Elvia Díaz appointed director of opinions at The Arizona Republic
Elvia Díaz, an award-winning journalist who joined The Arizona Republic’s editorial board in 2016, has been promoted to director of opinions and board chair, the first Latina to serve as editorial page editor since the newspaper was founded 132 years ago.
As director, Díaz will edit The Republic’s Viewpoints section, opinion columnists and guest writers, set the board’s agenda and, working with the executive editor and the board, shape The Republic’s institutional voice.
She’ll serve as a liaison with readers and community groups as well as civic, cultural and elected leaders as we identify issues in need of collaborative solutions. She’ll promote open dialogue and give voice to the voiceless. When needed, she’ll call for change and demand accountability.
A former reporter at the Albuquerque Journal in New Mexico and the Statesman Journal in Oregon, Díaz joined The Republic in 1999, working as a reporter and editor on the metro and politics desks. She edited The Republic’s Spanish language publication, La Voz, before stepping away two years ago to focus on column writing.
“I fell in love with journalism the moment I became a Spanish newscaster for KBBF, a public radio station in Northern California,” she said. “I haven’t stopped ever since.”
Her columns are both fearless and nimble, taking on the right for political stunts at the border and the left for resisting funds for police in neighborhoods desperate for safe streets. She has a clear vision of the hard road ahead.
“We’re facing turbulent political times when the future of America hangs in the balance. That’s not a cliché. It’s reality,” she said. “We must face that reality head-on without reservations.”
Born in Michoacán, México, Diaz immigrated to the U.S. when she was 16 and briefly worked in the farm fields of Northern California alongside her parents and older brothers. She earned a bachelor’s degree from Sonoma State University and a master's degree in journalism from the University of California at Berkeley.
In 2018, Diaz received Valle del Sol's "Special Recognition Award" for service and leadership in the community. A year later, the Arizona Newspapers Association awarded her a Silver Key for a career of significant contributions to journalism in Arizona.
High honors: Two Arizona Republic reports named as finalists for prestigious awards
She begins this new role having already proven she can expand outreach to underserved communities while promoting civil discourse across Arizona, especially debate that opens space for new ideas.
Her promotion marks an important transition at The Republic and a new beginning for her predecessor, Phil Boas, who successfully navigated the board through a period of intense political and cultural division.
Boas is not going far: He’s staying on the board and will launch a regular column to be published on the pages he edited for two decades, the last 10 as director.
“Arizona blesses us with its natural beauty and human warmth,” he said. “What a privilege it has been getting to know so many people in our state. Now it’s on to column writing and telling the stories of the state we love. I feel twice blessed.”
An unabashed but pragmatic conservative, Boas led the editorial board’s defense of Arizona’s immigrant populations in the wake of the so-called “show me your papers” law, helping to craft a front-page editorial calling Arizona leaders to account for the racist policy.
As Facebook and Twitter elevated hate speech and pundits said America’s center couldn’t hold, Boas pushed to the middle, a shift that angered conservatives as often as it angered liberals.
Once the realm of conservative kingmaker and publisher Eugene C. Pulliam, who died in 1975, The Republic’s opinion pages are today more of a place to consider a range of ideas in the pursuit of consensus solutions.
It’s a place where columnist Robert Robb’s fiscal analysis can lead to breakthroughs as the Arizona Legislature struggles to fully fund education, balance the budget and plan for future downturns. It’s a place where columnist Joanna Allhands can push the governor to reconsider Arizona’s drought contingency plans.
Boas joined The Republic in 1999 from the Mesa Tribune, where he was a reporter and editor. He previously worked at the Los Angeles Daily News and The Ontario (Calif.) Daily Report. He succeeded Ken Western as editorial page editor in 2012 and charted a centrist’s course bound for conflict with the newspaper’s roots as The Arizona Republican, founded by partisans on May 19, 1890.
In 2016, he oversaw The Republic’s break with 126 years of history by endorsing a Democrat for president for the first time. Death threats to the board followed, but Boas remained committed to the refinement of the newspaper’s stances on public policy and he strived to unite all Arizonans.
He collaborated with the Arizona Community Foundation and the Morrison Institute to help create the New Arizona Prize, encouraging teams of people to help solve some of Arizona’s most challenging problems.
For several years, as Boas considered editorials on immigration, tax policy and education spending, Díaz provided an important perspective. He’ll do the same for her.
She inherits a board where conservatives, liberals and centrists work side by side, including Greg Moore, Abe Kwok, Robb and Allhands. Also reporting to Díaz, but not on the board, are metro opinion columnists Laurie Roberts and E.J. Montini.
As we head to the 2022 midterms, no group of opinion journalists in the world is more deeply informed on the issues that matter to Arizonans.
Greg Burton is executive editor of The Arizona Republic.