Susan Paynter is a Northwest-based journalist and writer who has covered and commented on social issues since the late 1960s.
Background
Paynter was born in Portland, Oregon, to G. Allan Oakes and Vera Oakes. She grew up in Bremerton, Washington, graduated from West High School, attended Olympic College in Bremerton and got her first newspaper job at age 19 at the Bremerton Sun.
Career
A reporter, columnist and critic for the from 1968 to 2007, she wrote ground-breaking, often controversial pieces on civil rights. Equal rights for women, gays and lesbians. Prison reform; juvenile justice.
Abortion and contraception.
Police; racial divisions. Courts, and politics.
Early Life and Paynter wrote the first newspaper series in Washington state (12 parts, reprinted in tabloid format) on the struggle to pass state and federal equal rights amendments. (An interview with her on this topic, conducted by the Washington Women"s History Project, appears online) Two years before the United States. Supreme Court ruling on Roe v.
Wade she wrote two multipart series on the campaign for the passage of abortion reform in Washington state.
Paynter covered and commented on topics including equal pay, domestic violence, reforms in the reporting and prosecution of rape, societal attitudes toward working mothers, and the role of religion in American public life. Between 1975 and 1991 she covered local and national television, including network and cable news, entertainment programming, trends and television personalities. From 1991 until her early retirement in 2007, she wrote a three-times-a-week news and opinion column for the P-I, including breaking news and interviews with newsmakers.
In one column, based on an interview with progressive Seattle Police Chief Norm Stamper, the chief revealed his past as a racist, homophobic and excessively forceful rookie cop.
During the five years preceding her retirement, she appeared each Friday on Seattle"s National Public station KUOW/FM on a panel commenting on the week"s news.
Membership
The revelations caused members of the force to demand (but not get) his resignation.