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Carlos Amezcua, Marc Brown, Christine Devine, Laura Diaz,
Rick Garcia, Pat Harvey, Sylvia Lopez, Michaela Pereira

Laura Diaz

Diez. In Spanish it means "10." The KCBS-2 weeknight news anchorwoman, Laura Diaz, who sports the similar-sounding last name, is celebrating her tenth year as an 11 p.m. anchor in Los Angeles broadcast news. She became the first Latina to hold that role of prominence in Los Angeles when KABC7's "Eyewitness News" promoted her in 1997. At this point in Los Angeles, she and My13's Lauren Sanchez are the only Latinas anchoring an 11 p.m. news program. It is a position Diaz takes seriously.

"When I was promoted at KABC-7, I did feel a responsibility," she said. "Because all of a sudden, individual goals have come to take on a larger meaning to a greater number of people. I still do feel it. I know if I have a positive experience and if I succeed and reinforce that [Latinos] are capable of holding [weeknight anchor] positions and excel, then the next person will have an easier time and maybe even greater success."

The quest for success and a strong element of cultural pride was instilled in Diaz by her parents. The Diazes were migrant farm workers who labored in the Ventura County area of Fillmore, Calif., until the future news anchor was 4 years old. During the week, her father would work the fields, then on weekends would go to Santa Clarita to build a house for the Diaz family. The third of four children, Diaz's family moved to Santa Clarita when she was five after her father completed work on the family's new house. She indicated her father felt the children would have an opportunity for a better education in Santa Clarita.

Ultimately, her father would transition to factory work. He and his wife always remained an industrious, proud, and culturally aware couple. And these principles were passed on to the Diaz children. They were admirers of the labor activist Cesar Chavez.

"They were aware of him. They weren't out in the movement," she explained. "But they were aware of the positive change he was creating for people. My parents admired that he was trying to help people. They admired that Chavez did not believe in violence. He was a man of peace. He effected change not by hurting other people but by trying to help people reach a higher consciousness."

Additionally, the young girl's father took a strong interest in cultivating great pride in her and her siblings in being Mexican.

"Growing up, I was aware of being different) in relation to the whites," she reflected. "But I didn't see it as a negative. One of the things my father insisted on was that every year, we went to Mexico. We would stay in Mexico City. He would tell us, 'It's important to know who you are. To be Mexican is NOT to be poor.' In the U.S., we think of being 'Mexican' as being 'poor.' He stressed there are many, many people in our homeland (Mexico) who are educated and wealthy."

Diaz's father emphasized to his children that there are people who will try to give them a negative perception of their nationality and heritage. She said he insisted they not accept it.

"He said, 'You have to know what ALL of it means (to be a Mexican).' My father stressed that that although Mexicans come over here and struggle, that doesn't mean that there is not a proud past, present, or future for us."

With this philosophy instilled, Diaz displays on-camera and off a very regal, though not arrogant, bearing. She indicated cultural/racial pride is a factor in the pursuit and ultimate attaining of success.

"I never believed 'Mexican' meant 'negative.' Culturally, you have to grasp and hang onto something. Whether you are Latino, black, Asian, whatever. There are people with no concept of their roots or history who will try to succeed and reach their goals by saying 'I'm of mixed heritage.' Even if you reach your goal saying you're 'mixed,' you have nothing to stand on, no foundation when you get there."

Growing up with a cultural base and awareness did lead to some humorous experiences for Diaz as a child. "I remember being on the playground one day in grade school," the newscaster recalled. "This Caucasian girl came up to me and said, 'Do you speak Spanish at home?' And I said, 'Yeah. Doesn't everybody?' (Whoops, laughs). When I got home, I asked my mother why did that girl ask me that. 'Doesn't everybody speak Spanish at home?' My mother said no. I asked why not and she said, 'Not everybody is Mexican.'"

While maintaining her pride (and sense of humor), Diaz blended in with her classmates well throughout her school years in Santa Clarita. Her years at William S. Hart High School were especially active as she was a cheerleader, participated in the school's House of Representatives, served on the yearbook staff, and was a contestant on the school's version of "The Dating Game." Despite her diminutive 5'3" frame, she also participated in girls' football. Ultimately, she was one of the keynote speakers at her graduation.

Entering International University in San Diego and then transferring to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, Diaz initially planned on becoming an English teacher. Because there were few jobs at the time for student teachers in the SLO area, Diaz was advised to channel her strengths in different areas. Through that process, she landed a summer internship in Rochester, Minn., working in the communications department of IBM. While there, people in management strongly suggested that she should use her degree (B.A. in English) pursuing journalistic endeavors.

She would do some writing for the Chamber of Commerce in San Luis Obispo and was eventually hired by the local NBC television affiliate as an intern where she wrote edited, operated a camera, and helped run an assignment desk. At the end of the internship, she was hired as an on-air reporter.

Diaz made her way back to Los Angeles in 1983 with KABC-7, joining the "Eyewitness News" team. At that point in time, few non-whites occupied prominent on-air positions in local broadcast news in Southern California. "They had jobs," she noted. "But they would be second-, third-, fourth-tier. The market really had not awakened, I think, to the emerging Latino market and how quickly the demographics were shifting." During that time, Diaz continued to work hard, doing field reporting.

In the late 1980s, Eyewitness News management threw an odd yet frustrating twist to its non-white viewers. The main weeknight anchormen for the station at that time were the late Jerry Dunphy and Paul Moyer. Moyer would co-anchor the evening news at 5 p.m. and 11 p.m. with Ann Martin. Dunphy would co-anchor the 6 p.m. news with Tawny Little. The 4 p.m. news was sarcastically called "The Ethnic Rotation" in some quarters with Dunphy anchoring with a trio of non-white women serving as his co-anchor on a tri-weekly basis: Diaz, who is Latina; Angela Black, who is black; and Joanne Ishmine, who is Asian. "We were also called 'The Anchorettes,'" Diaz grinned and rolled her eyes. Viewers from each of the women's respective ethnic/racial backgrounds wanted KABC-7 to make a decision and pick one, preferably the one of their community's ethnic/racial background. Diaz, who emerged as the survivor, spoke about this two-year (1987-88) period.

"I was so young at the time," she said. "I saw it as an opportunity for me. Now, the longer it went on, you thought 'It's time for a resolution.' Because it went on for a long time. They rotated us for about two years.

"At the time, the whole time it was going on, I felt I was improving my skill set. I was the youngest and greenest of the three. But I know people on the outside looking in felt like, 'When are they (KABC-7 management) going to make a decision?' Latinos would sometimes come up to me and ask, 'Why don't they just put you in there permanently?' I would say, 'Well, they haven't made a decision. Until they do, I'm just going to do the best job I can.' Ultimately, it worked out for me. I'm not saying it was a perfect situation because it wasn't. However, it provided me with a vehicle to improve what I was doing."

As the years moved forward and more progressive management supplanted the 1980s regime at KABC 7, Diaz on-air role at the station expanded. She was paired with the dark-haired, white-mustachioed Henry Alfaro to co-host the urban affairs program Vista L.A. The show focused on news and other points of interest to Latinos in the Southland. Diaz is very appreciative of the impact Alfaro had in her career.

"He was fearless in his pursuit of news and his concept that the Latino community needed to be covered fairly," she interjected. "He was really sort of a tireless voice in the newsroom. At meetings he would constantly say, 'Well, what about this community?' You are not covering all of L.A. if you're just covering Beverly Hills, Brentwood, Hollywood, Downtown, and the Valley. He would say, 'What about East L.A.? What about Cerritos? What about these other communities?' He was really a great example to other young reporters in the newsroom."

Alfaro's efforts are an example of Diaz's vision of a successful news organization. "Diversity in the newsroom is extremely important," she emphasized. "Not only to the people at home watching, but you bring the prism through which you see life. Without a diverse newsroom, it's a pretty narrow perspective of what's occurring in Southern California."

Expanding the perspective of Southern California, KABC 7 promoted Diaz to lead anchor of its 5 p.m. and 11 p.m. weeknight newscasts in 1997. She held that position until early 2002, when KCBS-2 actively courted, recruited and hired her away from KABC 7 to anchor its 5 and 11 weeknight newscasts. Not since sportscaster Jim Hill, who is black, was ardently recruited from KCBS-2 by KABC 7 to be a prominent part of its news team in the summer of 1987 has a broadcast journalist of color been so heavily courted in Los Angeles.

"I was always mindful of what was going on around me," she observed. "I could see that [the Latino population and demographics] were changing rapidly. I just felt that my timing would be good given the changing market. I was always optimistic and reinforced that with hard work."

The changing demographics of Los Angeles have led to key sociopolitical demonstrations and activity within the last few years in the Latino community. Diaz offered her observations.

"The walkouts, I had mixed feelings about," she said. "Obviously with this historic drop-out rate, [the students] really need to be in school. With that said, I believe they were moved, they were galvanized (on the issues of immigration reform). I'm sure there were a section of kids that just wanted to be out of class.

"But I also believe there was a large number of students who really felt some real political stirrings and thought they were making a statement. These students read about the issues and were expressing their rights through civil disobedience."

Often in a position to provide a balanced story to Southland viewers, Diaz' career has seen her land the first in-depth interview with incoming Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, cover Pope Benedict's international travels, and confront a gang member of a street set that instigates animosity between Blacks and Latinos in Los Angeles. For her stellar work, Diaz has been honored with several Emmys and Golden Mike Awards. In 2006, she received a National Imagen Award for her interview with Mayor Villaraigosa.

Click a name to read more:

Carlos Amezcua, Marc Brown, Christine Devine, Laura Diaz,
Rick Garcia, Pat Harvey, Sylvia Lopez, Michaela Pereira