Kevin Huffer

Kevin was born in West Sussex in March 1961.
He attended Chichester High School and Portsmouth University in England
He was a member of Chichester Hospital Radio before moving to Portsmouth to work at St Mary's Hospital. He became Chairman of Portsmouth Hospital Broadcasting (PHB) in 1992 and began presenting on Wey Valley Radio in Alton in 1993.
Later in the same year he met Mark Samways, who had recently re-joined PHB as a presenter. Mark shared his thoughts on returning a local radio station to the Portsmouth area, Kevin recalled a recent conversation with the Lord Mayor of Portsmouth, Councilor Alex Bentley, about the city's 800th birthday the following year. An immediate realisation of common purpose bonded Kevin and Mark and a meeting was arranged to meet with the Lord Mayor who jumped at the chance to help the project. What would become Victory FM and Greater Portsmouth's new full time radio station was born in those moments, just outside of studio one of PHB's Queen Alexandra's Hospital base.
Kevin was also chair of the local community radio group at the time and had a close friendship with former Radio Victory presenter Anton Darby. All of these elements assisted the start of the project.
Kevin was part of the management team, Head of Programmes, compiled the daily commercial schedule and presented on Victory FM. He drove the equipment for the start of test transmissions, which were due to start at one second past midnight but knowing the importance ran them about 30 seconds late to ensure all the listening team had kittens! The first Victory FM ran for 28 days, the maximum allowed under licence from the Radio Authority.
For the second and third broadcast periods of Victory FM, each six months after the previous, Kevin produced commercials, scheduled them and presented.
Kevin became afternoon presenter at Way Valley Radio around this time so became less actively involved with the every day activities of running Victory FM. However this must not be construed as no involvement, even when the station changed name to Radio Victory and broadcast on Cable, Kevin was still involved in one capacity or another. He became acting Head of Programmes for the launch of Radio Victory in 1999.
After TLRC's take over in late 1999/2000 many staff were released from their contracts and Kevin joined BBC Radio Solent, one important assignment was during the fuel crisis where his hourly reports became essential listening to drivers, keen to fuel their cars, in the central South of England.
A chance to work once again on-air in Portsmouth in 2006 took Kevin to Express FM as Operations Manager. This service had recently started broadcasting.
By this time Kevin was married to an American, so it seems natural that the US called loudly and a chance to work on radio across the big pond.
Kevin is currently Programme Director at KGY Radio, Olympia, USA.

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