Kim Haas

Haas was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Rose and Spencer Lewis. She grew up in the West Mount Airy neighborhood and attended Philadelphia High School for Girls.^[1] After graduating in 1986, she attended the University of Pittsburgh, where she majored in Spanish and graduated in 1990.^[2] In 1996, Haas earned a master's degree in bilingual and bicultural studies from La Salle University.^[3]

Haas worked in the media for over 20 years for outlets including Telemundo,^[4] where she was marketing director for the Philadelphia station WWSI-TV,^[1] and as a pledge host for WYBE-TV.^[2]

In 2020, Haas created a series on PBS stations called Afro-Latino Travels with Kim Haas, with a grant from the Ford Foundation.^[1] Inspired by a visit to Acapulco, Mexico with her grandmother as a child^[4] and her time studying abroad in Seville, Spain during college, the show featured Black people's contributions to Spanish-speaking countries, out of her wish to see more Afro-Latino representation on television.^[5] While Haas had initially pitched the show around 2009 to public television in Miami, it took several years for her to get funding^[2] and for tourism boards to sign on.^[6] Another inspiration Haas cited was the travel shows of Anthony Bourdain.^[1]

The series premiered September 12, 2020. Its first two episodes were set in San José and Limón in Costa Rica and focused on Jamaican immigrants in the country,^[5] in particular their role in building its railroad. Haas had planned to shoot future episodes that fall in Salvador, Bahia and Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, but the COVID-19 pandemic stalled those plans.^[1] The third episode was shot in Cali, Colombia and is slated to air in 2023.^[7]

Haas currently lives in Jersey City^[5] and runs a communications firm in North Jersey and a blog, Los Afros Latinos, about Afro-Latino culture.^[2]