Filter launched in New York City in September 2018, with the mission is to advocate through journalism for rational and compassionate approaches to drug use, drug policy and human rights.
Filter ended its operations in August 2026, as this statement explains. The website remains online as a community resource.
Filter has been owned and operated by The Influence Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. You can read about The Influence Foundation’s structure and funding here.
Will Godfrey – Editor-in-chief
Will is the founding editor-in-chief of Filter, and executive director of The Influence Foundation, the nonprofit behind Filter. He has worked as an editor and journalist in the drugs and human rights spaces for two decades. He was the founder and editor-in-chief of The Influence, covering drug policy and related areas, and also founded and ran Substance, another harm reduction-oriented news site. His previous roles include co-founding and editing an award-winning print publication written by and for incarcerated people in London.
Kastalia Medrano – Deputy Editor
Kastalia previously worked at half a dozen mainstream digital media outlets and does not recommend the drug war coverage at any of them. She was also a syringe program peer worker in NYC, where she did outreach hep C testing and navigated participants through treatment. You can find most of her Filter writing here and here.
Helen Redmond – Senior Editor
Helen is a multimedia journalist and filmmaker. Her debut book is Liquid Handcuffs: Policing and Punishment in Methadone Clinics and the Future of Opioid Addiction Treatment. Her two documentaries about methadone are Liquid Handcuffs and Swallow THIS. As an LCSW, she has worked with people who use drugs for over two decades. Helen is an adjunct assistant professor at NYU.
Kiran Sidhu – Tobacco Harm Reduction Fellow
Kiran is a London-based writer and journalist, who has has written for publications including the Guardian, the Telegraph and I Paper.
Kiran’s fellowship was previously supported by an independently administered tobacco harm reduction scholarship from Knowledge-Action-Change—an organization that has separately provided restricted grants and donations to Filter.
Filter was an official media partner of the 2019 Reform conference in St. Louis. Filter has also been an official partner of the Global Forum on Nicotine in Warsaw, Poland, for several years.
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