Voices from the Earth: Current Issue

SRIC Friends

Table of
Contents
SRIC's Continuing
Commitment
From The President
Did you say "Groundwater Contamination?" What's That?
For 25 Years,
The Workbook
Call to the Land,
the Past, the Soul
Molycorp Clean-up
Far from Over
Border Plan for
Sustainability
Uranium Mining on Eastern Navajo
Black Ranch
Driveway to Sprawl
Los Alamos Fire
Book Reviews
Glossary

"Until one is committed there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth…that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance which no man would have dreamt would have come his way."

— W.H. Murray in
The Scottish Himalayan Expedition.

Kathy Cone, long-time editor of The Workbook

For twenty-five years The Workbook has been integral to SRIC's mission to provide citizens with information that both aids and inspires them to work for social change. I have been very privileged to work for ten of those years on such a worthy venture. When I first encountered the magazine in 1989 I was new to the world of environmental issues and I was frankly amazed at the national recognition The Workbook had already received. I was immediately proud to be associated with an organization doing such important work with communities to solve environmental and with a publication that was clearly respected for its integrity, its absence of polemic, and its already high standards for writing. Librarians across the country already knew us as "a gold mine of information" and activists thought of us as "a tool for action." People said we respected readers, our information was reliable, and we let facts speak for themselves. The great thing, too, was that I would be able to learn something new every day about environmental and social issues facing New Mexico and the rest of the world, and I would be working with good hardworking folks who lived and worked according to their convictions.

Producing The Workbook has always strained SRIC's budget and it has always required more labor than one staff person can give, and so we at SRIC have relied over the years on a great deal of voluntary help as well as the financial support of sponsors — help that has quite literally kept the magazine going. Unusual for magazines, our contributing writers of book reviews and features have been almost always unpaid. I have always felt extraordinarily lucky (and sometimes even astonished) to find good writers and busy activists willing to steal time from intense schedules to contribute fine work, with no compensation beyond our thanks and our readers' appreciation. And it always seems like the busiest among them are the first to honor our deadlines. My greatest pleasure as editor has been in the warm relationships that have developed from working with generous and talented people like Alison Monroe (a former SRIC staff person), David Walls, Joan Gussow, Byron Anderson, Steven Viederman, Elizabeth Wolf, Kevin Bean, Charlie Komanoff, Steve Fox, Eric Jantz, Pat Arnow, Daniel Berman, Moti Nissani, and many others, including several hardworking and very gifted interns during the past ten years, and, of course, all the SRIC staff who took time they didn't have to write feature articles on issues important to New Mexicans and the rest of the country. Friends all, I'll miss you!

Two years ago I began sharing the editor's job with Cynthia Taylor, whose creative talent for design has been apparent to Workbook readers. Not so publicly visible were her superb managing skills, her continual spark of ideas, energy, and enthusiasm for the work at hand, and her absolutely unflappable equanimity and good nature during the usually very trying production phase.

My decision to leave The Workbook and SRIC at midyear prompted our staff to begin exploring a new path for SRIC publications, one that will happily be more financially sustainable. I know many people will regret The Workbook's passing, as I do. But I expect that the best things The Workbook has been will survive the transition to a new and improved form, and our long-time readers will find even more to use and enjoy.

— Kathy Cone
Return to The Workbook