Mayor Clinton I. Young and his administration have put together an ambitious campaign to promote Mount Vernon as a great place to do business, partnering with Clipper Magazine and over 60 local merchants to bolster his effort.
     The mayor has utilized promotional expense money from his office to purchase the cover of  this past January 21^st edition of Clipper Magazine that will run for 6 weeks.
     The mayor's efforts must be applauded, since he is asking people, not only in Mount Vernon, but in surrounding communities, to rediscover Mount Vernon as a great place to shop, thus helping to invigorate the city's economy.
     As has been highly publicized in the Journal News and on this website, after operating The Inquirer Newspaper as a virtual one man show for over four years, I decided to go in a totally new direction with the paper. I recruited a team of junior and senior partners, each performing a unique function within the business, now known as The Inquirer Media Group.
     For the last four months, the new team has been training and working together to resurrect the new Inquirer newspaper. We have had countless meetings and training sessions, and we have also involved nearly 10 Mount Vernon High School students as apprentices. Many of these students intended to participate in our new journalist internship program, and hoped to receive scholarships from us as well.
     Please note that all of these students have spent endless hours soliciting advertising within the City of Mount Vernon, accompanied by our staff of former business executives. Shockingly, they failed to meet their advertising goals, since most merchants told them that they were already committed to Clipper Magazine. 
     Regrettably, the city's business partnership with Clipper Magazine has seriously impacted the effort to resurrect The Mount Vernon Inquirer newspaper, and we are now abandoning the idea of resurrecting the printed portion of the newspaper. Our young people found themselves competing against the City of Mount Vernon for advertising and that is truly sad.
     What is puzzling to members of our new team, as well as the young students involved in the effort, is why the City of Mount Vernon never reached out to The Inquirer before contracting with Clipper Magazine. The city knew we were bringing the paper back. Furthermore, our paper was read by nearly 45,000 readers every month, plus it was circulated in Pelham and parts of New Rochelle. Our plans were to expand our circulation to parts of the Bronx as well.
     As the owner of The Inquirer, I never made any money during the over four years the paper was in existence. As a nearby Pelham resident, I published the paper because I wanted to reverse the unjustified negative press the city has been a part of for decades. I tried to promote all the good that takes place in Mount Vernon on a daily basis, not only with the paper, but on my website, my television show on channel 6 and on my radio show. I also had a great desire to help Mount Vernon's youth.
     My paper made history in 2007 when it sponsored the first ever city city-wide spelling bee, the winner being sent to Washington, DC to participate in the Scripps National Spelling Bee. It was a proud moment for me, as well as the entire city.
     The new Inquirer Media Group is comprised of young Mount Vernonites seeking employment and an opportunity to venture into the newspaper business, along with the many students that planned to be a part of our new programs, all intended to help Mount Vernon's youth.
     I want to once again publicize the fact that I never asked the City of Mount Vernon to help subsidize The Inquirer. All I ever asked was that the city supported the paper by placing an occasional ad in our paper. It is something every municipality across America does as a way to support their local newspaper.
     My wife and I are very hurt over what has transpired, since Clipper Magazine has done absolutely nothing in the area of helping the City of Mount Vernon throughout the years. Yet, the city elected to support them over a paper that has done so much good for Mount Vernon.
     I have basically been chased out of Mount Vernon by the current administration due to their inexplicable actions. But I walk away proudly, since my legacy is a positive one, and I will always remember and cherish the good people of Mount Vernon and the good times I had reporting strictly positive news about the city. I guess you could say my paper was a labor of love, like
M. Paul Redd use to tell me.
     I will move on and venture into something else, but it breaks my heart that so many Mount Vernon kids will be cheated out of the wonderful opportunities we were ready to offer them.
     I intend to continue to run The Inquirer's website on a temporary basis.

Joe Parisi, Publisher, Editor