Mission:
To tell the stories of the Southern Kenai Peninsula accurately, honestly and with respect
Vision:
An informed and vibrant community served and nourished by an independent, local press
Principles Underpinning Our Work
We believe in community journalism — reliable reporting that is about and important to us, timely and trustworthy information that helps us make good choices for our community, and journalism that chronicles the highs and lows and in-betweens of our lives.
We believe in being a forum that presents and respects multiple viewpoints.
We believe vigorous civil discourse helps a community coalesce around common causes that make the community better.
We believe in the independence of the press as integral to our democratic republic.
We are committed to covering community controversies without fear or favor, by accurately and fairly depicting different points of view.
We are committed to earning your trust as we report the news of the southern Kenai Peninsula.
We abide by the Code of Ethics (https://www.spj.org/spj-code-of-ethics/) of the Society of Professional Journalism and its overriding principle that: “Ethical journalism should be accurate and fair. Journalists should be honest and courageous in gathering, reporting and interpreting information.”
Our Team
Editor
Michael Armstrong
Reporter
Delcenia Cosman
Contributors
Rich Chiappone
Joella Clove
Jake Dye
Ginny Espenshade
Lori Evans
Lauren Fliearman
Kate Henry
Roxanne Hoorn
Marcia Kuszmaul
Yonah Lempert Luecken
Jacqueline McDonough
Bjorn Olson
Poppy Smith
Hal Shepherd
Jessica Shepherd
Nick Varney
Daniel Zatz
Editorial Advisory Board
We have instituted a volunteer editorial advisory board to guide our community journalism and help us abide by our mission, vision and guiding principles. Our editorial advisory board members include the following local community members:
- Ginny Espenshade
- Lori Evans
- Tom Kizzia
- Marcia Kuszmaul
- Joe Ravin
- Nona Safra
Advertising & Development
Christina Whiting
Governance (Board of Directors)
The Homer Independent Press is a news organization of the Alaska nonprofit corporation NZP4H. We are governed by a Board of Directors:
Board President – Scott Waterman
Scott has been involved in Alaskan media since 1982, including work with a half dozen radio stations and reporting and editing for the Alaska Public Radio Network. Along the way and for the past 30 years, he also dabbled in home construction, real estate and energy efficiency and renewables. He currently serves on the board of the Cold Climate Housing Research Center, is chair of the Renewable Energy Alaska Project and past chair of the KPB Resilience and Security Advisory Commission and is Board President for Homer Independent Press.
Vice-President – Dr. John Fraser
John is a psychologist who has studied the changing face of journalism amid consolidation and the rise of social media. Trained as an architect in Canada, the UK, and the USA, he shifted to psychology in the early 2000s while working at the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York. From 2012 to 2022, he served as CEO of Knology, a social science think tank with offices in New York, Washington DC, and California, before joining the Alaska SeaLife Center in Seward, Alaska, as Director of Mission Impact, until retiring in spring 2026. A Past President of the Society for Environmental, Population, and Conservation Psychology, he now represents the society on the American Psychological Association’s Council of Representatives and is Series Editor for Springer’s Psychology and Our Planet books.
Treasurer – Bill Wuestenfeld
Bill has been a lifelong student of constitutional law and history, and with this background saw the imperative need for Homer to have a first-class news and information journal. He retired to Homer after over 40 years of law practice in Anchorage, and has worked professionally with non-profit corporations, their members, and their boards around the state. He has also spent extensive time serving on non-profit and civil organizations. Helping create and operate an important nonprofit like HIP is a welcome and necessary challenge and opportunity, and he is determined that it will succeed. Bill is gratified that his adult children and grandchildren live nearby in Anchorage. Multi-generation gatherings at the Kasitsna Bay family cabin are a treasured experience.
Secretary – Karen Wuestenfeld
Karen fell in love with Alaska in 1981 and discovered Homer in 1982. She and Bill raised a family in Anchorage, then retired to Homer in 2018. She had a 40-year career in the environmental field in Alaska and abroad. Always an avid reader of news, she recently felt Homer deserved better and more local coverage. She joined others in fall of 2025 to provide that service and is proud to be one of the many volunteers that have made HIP possible. She brings a variety of experience and skills to the group, including organizational leadership, basic business management, and participation in several non-profit boards. Looking forward, she envisions a future for HIP with paid staff, expansive content, and broad community engagement.
Director – Donna Aderhold
Donna has been a Homer resident since 2008 and an Alaskan since 1990. For years she thought that Homer needed a truly local newspaper with high-quality reporting, local management and revenues that circulate locally. In fall 2025, she finally voiced her interest and learned that others harbored similar feelings. Donna is thrilled to be part of the team that started HIP and is learning the news business and web management one day at a time. She brings leadership skills from project management, Homer City Council, and nonprofit boards to the HIP board and looks forward to the newspaper thriving with paid staff, outstanding content, and financial resilience.
Director – Wayne Aderhold
Wayne has lived in Alaska since 1974 and Homer since 1977. Pursuit of history and political science after 40+ years of work in construction and engineering management, combined with volunteer governance in public radio, led to his interest in the importance of ethical journalism in a healthy republic. Participation in founding an independent, non-profit and locally owned journal for Homer and the Southern Kenai Peninsula felt necessary. He is fully aware of the challenges ahead for HIP and is optimistic on community support into the future for the benefit of the next generation taking the reins.
History
The short story
The Homer Independent Press was founded in 2025 to provide reporting on local events on the southern Kenai Peninsula by locals for locals. We formed an Alaska nonprofit, NZP4H (no zombie press for Homer) so that revenues will go towards strengthening our ability to cover the news and dollars circulate in our local economy.
How we introduced ourselves in our inaugural issue
In fall 2025, a group of local individuals met over coffee and realized we all felt our long-time local paper had eroded in both quality and integrity. We are supporters of the First Amendment — and we wanted to know what’s happening locally. With enthusiasm and shared concern, we set out to do better. Our community is complex and fascinating; we deserve a news and information outlet that rises to the challenge of covering our home. By community, we mean the region from Ninilchik in the north to Nanwalek in the south, and from Anchor Point in the west to Fox River in the east.
We started as a small group, but word about our intentions spread. Informal chats in stores or on the beach turned into community conversations, including a popular Bake Sale for the First Amendment. We experienced a groundswell of support, received great ideas and direction on what we should be, cautionary tales, opposing views, and professional advice from business leaders and journalism professionals. We posted an online survey on bulletin boards around the Homer area to receive anonymous input on what the community wants to read in a local news outlet. We convened a meeting to hear from both sides of the political spectrum what they would want to see in a reliable local news source. Some people offered us generous cash donations before we’d formed our nonprofit corporation (NZP4H, for no zombie press for Homer).
We are set in an epically beautiful landscape, called the cosmic hamlet by the sea, are a nuclear free zone, and have a wide diversity of opinions, spiritual beliefs and people. We are collectively politically purple with wide variation across the political spectrum and appreciate one another as good people despite differing views. We are fishermen, farmers, contractors, artists, scientists, retirees, carpenters, writers, welders, medical professionals, students, subsistence harvesters, heavy equipment operators, teachers, marine tradesmen, business owners and those who just want to live here. The Homer Independent Press aims to serve the entirety of this community as a trusted news and information source —one that unites rather than divides.
We believe our community deserves factual, in-depth and unbiased reporting. We intend to be our community’s source for local news, both the positive and the difficult. We intend our editorial team to shine a light on things that aren’t working well so that our community can come together to put them right. We plan to provide interesting features and an events calendar so community members can join friends and neighbors at local events and meetings. In addition to the local elections, local government and in-depth feature articles most requested in the online survey, we’ll let readers know about the arts, school activities, outdoor recreation and all the other events that make our community vibrant and fascinating.
We want to provide connections that build community and help us understand ourselves and each other in this time of divisiveness and mistrust. And we’d like to hear what our readers woul like to see in our online paper — tell us!
We will provide a forum where multiple viewpoints have an outlet for respectful expression. We might not agree with you, but we will defend your right to free speech just as much as we want you to defend ours.
We are committed to ethical journalism and adhere to the Society of Professional Journalism Standards. Our nonprofit corporation, NZP4H, is structured to assure our Board of Directors and business management team are unable to influence editorial opinions and news coverage – this is dictated in our bylaws. As a nonprofit, management of the Homer Independent Press and its revenues will remain local. We promise to be ethical stewards of donations and grants. Funds we receive through advertising and other sources will grow and strengthen local reporting.
We are committed to working hard to earn your trust as we present the news of the day from the southern Kenai Peninsula. We ask this: if you like what we’re doing, tell others and, if you are able, please donate, subscribe and/or advertise to keep this cause alive. If you don’t like what we’re doing, please tell us (and we’d still like to have you subscribe and donate).
A free press, our Homer Independent Press, is only possible with your support. We hope you agree.
© Copyright 2026 NZP4H dba Homer Independent Press An Alaska Nonprofit Corporation and 501(c)(3) tax exempt organization
EIN 39-5059578
P.O. Box 1204, Homer, AK 99603