“Finally, the truth.

Our community was sold the idea of merging city and county governments as being an economically efficient way to better manage services, promote economic development and address growing fiscal problems.

After numerous failed attempts, the claim that by combining city and county departments and reducing duplicate services we would create a stronger, more effectively managed metropolitan community was touted as being the reason to merge the two governments.

None of this has proven to be true and we are outraged at the duplicity exhibited by Mayor Jerry Abramson in West Virginia last week.

At the time, we vehemently opposed merger because we saw the measure for what it really was - a means to abandon the poor, old, and yes, Black population in our inner city.

The mayor always denied our claims, continuing to push economic opportunity as his impetus to merge our two governments.

The ugly truth was revealed last week when the mayor told an audience in West Virginia the reason for merger was we were getting older, Blacker and poorer.

Mr. Mayor, the fact is this is true, so why apologize?

We should be pleased that our suspicions have been confirmed and the mayor has finally come clean.

However, we call for the mayor to come clean to his constituents right here at home.

All of this leaves us with more questions and a sense of outrage that our residents were so spectacularly hoodwinked by a man in whom we placed so much trust.

We would also point out that he could not have fooled so many without the complicity of a media industry that was, at the time, not an objective seeker of the truth.

We suspect that some media outlets were prepared to not even report the West Virginia revelation!

This episode causes us to now ask...what else has Jerry Abramson not told us?

Mr. Mayor, you do not have to apologize for telling the truth.

But we regret that the truth was told many years later and not to the citizens of this community.