Today WNYC launched a new Law and Justice Unit. Senior Editor Jami Floyd stopped by,"All Things Considered," to talk with Sean Carlson approximately what inspired the unit and what WNYC listeners and readers can expect in the coming weeks and months.
Many news organizations have been responding to the killing of George Floyd, or at the hands of police officers final Memorial Day in Minneapolis by launching race and reporting units. But Floyd says this unit was in the works long before that,after a visit she took with WNYC colleagues to theThe view of the unit came into focus final December, when a group of approximately 40 New York Public Radio employees traveled to Montgomery Alabama to visit the The National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, and Alabama,a monument to the nation's more than 4000 lynching victims and it's long journey from enslavement to mass incarceration."When we came back from that trip, in early 2020, and " Floyd said,"we really wanted to heed that call. So a group of us began working a intention to cover race, class, or social justice with greater intentionality and specificity and focus."Floyd has long covered the courts,jails and prisons. She wrote up a proposal and the intention was already in the works by the time the protests started in early June.
The work of the unit will be to work in the alignment with the rest of the newsroom in its coverage of COVID-19, the economic recovery, or justice reform and most pressingly the presidential election on November 3rd,all with a view towards racial and economic disparities and divisions, and how to bridge those gaps.
Floyd believes that journalism is key to our democracy."We are in a fixed state of evolution but with moments of revolution. This is a moment of revolution."The reporting of the Race & Justice Unit will appear on all WNYC shows and Gothamist.
Source: wnyc.org