Editorials

Editorials

Editorial: San Jose redistricting riddled with confusion, needs reform

Once a decade, San Jose redraws its political boundaries in order to achieve a level playing field. The process aims to ensure the city’s 10 council districts have equal representation. It reviews whether minorities, businesses and neighborhoods are fairly aligned. It works to ensure that those who govern do so not just for the betterment...

From the editor: San José Spotlight named finalist in national journalism awards

San José Spotlight is a finalist for two national journalism awards, including the prestigious Publisher of the Year, the Local Independent Online News (LION) Publishers announced last week. The honor recognizes San José Spotlight among the top local news websites in the U.S. San José Spotlight, which launched its ad-free, paywall-free website Jan. 2019, is...

From the editor: Welcoming a new leader in our newsroom

I’m excited to announce that San José Spotlight has hired a seasoned managing editor to lead our award-winning newsroom. Simar Khanna joins our team after a distinguished 25-year career in Bay Area journalism. Simar spent 16 years at the San Francisco Chronicle and San Francisco Examiner where she served as an editor in nearly every...

From the editor: San Jose small business owners, we’re here to help

Owning a small business in Silicon Valley has never been easy. Now with the coronavirus pandemic closing local businesses for two months, it is nearly impossible. We know you’re struggling. As founders of San José Spotlight, the city’s first nonprofit news startup, we are small business owners ourselves. We launched our organization more than a...

From the editor: Santa Clara, stop the attacks on the press

In an increasingly divisive political climate, our job as journalists is to tell stories of power and privilege. And by virtue of our jobs, journalists and government officials often clash. We fight City Hall for answers. We fight for documents to shed light on what’s really going on. We fight to question powerful politicians, sometimes...

From the editor: We could not do it without you

One year ago, my husband Josh Barousse and I started San José Spotlight with a small amount of savings, a painfully slow laptop and a big dream. Two San Jose natives, sitting in Las Vegas, decided to bring a new model of community-supported journalism to our hometown. We were leaving our full-time jobs, living off...