Spokane Public Radio is fortunate to have a dedicated, award-winning, news staff that collectively bring almost 120 years of reporting experience to the listeners of KPBX and KSFC. As a member of Northwest News Network (N3), the station also
benefits from the regional talents of N3 reporters, who cover
Western and Central Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and British
Columbia. In addition, SPR retains a North Idaho bureau chief,
based in Coeur d'Alene, who covers stories from the panhandle
to Boise.

MEET THE TEAM
John Vlahovich, news director

Tom Bacon, correspondent
Tom hates to admit that he's been working as a reporter for about 38 years. "I have flipped back and forth, Janus-like, between print and broadcast journalism." he says. "When my wife and I moved to this area from southeast Texas 13 years ago, I had been afternoon news anchor for eight years at KTRH in Houston, the leading news and information station in Texas." Before that, Tom was twice managing editor of a daily newspaper in a town near Houston, and news director of two other radio stations. He also worked in the other Washington for a year as press and legislative aide to Rep. Charlie Wilson of Texas (yep, the “Charlie Wilson’s War” guy.) Tom has won a number of individual journalism awards and was instrumental in winning a Peabody and an Edward R. Murrow award for KTRH. Tom happened to be on the air (and stayed on the air four hours straight without so much as a bathroom break) when the first bombs fell on Baghdad in the first Gulf War, and was anchoring when the Branch Davidian compound in Waco went up in flames. In balance, news reporting has been satisfying, although sometimes larded with frustration for Tom, with the occasional unflattering feedback and, once in a while, outright fear. "I’ve proven to myself over the years that the craft is, without question, lowpaying," he quips. For Tom, working at Spokane Public Radio has been doubly fun and satisfying because of the smart, creative people, and because of the stations' proximity to the top-drawer newsfolk at NPR.

Steve Jackson, correspondent
Steve has worked in radio since graduating from the University of Idaho in 1980. His early career included a stint at the Pullman commercial station where he learned the intricacies of early automation systems, reading the news via a “clacker” style AP wire machine from the 1940s, and producing literally dozens of radio commercials on a daily basis. After moving to Spokane in 1984, Steve found work on two commercial stations at the same time, and had to use two different air names. One station featured the “Music of Your Life” format, the other was KXLY, where Steve finally was hired full time and worked for 15 years. That stint included learning the news biz from some very established veteran broadcasters, and also fill in shifts as a TV news producer, and TV newsman on the KXLY “Extra” channel. He also learned how to survive working 14 hour shifts during coverage of the Icestorm in 1996. Steve was hired at Spokane Public radio in 1999, and began his career at KPBX as the All Things Considered host and found a niche in environmental and natural resource reporting. Nowadays, many Inland Northwest residents wake up to Steve’s voice as early as 5am, as the local host during NPR’s Morning Edition.

Amanda Loder, correspondent
Amanda took the scenic route to Spokane Public Radio. She was born and raised in the small town of Newton, Iowa. As a high school student searching for a first job, she was fortunate to be hired as a disc jockey at KCOB, the local country radio station. For her undergraduate degree, she went to Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin. In 2005, Amanda graduated Phi Beta Kappa with majors in Spanish and Religious Studies, and a minor in Art History. A stint on the campus newspaper and a summer internship at a alternative daily in Newton got her thinking about journalism as a career, and two weeks after graduating from Lawrence, she was off to Syracuse University in New York to earn her M.S. in Broadcast Journalism. There, she interned at the local NPR affiliate, WAER, where she filed reports and occasionally anchored in the evenings. She also took up a news producing internship at the local CBS television affiliate, WTVH. The program at Syracuse culminated in the summer of 2006 with an internship at WTOP, Washington, D.C.'s 24-hour news radio station. Amanda came out West for the first time to interview with Spokane Public Radio the following winter. She rolled into Spokane on St. Patrick's Day 2007, and started work at SPR the day after April Fool's. Amanda is a general assignment reporter/producer at Spokane Public Radio, anchors news Monday and Friday afternoons on KSFC, and occasionally fills-in as a host during All Things Considered on KPBX.

AMANDA LODER RECEIVES TOP REGIONAL EDWARD R. MURROW AWARD
LISTEN TO HER 3-PART SERIES ON NATIVE AMERICAN HEALTH CARE

Doug Nadvornick, N. Idaho bureau chief
Doug was born the son of a poor sharecropper in the Mississippi Delta. He began picking cotton when he was three, graduating to soybeans when he was nine. Doug was unable to attend public school, so every night after supper, his mother read to him by candlelight. By the time he was 13, Doug was reading in five languages, had memorized the Periodic Table of Elements, and calculated square roots to impress people at family parties. At the age of fourteen, a nosy reporter from the big city paper wrote a story about Doug. The story hit the wires and, within three days, Oprah called. Immediately after his appearance on her television show, a nice philanthropist from Atlanta approached him, and offered to pay all Doug's expenses to the college of his choice. He spun the globe and his finger landed on Washington State University, where he majored in journalism and minored in multi-cell biology. After graduation, Doug took a job at a country music station in Winnemucca, Nevada, eventually working his way to news director. After four years, he took a job as news director at Spokane Public Radio, where he toiled for 16 years. He left for an 18-month sabbatical at The Inlander and eventually came to Coeur d'Alene, where he now reports on North Idaho and Eastern Washington.