Twenty-five years ago today, on December 3, 2000, News Director Monica Miller delivered the first KHJ News bulletin. This morning, she drive to the 93KHJ studios before the sunrise and did it again.
“It’s harder to get out of bed and climb the stairs now,” Miller admits. “But you think of people waiting for the 7 o’clock news. That gives you the oomph to come in and do the work.”
Miller is South Seas Broadcasting’s longest-serving employee, but her journalism career spans nearly 50 years. A photo in the station hallway shows her as a teenager at WVUV in the 1970s. South Seas Broadcasting now owns that station, bringing Miller’s career full circle.
The news operation has grown from three daily bulletins to seven newscasts across multiple platforms in two languages. Doug Tuigamala handles Samoan newscasts. Jack Seumanutafa delivers daily reports from Apia, Samoa. Matt Kaye covers Washington DC. John Raynar handles sports. Monica orchestrates it all.
When KHJ News launched in 2000, the bulletins were unusually long for radio – packed with detail. Anyone who’s listened to KHJ News long enough knows the feeling of sitting their car at their destination but not wanting to continue with their days until Monica’s news was finished. Around 2007, Miller pushed to post stories online. By 2010, talanei.com was delivering news in English and Samoan with photos, audio, and video.
“Nowadays you have to deal with not just radio news, but electronic news, photos, audio, social media,” Miller says.
The stories have been consequential. Miller exposed corruption in government contracts awarded without bidding. She revealed Development Bank loans to government officials, drawing multiple lawsuit threats. She covered the shooting death of Lieutenant Lusila Brown and the Wyatt Bowles case.
During the 2009 tsunami, Miller reported from Hawaii where reliable communication allowed her to dig deep and feed comprehensive coverage to talanei.com when local infrastructure failed.
“It is harder to get news these days than when we first started,” Miller says. It is. “Courts used to give out information and affidavits. Now you have to sort of sweet talk the court clerks to get public information. People have more to hide now. There’s more nepotism going on.”
Social media has complicated things further. “Citizen journalists can just put anything on and people will believe it,” Miller says. “It helps with leads, but giving out information is not good enough. You have to give out good and factual information.”
She spends hours moderating comments on talanei.com, weighing profanity, libel liability, and factual accuracy. For every legitimate story, two false leads come through the door from people with axes to grind.
About 10 years ago, Miller and her Pacific journalism counterparts created the Pacific Freedom Forum to protest government crackdowns on press access. “We write letters of protest when governments try to clamp down on access to official information,” she says.
Miller has trained countless young reporters. Some have stayed a few years. Others lasted weeks. The challenge of finding someone to eventually replace her weighs on her.
“If I retire and haven’t trained anyone to take over, I’ve failed,” Miller says. “It’s a demanding job but also very rewarding. You become knowledgeable of all subjects. You’re there when history is made. You’re the first witness.”
“Monica is the heartbeat of KHJ News,” says Joey Cummings, Vice President and General Manager of South Seas Broadcasting. “For 25 years, she’s held the line on accuracy, fairness, and accountability in a place where those things matter deeply. That teenage DJ from WVUV became the journalist American Samoa needed.”
This morning, Miller delivered the 7 o’clock news. Tomorrow, she’ll do it again.
