You, our valued audience, have asked for more local news coverage, and KPTZ delivers. As many want to know more about our community, we have recently expanded our local news offering with a twice weekly headlines program. KPTZ News now airs Tuesdays and Thursdays at 12:05pm.

Hosted by journalist Charlie Bermant, the 5-minute program summarizes stories from local media including the Port Townsend Leader and Peninsula Daily News, along with original stories produced by the KPTZ news staff.

“Not everybody reads the local papers, so they can miss what is going on around them,” says KPTZ Program Director Larry Stein. “We monitor the local media and report those stories of greatest interest and relevance to area residents.”

During our first month of operation nearly half the reported stories were written and produced by Bermant, who worked as the Peninsula Daily News Port Townsend bureau chief for 6 years before retiring in 2016. Other members of the KPTZ News team will contribute over the next few months.

The short bursts of the KPTZ News program complements the deeper coverage of KPTZ’s weekly half hour Compass program, which highlights more in-depth, feature-oriented stories.

Bermant has retained many of his PDN sources, adding “I still have the same cell phone.” He also has held on to many of his previous Facebook friends, as the social network is a tremendous source for news tips.

While Bermant has written a fair share of longer pieces, this program caters to the prevailing short attention span of the listening public. “People don’t have the time or inclination to learn about issues in depth,” Bermant said. “So we are boiling down these stories to the barest bones. Still, it plugs listeners in to the latest issues, and they know where to go if they need more information.”