The Man In White: White Party Founder Jeffrey Sanker
By Daniel Amspaugh
BLADE: Why did you choose Palm Spring for your first White Party?
Jeffrey Sanker: It’s so beautiful there, you know, it’s chill out to Los Angeles. It’s the center of Southern California. And it’s just romantic and nice. The weather is so appealing. There’s probably nowhere else in the whole country, except for Florida, which can be hit or miss, that has good weather in April.
Are they very supportive there?
Yeah. The town. The mayor. Everyone is very supportive of White Parties. There was a few years that they weren’t supportive but now with the economy, this generates a lot business for Palm Springs.
What do you have planned this year?
Saturday night Lady Gaga is performing, which we are really excited about. Sunday Kat De Luna is performing at the Tea Dance. We also have Nikki Harris and Candis Cane, performing, during the day by the pool. And for the first time I have the lead singer from Erasure, Andy Bell. He’ll be DJing by the pools during the day. Those are some of the highlights, and there will be a few surprises.
What is your favorite event?
My favorite is the Sunday Tea Dance. I like daytime parties. I love watching the sun go down. The Ferris wheel and the fireworks, it’s my favorite thing.
What’s the best part of being Jeffrey Sanker?
Gosh, is there a best part? The funny thing is that everyone having fun over the weekend and the best part for me is when it’s over. You know, because I work all weekend. And I love seeing my friends, and I get to see my friends that fly in from all over the world for this party. And so I know once a year I get to see everybody I know. Including my family. They come out.
Oh, your family comes?
Oh yes. My mother, my father, my sister, they come every year. They’re very supportive.
The County of Los Angeles recently issued warnings of syphilis and sexually transmitted diseases. How do you feel about that? Do you take some responsibility?
Well we work with protective projects and we give out safe-sex kits and give them to everyone at these parties, and there’s only so much we can do. We can put signs up. We can hand you a safe-sex kit, if choose not to have safe sex, then I can’t take responsibility. But we do try to put something in your hand so when the time comes you will have something in your pocket.
I guess you just have to trust people to make the right decisions and in the end they are going to do whatever they want to do.
We try to be proactive. We are very proactive. We give out safe sex kits. I have paramedics and an ambulance on duty. We’ve never had any one die. We really take care of the customers. We really look out for them. We’ve never had a serious incident. And we’ve never had a fight in 20 years.
Never had a fight in 20 years?
Never had a fight.
That’s amazing.
They don’t want to fight. They want to dance.