The Record's landmark building is closing

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The new Hackensack Bus Terminal is across the street from The Record's old headquarters.

The old headquarters of The Record and North Jersey Media Group at 150 River St. in Hackensack is being cleaned out in preparation for its closing.


Black dumpsters were visible in the front and rear of the parking lot on Monday. They come from a company called Accurate -- a curious choice given the paper's growing inaccuracy.


Two women were working at computers set up in the old guard station when I stopped in on Monday afternoon. One of the women was helping a couple who are subscribers when I asked her if the building was being closed.


She said yes and that it would be closed "soon." When I pressed her for more information, she said, "My last day is tomorrow."

The move of the Hackensack daily to an office building on Garret Mountain in Woodland Park was completed in 2009, but some employees continued to work in the River Street building and NJMG Chairman Malcolm A. "Mac" Borg's Mercedes-Benz could be seen parked in its usual space.

The many empty parking spaces were rented to a nearby Toyota dealer and unsold new cars were parked there and near the submarine Ling and the diner. 

The Record once was headquartered in downtown Hackensack.

The new building faced River Street. It still carries The Record name in an old masthead type style. The elder Borg worked in that first building, as a sports reporter.

At least two additions were added over the years, and the four-story building was prepared for a fifth story that was never built. There also was a major project to remove asbestos. I worked there as a reporter, copy editor and freelance food writer from 1979 to 2008.

A lot of great journalism was practiced in the redbrick building until the arrival of Editor Francis "Frank" Scandale from the Denver Post in early 2001.

The decline of the paper accelerated when Stephen A. Borg took over from his father in mid-2006, printing was moved to Rockaway Township and the staff was downsized and scattered to offices throughout North Jersey, including the cramped newsroom of The Record and Herald News in Woodland Park.

Scandale's mobile-journalist initiative led to a decline in productivity and staff members' loss of a shared sense of purpose. A banner with The Record masthead on it was conspicuously hung in the Hackensack newsroom and was visible from one end of the room to the other.

Employees took chances when parking in Hackensack, because of the proximity of the building to the Hackensack River and frequent flooding. 


The younger Borg's dream of making a killing on the River Street building and its many surrounding acres was shattered by the recession.