Ananda Rochita is the Vice President of Communications at the California Manufacturers & Technology Association (CMTA). She currently provides a strategic focus for the organization’s branding and messaging and can be seen on television networks as a spokesperson advocating for California’s manufacturing industry. Ananda comes to CMTA as a national award-winning journalist and bilingual reporter. She previously worked at ABC News in Sacramento, Ca. as an investigative anchor and reporter. She spent more than a decade in journalism, holding the powerful accountable throughout the country. Ananda and her team launched a financial segment during the pandemic to help people navigate California’s Employment Development Department through unemployment claims and helped people get back hundreds of thousands of dollars. Her investigations also revealed flaws within the department which are currently being addressed and modified.
In addition, some of her investigations revealed to the state that toxic creams were being sold in stores, lack of oversight on budgeting for homeless solutions, and current impacts of past racial covenants on Sacramento neighborhoods.
Ananda’s journalism career took her from coast to coast, working in Maryland and Virginia. In Virginia, she received a national Edward R. Murrow award in hard news for her investigation of Virginia’s sterilization practices which led to reparations for victims.
Ananda received her master’s in journalism from Georgetown University. She received her Bachelor of Arts from Mount St. Mary’s University, where she served as an assistant news editor for the school newspaper and was a Division I golfer.
Ananda was elected and serves as a Director-At-Large for the Public Relations Society of America’s Capital Chapter. She was also selected for Sacramento Metro Chamber Foundation’s Leadership Sacramento ’23 class. Ananda was also recognized for her leadership in 2023’s Comstock Magazine’s Young Professionals Issue.
Ananda grew up in San Francisco and currently resides in Sacramento with her family restoring her mid-century modern home.