Bryan Goebel

I'm a radio reporter and writer based in San Francisco. Over my twenty year career I've reported or produced pieces for a number of radio stations and networks, including CBS, ABC, NPR newscasts, Associated Press Radio and the BBC. I'm currently working on my first novel and a play.

In the beginning, though, I never really wanted to be a journalist. I just wanted a front-row seat to everything. I dropped out of high school and got my first radio job in 1987 covering Southern California’s Mojave Desert, my home turf. By my late teens instead of going to college I was on hiking trips with U.S. Senator Alan Cranston, covering nuclear waste hearings in Needles and spending long nights in the press box at Barstow City Hall. These early events spurred my interest in politics and I would move on to cover the state Capitol many years later for KFBK radio, taking a special interest in the assault on affirmative action. I became so interested in hate crime prevention after covering a firebombing trial in 1993 that I left journalism briefly to become the spokesperson for the Human Rights Commission of the City and County of Sacramento.

One of my favorite jobs was doing multi-media author interviews, or online audio slideshows, for the website of Publisher’s Weekly Magazine. I produced interviews with such authors as Cornell West, Mary Karr and Ha Jin. I learned a little about the publishing industry and multi-media producing.

All my years of working in commercial news has propelled me toward one unwavering goal: to tell what the mainstream chooses to ignore, to chisel through the brick wall of formulaic journalism. This is my mission today amidst a sea of crime and celebrity stories.

As a journalist and citizen, I aspire to have a global and historical consciousness. My key areas of interest are politics, human rights, global warming, bike-friendly streets, urban planning, immigration, marginalized communities, LGBTQ issues and literature. I have succeeded in getting these issues covered on commercial radio, locally and nationally. I am also in search of unheard voices and I have spent a great many volunteer days reporting on gay literature and LGBTQ issues for an international community and public radio show. I also volunteer for the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition and am a proud bicycle commuter.

I believe in fairness and accuracy in reporting. As a journalist I am always striving to find the truth.