Heidi Kyser
Managing EditorDesert Companion welcomed Heidi Kyser as staff writer in January 2014. In 2018, she became senior writer and producer, working for both DC and KNPR's State of Nevada. She produced KNPR’s first podcast, the Edward R. Murrow Regional Award-winning Native Nevada, in 2020. The following year, she returned her focus full-time to Desert Companion, becoming Deputy Editor, which meant she was next in line to take over when longtime editor Andrew Kiraly left in July 2022. In 2024, CEO Favian Perez promoted Heidi to managing editor, charging her with integrating the Desert Companion and State of Nevada newsrooms.
In her 20 years as a print and on-air journalist, Heidi’s done it all, from news writing for weekly business magazines, to producing multimedia pieces for alt weeklies, winning a load of Eddie, Maggie, and Nevada Press Association awards along the way. She left academics after getting a master's degree from Harvard, so she could pursue research and writing with more immediacy.
When she’s not camping, hiking, riding her bike, or doing some other outdoor activity with her husband, Heidi is most likely to be found on a yoga mat, being spotted by her 100-pound pit bull Buster.
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I’ll be honest: There was something I dreaded about taking the helm at Desert Companion a few months ago. It wasn’t the management meetings, board reports, HR paperwork, or even the stress of being responsible for the accuracy and appeal of every word in these pages. It was the annual Restaurant Awards. Don’t get me wrong, I love assigning and editing stories generally. But this specific story is not only Desert Companion’s signature service piece, but also an entire project that lives beyond our pages -
Fall feels like a break between seasons in our city, where it follows the hot mess of summer and precedes the frenetic cheer of the holidays. Philosophers of yoga write about the second between the inhale and exhale as the moment when the good stuff happens — though the entire breath requires attention for the process to work -
No call from his wife or kids will ever go unanswered again, if this former Las Vegas Metro Police sergeant and Route 91 incident commander can help it -
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Life, love, and work went on after October 1, 2017, but what happened that night is indelibly woven into every survivor’s story -
Clear your calendar app for these concerts, dance performances, literary events, musicals, plays, and more! -
As executive director of UNLV’s Performing Arts Center, Lori Cobo leads from the heart -
Here are a few of this year’s Focus on Nevada entries that made us smile — in the best possible way — at a time when smiles were hard to come by
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We scoured the valley to find our new favorite spots for cold, creamy goodness -
Tony Hsieh owned a lot of property in downtown Las Vegas. It was all part of his massive purchase of properties in his planned Downtown Project.One of his…
