. We have recently coined new terms: food insecurity, food deserts, heat islands, essential workers, learning loss, housing instability, and in its most dire incarnation, the unhoused.
With this equity initiative, we envision compelling storytelling that encompasses interdisciplinary reporting across our newsroom and deeply examines the impact of these disparities and how as a state we can begin to bridge the equality gap.
This is a newly created beat, and we want you to bring your ambition, ideas and creativity to the job. The ideal candidate will have knowledge in these areas, a curiosity and passion to explore issues through vibrant storytelling as well as an ability to juggle breaking news with enterprise reporting. The reporter would be adept at on-the-ground reporting, analysis, newsletter writing and multiplatform journalism skills. A minimum of seven years of journalism experience is preferred.
Requirements
- A creative storyteller eager to experiment with various platforms
- Ability to tackle a mix of enterprise and longer-term stories, along with breaking and daily news in a deadline-driven environment
- Able to contribute to a newsletter with a personal voice and beat-based articles and information
- Excellent skills in news writing and reporting, combining strong news judgment, fluency in style
- Fluency in Spanish a plus though not required
- Ability to navigate digital platforms and stay on top of current events
- Comfortable and skilled at engaging with readers on digital platforms including newsletters
- Understanding of the importance of accuracy and precision
- An ethical and inclusive approach in the workplace that promotes collaboration
- Comfortable appearing on TV, radio and podcasts and presenting at events on behalf of the L.A. Times
The initiative is funded through the generous support of the Irvine Foundation, which focuses on the needs of low-income Californians.
The position is funded for two years and is listed as Reporter in the Los Angeles Times Guild, with the complete array of health and other benefits offered to all full-time employees. It will be based in El Segundo, Calif. Reporters must have a valid driver’s license and access to a vehicle in good working condition, with suitable auto insurance coverage.
The L.A. Times is an equal opportunity employer and welcomes expressions of interest from people with diverse backgrounds and perspectives. The pay scale for this position is $60,000 to $116,000. This is the pay scale range the Company reasonably expects to pay for this position at the time of this posting. Compensation will be determined based on skills, qualifications and experience of the applicant along with the requirements of the position. Please visit our career site to view the benefits available to our employees as well as our company history, achievement, values, mission and more.
The Company is a mandatory vaccination employer for COVID-19 and its variants. The Company requires that its employees be fully vaccinated as of their start date. If you require medical or religious accommodation we will engage in the interactive process with you. Proof of vaccination will be required prior to start. If we make you an offer and you are not yet vaccinated, we will accommodate a delay in start date.
Qualified candidates should submit a resume, cover letter and applicable links to clips and/or multimedia projects to City Editor Maria La Ganga and Deputy Metro Editor Stephanie Chavez. Please note, the opportunity to attach additional documents appears on the third screen and is labeled “Upload.”
Thank you for your interest in joining our team at the Los Angeles Times! We look forward to reviewing your application.