La Prensa Texas, established in 1913, is the oldest bilingual newspaper in Texas whose mission was to serve as the voice of the Mexican exile community and to defend and represent the views of the Mexican exiles. La Prensa’s editorials strongly challenged Mexican public policy. For nearly 50 years, La Prensa was the leading Spanish-language newspaper circulating in South Texas. For many years, it was the most widely circulated Spanish-language newspaper in the United States and had an international readership.
By 1961, readership declined due to television and radio competition. The newspaper changed ownership a few times before closing its doors. In 1989, La Prensa de San Antonio was relaunched by the late Tino Duran and his wife Millie Duran. Tino Duran was the owner and publisher for 27 years. Tino Duran’s mission was to highlight the Latino community in a positive light. Up until this point, much of what the mainstream media showed were the gang related crimes which involved Latino youth. Thus, La Prensa became the place to highlight beautiful Hispanic cultural events and stories. In 2017, Tino Duran passed away and within a year of his death, the announcement was made by his daughter that the publication would be coming to an end. Once again, the publication was resurrected. This time by Tino’s son Steve Duran and Yvette Tello without skipping a week of printing. On Father’s Day, June 17, 2018, the first edition of La Prensa Texas was printed and distributed. Yvette Tello was the liaison and Executive Vice President to Steve Duran. She was the person responsible for overseeing the technical publication of the weekly paper as well as its business operations. Leonard Rodriguez, former white house advisor, helped incubate the life of La Prensa Texas by allowing La Prensa Texas to office from the Westside Development Corporation office where he was CEO at the time. As Steve Duran’s health declined, he decided to step away from the publication and hand it over to the board of directors that Leonard Rodriguez and Yvette Tello developed as they felt they had no choice but to turn the privately owned business into a nonprofit corporation to keep it alive. In the midst of the pandemic on August 26, 2020, La Prensa Texas was given a new life by a new board of directors, and thus, a new direction by going nonprofit officially. The Board of Directors, Leonard Rodriguez , Louis Escareno , Yvette Tello , Commissioner Tommy Calvert, Dr William Elizondo, Dr Ricardo Romo, and Fernando Reyes decided to continue the mission of the late Tino Duran and highlight positive stories, but at the same time, much like the first publication, they would serve as the voice for the Latino community and defend and represent the underserved of San Antonio.
La Prensa Texas is a powerful resource for those without internet access. It is where one can find the news by the people for the people. The hyperlocal publication could not have come at a better time. During the pandemic, the community counted on La Prensa Texas to give them the information to find resources for needs one never imagined we would have.
With Yvette Tello at the helm as active publisher and the newspaper’s driving force, she has
expanded La Prensa Texas by digitizing it, publishing a weekly print edition that is laid out by Roxanne Eguia , Editor in Chief , and Nicodemus Gonzalez. Graphic Designer. Included on the team is Community Liason, Ramon Chapa, Jose Franco, Spanish Editor, Maria Cisneros, Sales Executive, Dr Ricardo Romo, staff writer and contributor. Yvette Tello also recruited a staff made up of a dynamic group of young people; Roy Aguillon, Julia Aguillon, Joe Estrada, Angel Contero, Natasha Gonzalez, Acey Turner. They are embedded in the heart of San Antonio’s thriving Hispanic community. The new digital team composed of native San Antonio community journalists who deliver heartfelt stories from our neighborhoods and urge the public to support the Latino community and its voice in this effort to upend the media bias and war to silence us and that this team is committed to the continued support of our people, our struggle, our culture and way of life.
The new La Prensa Texas now includes digital platforms and a digital news team while still printing a weekly publication without skipping a week despite the pandemic, the state blackouts, or the freeze. Yvette Tello has facilitated the partnerships with television network- Telemundo owned by NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, and KROV FM radio station to ensure radio and television will never be the competition again. The team has provided coverage of the election results of the presidential race of 2020, the streets of Washington DC during the inauguration, and the freeze of 2021.
