King Harris, managing editor of the San Luis Obispo weekly, was a television news anchor until two years ago. His April 13 cover story details the careers of seven anchors who have chosen to stay in the area despite opportunities elsewhere; the last profile is of Harris himself. He reveals that he "got into the business to tell stories about people" and was dismissed by a local station for being too "folksy."
According to NBC-affiliate KSBY, some area residents were upset by the paper's Feb. 2 cover package on methamphetamine, which included a recipe for manufacturing the drug. After the paper hit the streets, one former meth user suggested that citizens should take matters into their own hands: "Everybody should just get [copies of the paper] and burn them. It's just ridiculous." The next day, KSBY reported that "angry readers, recovering addicts, police, and drug counselors" were removing papers from the streets and pressuring store managers to do the same. Andrew Carter of Cellular One, which spends $52,000 annually advertising on the back cover of the New Times, said, "As the lead advertiser in the publication, they've not only, in my mind, embarrassed themselves, but they've embarrassed us." SLO New Times Managing Editor King Harris noted that "instructions for making meth are readily available on the Internet" and said the paper's intention was to inform people, "especially worried parents, about what to look for and what to consider suspicious."
