I want to talk to you about the land. About how it inspires me, grounds me, makes me feel alive. About how passionately I feel that landscapes and ecosystems and species should be protected. But we can’t talk about the land without also talking about human desires and behavior, equity and justice. Because people — each and every one of us — have both direct and indirect effects on the health of the land, and we are all interdependent with the land. This makes it difficult to cover the West without talking about housing, labor, transportation or voting rights — issues that have everything to do with the fate of the land, water and wildlife. Readers of this magazine know that it would be irresponsible to tell the story of the West any other way.
The roots of High Country News reach back to a time when there was a shortage of good reporting on the environmental issues affecting the West. And while that condition persists, the concept of what is considered an environmental issue — and of environmentalism itself — has changed considerably, and in important ways. Narratives from marginalized communities have begun to be integrated, and the focus has started to shift toward intersectionality. HCN has proudly been part of this evolution, and we will continue to bend our coverage toward fairness and equity. We are committed to telling conservation stories that consider, and often center, the interests and yearnings of people from differing cultural or economic backgrounds, and to thinking critically about which writers and artists we tap to tell those stories. With open hearts can come great change.
Long ago, HCN made a commitment to tackling the thorniest issues affecting the region. And this may be the thorniest of all: how to preserve what we love about the West in a way that is fair to all cultures and stakeholders and that doesn’t leave anyone behind. This includes how much we pay for groceries and who harvests our food. It includes trail systems and highway systems, flight paths and migration paths. It includes Indigenous sovereign nations and multigenerational ranching families and the immigrants who are arriving as you read this. HCN will continue to represent the ever-changing West, to celebrate biodiversity and human diversity, alpine peaks and urban creeks — because it has never been more true that we are all in this together.
For now, I’m pleased to introduce some new voices: Laureli Ivanoff, whose column “The Seasons of Uŋalaqłiq” debuts in this issue (more regular columnists coming soon), and Tiffany Midge, who takes her place as the new curator and scribe of HCN’s beloved “Heard Around the West.” Thank you for being with us on this curious and open-hearted journey.
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This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline An open-hearted journey.
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