Rosenthal reports today that CBS 2’s Antonia Mora will be departing Chicago this week for a new gig at CBS’s WFOR-TV in Miami. Mora recently had his duties trimmed from anchoring both the 6pm and 10pm newscasts to just the 6pm newscast. At that point, it was clear that Ch. 2’s plans didn’t include a major role for Mora, who came to the station in 2002 from ABC’s “Good Morning America”.

It’s unfortunate that Mora is leaving the market, as Ch. 2’s struggles can be pinned on a lot of people. One of those people is Diann Burns, whose contract is reportedly set to expire sometime later this year. Will Ch. 2 renew a deal that’s costing them somewhere in the neighborhood of $10 million over five years?

Feder offered veiled speculation earlier this year that Burns’ future maybe somehow connected to that of Anna Davlantes, currently in-house at Ch. 5.

UPDATE: Feder talked to Mora about his departure from Chicago:

Q: Your hiring here was a major advance for Hispanics in the market. So does that make your departure a setback?

A: I think there is little doubt that it’s a setback for Latinos and minorities in general. I was the first Latino male to be the main anchor at a network station in the country’s top three markets. Chicago will now have no prime-time Latino at the three big broadcast networks in any position — news, sports or weather.

David Novarro [of Fox-owned WFLD-Channel 32] is now the only Latino in any position in the evenings at any English-language station. That’s in a city that is one-third Latino!

UPDATE PT. 2: Feder corrected Mora on his point about Latinos on Chicago evening newscasts in his latest column:

Antonio Mora’s observation in this space Wednesday that David Novarro of Fox-owned WFLD-Channel 32 is “now the only Latino in any position in the evenings at any English-language station” caught the attention of staffers at Channel 11’s “Chicago Tonight.”

They politely noted the presence of two Latinos on the show — anchor and managing editor Phil Ponce and correspondent Eddie Arruza.