NABJ says no to changing 2027 conference dates amid scheduling conflict with NAHJ

The National Association of Black Journalists will not change the dates for its 2027 conference, the group’s president said, despite a public demand from the National Association of Hispanic Journalists to avoid overlap with its own annual gathering next year.

The associations’ conferences, which draw hundreds of journalists for panel discussions and career events each summer, are scheduled for the same weekend in early August after NABJ leaders decided months ago to shift the date of their Houston event.

The move, meant to better accommodate students, teachers and parents, means the group’s event will effectively be pitted against NAHJ’s annual convention in Minneapolis the same weekend.

The overlapping dates have created a frenzy among group members and exhibitors concerned about how they will attend both events. Both organizations have already signed hotel and venue agreements, and pulling out could cost them financial penalties. 

NABJ initially scheduled its Houston conference to begin Aug. 18 and informed other professional journalism affinity groups in 2024. NAHJ picked its Minneapolis dates from Aug. 3 through 7 later that year. 

Five months ago, NABJ moved its 2027 event to kick off Aug. 4.

After being unable to reach an internal resolution, NAHJ leaders — meeting at the group’s conference this year in New Orleans — publicly asked NABJ to resolve the scheduling snafu and again shift the gathering. 

NAHJ President Dunia Elvir also called Errin Haines, her counterpart at NABJ, and personally made the request earlier this week, leaders of both groups said.

But Haines said in an interview that changing the NABJ conference dates again is not possible, due in part to the costs of changing contracts. 

“It’s not an option,” she said.

NABJ Interim Executive Director Nathaniel Chambers, who took over the position following the retirement of the group’s former director, reviewed the 2027 conference dates last fall, Haines said. 

He noticed the dates would conflict with back-to-school schedules and proposed in March that NABJ elected leaders change the dates. With agreement from NABJ’s board, he then signed amended contracts to make the move official.

Haines said she was not aware of the overlap with NAHJ until the Latino Reporter contacted her for comment earlier this week. Chambers did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

NAHJ National Vice President of Broadcast Julio-César Chávez, expressed concerns about how the scheduling snafu could impact the Hispanic journalists group. 

“It puts undue pressure and undue financial burden on NAHJ for us to be changing our dates at the last minute when we have had our dates finalized and signed and publicized,” he said.

Gregory Lee, a former NABJ president from 2011 to 2013 who is attending this year’s NAHJ gathering in New Orleans, said the scheduling conflict was not nefarious and that changes in leadership meant information was not passed along, he added. 

“Errin just became president last August and then you had a transition with executive director,” Lee said. “You have a new board, so things will fall through the cracks. And this is unfortunately one of those things.”

NABJ is still searching for a permanent new director.

Rosa Morales, a lifetime NAHJ member, called the conflict “a sensitive thing.” 

“We’re talking about funding, the recruiters, facilities, the contracts with hotels,” she said. 

Morales recalls attending UNITY conferences that were hosted every five years by NAHJ, NABJ, the Asian American Journalists Association and the Indigenous Journalism Association — an effort that eventually fell apart.

NAHJ and NABJ planned a joint conference in Chicago for 2024, but NAHJ pulled out in 2023, even as the two groups had already signed hotel agreements. NAHJ officials said the decision was made to celebrate its 40th anniversary. 

Morales said she was surprised over the groups’ inability to resolve the issue in light of their overlapping missions.  

“All of us journalists of color know our value, our worth, and we as journalists have a brotherhood or sisterhood that you cannot cut or erase,” she said.

Angela Osorio is a senior at Cal State Long Beach and is the editor in chief of the Long Beach Current, her campus newspaper. She has interned for the Los Angeles Times and at ABC 7 in Los Angeles. She hopes to one day work for a national newspaper. Reach her at angoso1638 [at] gmail [dot] com.