LCI Blog: Meet the Media – Javier Sanchez, editor for Extreme Times

What’s your top story for today?
I’m currently working on a story asking our readers to let us know if their communities are being run the way they expect them to, or if they care how they’re being run. I want to know if residents feel as if their community leaders are trying to emulate their “higher level” counterparts in Washington. Do parents who work hard to raise their children in “good” communities feel disconnected with the people who decide how things are done right in their own community? Decisions that are made in Washington will eventually trickle down to us, but the decisions made at city hall, in school board sessions and even at the local Little League group are ones that affect us now.
Tell us about your dream assignment?
My dream assignment would be to fix the huge homeless dilemma in our area once and for all. We’ll do it without building more shelters or giving the homeless a couple of meals and saying “see you tomorrow, Sam.” With the help and ideas of all who would join, we’d build an answer not just a good photo op, and yes I do have it all figured out already! You did say it was a dream assignment, right?
Describe the wackiest story you’ve ever written?
“If you could only see what I see” is a story about a baseball that tells his life story on the field in my kid’s baseball league. The ball is telling the story of what the coaches, parents and players say and do when none of the others are within range.
What is your PR pet peeve?
Don’t expect me to cover a story unless you really want an honest account of the event when I write it and run the clips!
Top trend in the industry you’re currently covering or are interested in covering.
I want to research and write about how today’s native “electronic” kids will turn out as adults. Most of us over 25 years old were grafted into it. We were not born with twitching thumbs able to master the art of texting straight out of the womb. We were just figuring out what the other buttons on the remote did. At seven years old, we could barley dress ourselves, let alone create our own avatar. Today, there’s more to being cool than owning the best pair of Nike shoes—you must also own the latest iPhone and iPad too.
Tell us a little about yourself.
I am a Mexican American born in California’s Central Valley where the summer sun will melt your skin but won’t melt your ice in January. This is perfect weather for growing and gathering all the wonderful crops in California’s Heartland, but not so perfect for the gatherers. I trust in God and pray a lot, which is probably why I’m not one of the gatherers. In my first life, I owned a few businesses. I went through a divorce about 11 years ago and remarried a woman who taught me a few things. I have two kids: my beautiful 19-year-old daughter who attends high school in a special education class and my handsome 10-year-old son who’s in a 5^th grade honors class – go figure. When I grow up, which should be anytime now, I don’t want to be a superstar investigative reporter. I just want to present my readers with the “real” story, whether it’s about today’s top local news, politics or about how different things would be if we all decided to be more involved in our own communities. If I’ve learned anything in my forty something years, it’s that it all starts and stops with me!
 
Questions or comments? Please send them to Javier at [email protected] or leave a comment below.