Anyone fearful that former Natchez Mayor Phillip West’s appointment to the Natchez-Adams School Board would be just another board appointment, doesn’t know West.

In his first meeting last week, West made quite an entrance.

The nearly five and one-half hour meeting apparently focused heavily on the question that most of the residents of Adams County have wondered for some time: How can the school superintendent still be employed after a federal jury confirmed he racially discriminated against a former district principal?

West, who has never been one to shy away from controversy, took the matter head-on just minutes after he was sworn into office calling for a vote to fire Superintendent Frederick Hill or for the board to seek Hill’s resignation.

Bafflingly, the other school board members sat silent and allowed West’s motion to die for lack of a second.

West even argued against the board’s ultimate decision to discuss the matter in executive session — out of the public view.

“If you want to go to the back room, that is your choice,” he said before pointing out that racial discrimination has been a lifetime foe.

“If it was a white person who was found guilty of racial discrimination, you would be getting ready to march in the streets.”

West is spot-on, and perhaps he’s one of the few people who can speak to this with some authority. He’s been an advocate for fairness for decades. We’ve been a West critic at times, particularly for some of his rash decisions and actions when he was in the mayor’s office.

But we call things like we see them, and West is correct that had the superintendent been white and the discriminated principal been black, Hill would not have been allowed to continue in his role.

The time for the school board — except for West — to publicly explain their silence is long overdue.