Humble Beginnings

Founding editor Jim Scarantino started the Port Townsend Free Press in 2017. (See Who is this Scarantino guy? below.) He explained:

“Our local newspapers are stretched far too thin to cover all the news that matters to the people of Jefferson County. Often decisions of the Port Townsend City Council and the Jefferson County Commission are not covered at all, and then, rarely in depth. Our local newspapers are not staffed and funded to provide investigative reporting that takes time to develop.

We live in a diverse community. Yet not all our stories are being told. Many important issues go unreported because there are just not enough journalists at work.

This is our humble way of contributing to a better, more informed dialogue in our community.

Some of us have had careers in journalism and continue to work in that field. Some are young writers wanting to speak on what they see and hear in their community. We don’t always agree with each other, but we respect facts and good, honest, unflinching debate. The site is open to reporting and guest commentary.”

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After nearly four years of publishing, in September of 2021 Jim announced that he was moving on to new projects and activities. Several of us who had written for him joined together to resurrect the Free Press. Censorship by local media outlets reached a crescendo in the last year, silencing virtually every voice that challenges official narratives. We felt keenly this last remaining outlet must not be lost if there was anything we could do to save it.

“The specter of totalitarianism has revived the Port Townsend Free Press. A new team is stepping up to keep this exercise of First Amendment rights and free thinking alive,” Jim announced in Long Live the Free Press! A New Team Steps Up.

Who are the new team?

Taking on the editorial mantle are three of us—Annette Huenke, Stephen Schumacher and Ana Wolpin. We bring different backgrounds and experiences to this endeavor. What we share is a commitment to free speech and speaking truth to power. We are nonpartisan, fact-driven, and are not beholden to any advertisers or other commercial interests.

As the only uncensored media source in our county, we aim to continue founder, departing editor, and now-ongoing contributor Jim Scarantino’s legacy.

Annette Huenke studied International Relations at the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to heading west, she was a manager for an Auckland-based international publisher of peer-reviewed drug information journals. In 1992 she moved to Port Townsend, opening Ancestral Spirits Gallery in 1993. She is past vice president of the Jefferson County EDC and board member of The Boiler Room. She researches, writes and wanders the forests around PT.

Stephen Schumacher graduated with honors in Mathematics from Harvard College and programmed funds transfer systems between Wall Street banks and the Federal Reserve before moving to Port Townsend in 1983. He has served as an officer for various community organizations such as the Food Co-op, Jefferson Land Trust, and the Northwest Nutritional Foods Association. He co-created The Port Townsend Leader’s original online newspaper and programs shipboard stability software used by naval architects.

Ana Wolpin‘s professional and personal pursuits in Jefferson County have included publishing, business development, marketing, graphic design and community service. Arriving in Port Townsend in 1975, she was first General Manager of the Food Co-op, past president of the Jefferson County Economic Development Council, former Port Townsend City Council member, founding board member of Habitat for Humanity of East Jefferson County, co-founder of the Port Townsend Peace Movement and co-organizer of Smart Meter Objectors Group (SMOG). Currently she researches, and, weather permitting, gardens.

Who is this Scarantino guy?

Jim Scarantino started the Port Townsend Free Press as founding editor. In his own words:

I practiced law as a trial attorney for over 25 years, starting as a prosecutor in Philadelphia and concluding my career as the New Mexico ACLU Cooperating Attorney of the Year in 2006. I was a partner in a sizable law firm then set up a solo practice that took me to just about every state west of the Mississippi. I even managed to litigate a case in the United States Supreme Court (I won, little old me, against 27 state attorneys general).

I saw a need for more and better reporting at the same time as I made the decision that I’d had enough fun as a lawyer. I started writing a column for New Mexico’s largest alternative weekly and was recognized as one of the nation’s best political columnists in that segment of the newspaper industry. I then went on to write a column for The Albuquerque Journal. And then I got bit.

Bit by the investigative journalism bug. I surrendered a column that reached over a hundred thousand people with each publication to launch the New Mexico Watchdog investigative journalism site. It was part of a nationwide effort to fill the void in state and local investigative reporting caused by the disappearance of statehouse reporting desks and the general contraction of newspapers. I broke several stories that went national. My stories exposed large dollar fraud, corruption and waste, and more than a few incidents very embarrassing to politicians and bureaucrats.

I have been in Jefferson County for five years. I love this place, but I think the community is being hurt by inadequate information and very limited forums for exploration of the important issues around us. Let’s be frank: The Port Townsend Leader really speaks for and to only a slice of Jefferson County. I know plenty of people who refuse to subscribe because they believe it is so biased. “The Misleader,” they call it. I think that unfair, though I have also been disappointed in the paper’s reporting more than a few times. Our other paper, The Peninsula Daily News, does a great job, but Jefferson County needs and deserves more attention than a paper based in Port Angeles can provide.

“Hey, but you’re a player. You’re not impartial.”

Yes, I was very involved in the fight to defeat Prop 1 in 2017, a regressive property tax increase pitched as the answer to our community’s affordable housing crunch. In the course of that effort, I saw up close the need for another news and opinion forum.

The Prop 1 contest was a crash course for me in learning about our county, its divisions, its inequities, its struggles, its poverty and the power structures calling the shots. I had to ask, how come I didn’t know about these things before? Where are our newspapers?

“You’re a Republican!”

Not only that, I am head of the Republican Party in Jefferson County.

Or so I was told by a Democratic activist with whom I had a long, friendly conversation after Prop 1 was rejected by over 2/3 of the voters. Apparently, much of the Democratic establishment in Port Townsend thought I had come out of nowhere to lead the local GOP in defeating that push for a property tax hike.

That gave me a good laugh. My Republican friends will tell you I am definitely not a Republican. My Democratic friends will say the same about my relationship to their party.

I am independent, in party affiliation and philosophy. In the past, I have worked on the campaigns of and contributed to both Democrats and Republicans.

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