For Dallas News Guild members, strong families make strong journalists

We need solid paid family and parental leave to help recruit and retain top talent

When Dallas Morning News aviation writer Kyle Arnold’s daughter was born 11 years ago, he was working at a smaller paper and was able to take just one day off. 

 “I missed out on some of the most important days of her young life because a lack of vacation time left me scared of taking time off in case I needed it later for emergency or sickness,” he said. 

“Fast forward a decade and the professional world has learned that parental leave is a competitive advantage, not only as an employee perk, but as a way to give journalists, especially women, a way to maintain their career tracks and start families."

Kyle Arnold (right) and his family.

Paid family and parental leave time at full pay is a key recruitment and retention tool to attract the best journalists to Al Día Dallas and The Dallas Morning News. That’s why the Dallas News Guild is kicking off its 2021 contract campaign with a focus on the family. 

Journalists at Al Día and The News receive just eight weeks of paid maternity leave, four weeks of paternity leave and no paid family leave for adult caregivers.

We want to see a more inclusive, expanded policy that affords parents more time with their new babies, as well as paid leave for members who care for aging or sick relatives.

“Women starting their families are also in critical years of their career,” said Sue Ambrose, an investigative reporter at The News. “As a mother of two young adults, I know how hard a baby's first few months are for the parents. A strong — and guaranteed — family leave policy will help retain talented journalists.”

Michael Hamtil (right) and his family.

Investing in strong families is investing in a stronger company, said Michael Hamtil, a photo editor at The News and a father. 

“Parental leave is crucial to help employees return ready to work in what can be an exhausting time,” he said. “Strong family leave policies help us retain highly skilled journalists — and weak ones fuel their desire to seek better options. Now is the time to make our leave more competitive.”

We believe that strong families help foster strong journalism. A 2015 University of Kansas study found that "female journalists are experiencing more job burnout and more intend to leave the field or are uncertain about their futures than their male counterparts.”

The women cite “a feeling of less support from their organizations. Their dissatisfaction with the field was, in part, attributed to women’s desires to balance work with family responsibilities,” according to a Nieman Reports article about the study.

At Al Día Dallas and The News, all too often, workers have had to use vacation time or short-term disability to augment time off for the nurturing and care of loved ones, be they young children or elderly or ailing parents. 

We recognize that a 21st-century workplace requires the type of flexibility that is needed for both employers and employees to achieve a necessary work-life balance. 

Then a news reporter, editorial writer Julieta Chiquillo said she left The News nearly two years ago because she worried about balancing a fast-paced, demanding job with life as a new mom. 

She said she was treated graciously during her maternity leave, but ultimately left The News to pursue an opportunity that would offer a more flexible work schedule.

“My heart never left the paper, however, which is why I am so grateful that The Dallas Morning News hired me back in a new role,” she said. “A company that embraces parents and gives them the flexibility to juggle their journalism careers and their evolving family responsibilities makes it easier for young journalists to picture a future at the paper.”

Over the past two years, The News has lost more than 100 journalists. Among those departures were people who found better jobs or left for the security of improved benefits and pay. Among our current members, some tell us they wish to start families but are delaying because they can’t afford to do so.

But there are promising signs that employers are getting the message. Federal workers are now eligible for 12 weeks of paid leave to care for a new child, thanks to a bill signed into law in 2019. 

And we’ve seen leaders in our own industry embrace the importance of paid family and parental leave, including the nonprofit newsroom The 19th, which offers six months of paid parental leave. The COVID-19 pandemic has only shined a harsher light on the need for stronger family leave policies.

The Dallas News Guild is working to build a contract that will improve our workers' lives and protect our paper's future. At the bargaining table, we will push for increased paid family leave for the benefit of all.

Strong families make strong journalists.