Last September, when Lynnwood journalist Jaime Méndez heard that Univision Seattle would be gone by the end of 2023, he knew that he and his wife, Diana Oliveros, would be unemployed. A 17-year veteran journalist at Univision Seattle, Méndez is familiar to many Hispanic residents  in Washington who tune into the evening news. He said that he could find work at another news station, but that is not where his heart is. He and Oliveros took the change as “a sign from the gods” and started Se Habla Media, an independent media company that caters to Hispanic communities throughout Washington state.

“There is no community service in the state of Washington at this scale when it comes to communications in Spanish,” Méndez said, pointing out that Hispanics make up about 14% of Washington’s population in 2023, a jump from 4.4% in 1990 adjusted for population growth.

Instead of the regular 30-minute news format that he was used to at Univision, Méndez condenses four to five topics into a 10- to 11-minute brief. During a livestream, Méndez stands in front of a green drape and reads the script in Spanish from the teleprompter that stands between two parabolic lightboxes. 

The shows are all broadcast from his son’s former bedroom, which can be used to create five studio backgrounds with five different cameras and angles. Oliveros handles most of the technical and digital aspects of the shows. 

“It’s fancier than most other home studios that do live streaming,” Méndez said. “We want to look very professional and newsy. We want to continue the trend of doing hardcore news, well-produced, not just someone with a cell phone or selfie stick reporting from the streets.” 

Building all the technical aspects from the ground up was a huge learning curve for Méndez and Oliveros. They had to learn which equipment and software to use and be ready to broadcast on Jan. 1, 2024 – their publicized start date. 

“I haven’t edited anything since college,” Méndez said, who graduated from Evergreen State College in 1995, majoring in communications and political science. 

Selling advertising to fund Se Habla Media was also a learning curve, since Méndez’s background is in communications, and Oliveros was working in the Mexican consulate in Seattle in community outreach.

“Now we have to be everything when you’re the owner of your own business,” Méndez said. “Business challenge is knowing how to sell your product, learning about selling on social media. Fortunately, we learn fast. We spent a lot of time, we built a strong base. We and our clients are satisfied with the product.”

In 2005, Fisher Communications was looking to purchase four Spanish-language television stations after former president of Fisher Communications Colleen Brown noted the growing Hispanic population in Western Washington. She wanted the company to be the first in providing such a service.

In 2007, Fisher acquired Univision Seattle, and Méndez was the first anchor to cover local news. 

“In 2013, Fisher Communications sold all their assets [to Sinclair Broadcast Group], including KOMO News, Univision Seattle and a few radio stations like Star 101.5 and KVI,” Méndez said. “Sinclair was only interested in KOMO News, but they inherited all the other news stations. We kinda knew that with time, they were going to sell the other products that they were not that interested in, like radio. At the end of 2023, that’s when Univision was switched. They did not sell Univision to another company, but they cut the signal from Univision and turned it to CW Network, an English-language network. KVOS (TV in) Bellingham picked up the Univision affiliation, but they don’t have local programming.”

That’s where Méndez and Oliveros came in to fill in the void of Spanish-language local news. They also hired freelance journalists, including local reporters Cesar Canizales and Fernanda Mejía, Latin American reporters Karen Murillo and Ramón Sevilla and international news reporter Liz Snozzi, who broadcasts from Switzerland.

Oliveros thinks that Hispanic populations in North King County and South Snohomish County get overlooked because most people think Hispanics live in the South King County area, such as Burien and Renton. 

“There are important pockets of Latino populations in Edmonds, Marysville, Lynnwood, Everett, etc,” she said. “They don’t get as much visibility as South King County. I heard that a lot when I was in the consulate. ‘We are here! We also have the same needs as other Latinos in other areas have.’”

When Méndez was with Univision, most of the broadcast territory was limited to Western Washington. Because Se Habla Media broadcasts on social media, the company is reaching out to Eastern Washington and Hispanic communities outside of the state and U.S.

“We don’t want to be too ambitious or greedy or unrealistic and build a new audience in South Africa or Argentina,” Méndez said. “Right now we have more control and knowledge about what happens in Washington because we have no real competition in the state.”

Méndez said that he’s picky about what is covered and has to be mindful about what is relevant to his audience. “I think immigration is a big deal for a lot of Latinos,” said Méndez, who originally came to the U.S. in 1987 from Bogotá, Colombia. “Many of them may not have a status yet. These types of topics, when spoken in their language, are a lot easier to digest.”

Although they focus primarily on what’s around the corner in the Greater Seattle Area, Méndez occasionally receives requests from locals in Spokane and other regions in Washington to cover their events, such as a snowstorm. 

“When it comes to the economy, we know which sectors most Latino populations are working,” Oliveros explained. “That way we can focus on what’s happening in construction, agriculture, stuff like that.”

She also said that many Hispanics who moved to Washington for the first time are not familiar with the winter season. “People need to know how to be prepared for the winter, protect their homes from damage, and prevent their outdoor faucets from freezing and slipping on the streets,” Oliveros said. “Our communities are not necessarily familiar with these things, and they need to be exposed to this kind of information in a way that is accessible. For me, it’s really exotic to see what’s happening when it snows or the freezing rain. It’s something I would never think about back in Mexico.”

Se Habla Media can be watched on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

“If people know about news happening around here, let us know,” Méndez said. “And if they want the Latino community to know about other Spanish-speaking communities, please write to us. We can probably cover it.”  Email Jaime Méndez at jaime@sehablamedia.com.

— Story and photos by Nick Ng