Matthew Simon

Murrow and Emmy-winning journalist Matthew Simon could not be happier to move back to his adopted hometown of Anchorage, where he re-joined Alaska’s News Source, and Gray Television, as assistant news director in Aug. of 2023. While he spent more than one decade working and learning alongside extremely talented Lower 48 journalists, he never stopped missing his Alaska communities, his adopted family and the former co-workers he’d always make time to visit. Now, he is excited to return North to the Great Land and use his 25 years of journalism experience, and passion for investigative reporting and sharing stories based off the human experience, to help lead the state’s number one television news organization, KTUU-Channel 2 & KYES-CBS5.

Simon considers his Alaska homecoming to be a very full circle moment, as Alaska’s News Source now combines KTUU & the former KTVA’s operations. Between 2005-2012 he worked for both stations, respectively, as a political-investigative reporter/anchor, where he also managed both newsrooms on the weekends. His Alaska reporting highlights include covering former governors Frank Murkowski, Sarah Palin, and Sean Parnell's administrations. He also anchored some of the state’s biggest, historic breaking news stories, including: Sen. John McCain announcing former Gov. Palin as his running mate; the Supreme Court’s Exxon Valdez oil spill ruling; 2009’s Mount Redoubt volcanic eruption, and the last years of one of the most prominent political figures in U.S. history, former Sen. Ted Stevens. He also provided months of reporting coverage during the series of VECO political corruption trials. And for five years traveled to Juneau to provide gavel-to-gavel legislative session coverage. As a cancer survivor, some of his most important work, during his first Alaska stint, was spent volunteering and reporting on cancer’s impact as Alaska’s number one killer. He volunteered with the American Cancer Society, Alaska Men’s Run, and Alaska Men’s Retreat boards and committees. He also spent years sharing his cancer story with Anchorage School District middle schoolers. His cancer reporting, and community service, was also honored with several Alaska Broadcaster Association awards.

Prior to moving back to Alaska, Simon worked for Florida, Ohio, Wisconsin and North Carolina Lower 48 stations, most recently serving as assistant news director for Ft. Myers, Florida’s WFTX-TV. There he was part of the leadership team that oversaw coverage of the biggest story of his career to date: Category-5 Hurricane Ian’s landfall and direct aftermath across every Southwest Florida community. Simon’s point of pride during this Regional Edward R. Murrow-winning breaking news coverage was his station, and dedicated team, never went off the air. Broadcasting from a remote evacuation site, they rode out the storm with the communities they served. The Florida Association of Broadcast Journalists, FABJ, went onto name WFTX the Community Service Station of the Year. Simon went onto manage the production of the Murrow & FABJ-winning documentary, Hurricane Ian: Still Standing, as executive producer. The special used the WFTX reporting and meteorologist staff’s perspectives to document Ian's formation, impact and aftermath. At WFTX, Simon was also responsible for starting and overseeing the station’s investigative unit, which would end up covering months of Ian’s after-effects, on top of leading coverage plans for ongoing water and housing crises and Florida’s trending rise of Antisemitism.

Before moving to Florida, in 2019 Simon made the transition from longtime investigative reporter/anchor to newsroom manager when WHIO-TV, America's #1 CBS affiliate, recruited him to oversee the station’s investigations and special reports unit as Special Projects Executive Producer. (Yes: there he had the pleasure of working with former KTUU news anchor James Brown.) Following exposing how a lack of multi-agency communication led to a child’s death, his team’s award-winning investigative reporting served as the impetus for changing an Ohio state law, which created an ombudsman to investigate similar child abuse cases. Simon was also part of the WHIO leadership team that oversaw breaking news coverage of a mass shooting in downtown Dayton, Ohio’s entertainment area, the Oregon District. During his nearly three years in Ohio, Simon was part of a team honored with dozens of journalism’s most prestigious awards, including: Regional EMMYs, Regional Edward R. Murrow awards, and Ohio Society of Professional Journalists & Ohio Associated Press accolades.

Simon’s journalism passion started where he grew up in the Birmingham, Alabama suburb Mountain Brook. Thanks to his high school's work study program, he was fortunate to be able to start his TV news career at 16 years old, interning for the next two years with WVTM-TV, at the time owned by the NBC network. For the next 20 years, his respective reporting career stops included Missouri, Kansas, Alaska, North Carolina and Wisconsin. The proud University of Missouri School of Journalism graduate focused his studies on investigative journalism, (the world's premier investigative journalism organization, Investigative Reporters and Editors [IRE], is located at Mizzou). He spent all four college years working for the university-owned NBC affiliate KOMU-TV, where he helped start the station's Target 8 investigative unit, which is still in existence today. His point of pride decades later continues to be championing journalism's founding principal of being a government watchdog. His long track record of reporting on government waste, holding people in power accountable, giving those that feel they do not have a voice an outlet and uncovering personal stories behind trends, he hopes, has led to change for the better in the many communities he has served. In that spirt, he is a proud member of several professional organizations, including: Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE); National Press Photographers Association (NPPA); NLGJA: The Association of LGBTQ+ Journalists; and the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.

Simon’s Ohio move came after spending five years in Wisconsin, including the last three years working for Alaska News Source Gray-TV sister station, WSAW-TV, in the north central city of Wausau. He was hired to start the station's investigative unit and served for three years as WSAW's senior investigative reporter along with anchoring the 4:00 p.m. newscast. At WSAW, his reporting included exposing a crisis and government coverup inside the state's juvenile justice system, loopholes impacting veterans' emergency care, and the lack of resources for families battling the opioid crisis, which received a regional Edward R. Murrow award. His first two years in Wisconsin were spent reporting for Madison's WISC-TV, where his investigative reporting on gangs and the opioid epidemic, along with extensive reporting on an officer-involved shooting death, was part of a National Edward R. Murrow and a regional EMMY award for Outstanding Achievement for Media Interactivity. Simon was also part of the investigative team the Wisconsin Broadcasters Association honored for exposing how emergency radio failures were putting first responders' lives at risk.

Prior to his first Alaska move in 2005 to report at KTVA-TV, Simon was a general assignment reporter for Wichita, Kansas’ KAKE-TV, where among much crime news he covered the infamous BTK serial killer's reemergence and capture. His resume also includes news reporter roles at Raleigh/Durham, North Carolina's Spectrum Cable News and in Montgomery, Alabama, at Gray-TV sister station WSFA-TV.

From his large adopted Alaska family, to extensive network of people he cares deeply about scattered across the Lower 48, most important to Simon are the loved ones in his life. He survived both testicular cancer at 21 years old, and a massive "widowmaker" heart attack at 35 years old. He thinks health education and taking care of yourself is vital. In his free time you'll find him working out most mornings, reading all sorts of books, from a good biography to the best fiction, traveling to his next, new destination, finding healthy food that doesn't taste too healthy, streaming the best TV shows and movies and trying to be Mason’s best fur dad.