You have to read Page 1 from the bottom up

To vote against the well-honed political machine that has dominated Hackensack for decades, residents will have to go to Line 11 at the bottom of the May 14 ballot, below, to elect independent City Council candidate Victor E. Sasson, editor of Eye on The Record and Do You Really Know What You're Eating?  Readers of The Record also have to employ this bottoms-up strategy.

After 7 straight days of front-page, sky-is-falling coverage of the Boston marathon bombing, local readers have learned to unfold Page 1 of The Record to find news that hits closer to home.

Editor Marty Gottlieb, who is walking around the Woodland Park newsroom humming "April in Paris," devotes most of the front page to the "big story" of the day, throwing crumbs to local-news readers.

Below the fold

Today, readers who look below the fold will find a story on the continuing decline of Catholic schools in Hackensack and other communities, and a report on towns investing in lightning-detection systems (A-1).

On A-2 today, head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes acknowledges an error in the Dean's List she uses as filler in place of local news.

User unfriendly

On Sykes' Local section front, an interesting story on Fair Trade coffee farmers in Guatemala omits the address of the Teaneck General Store or any other place North Jersey readers can buy the coffee (L-1).

On L-2, a story on a proposal to limit comments by Englewood City Council members to 10 minutes doesn't say how much time residents have to comment or whether other municipal councils also impose a ceiling on their members.

In Hackensack, residents have a 5-minute limit, even though only a handful of people show up for the meetings.

Anyway, City Council members have been ignoring what they say for decades.


Better Living

The "Contact Us" box in Sunday's Better Living section continues to list Susan Leigh Sherrill as food editor, despite rumors she is leaving the job.

Sherrill has kept her Twitter handle as @susanlsherrill, but on the site she appears as Susan L. Axelrod, using her photographer husband's last name.

The Better Living editor is now Marc Schwarz, replacing Stephanie Rivers, who was hired in September 2011 to replace Barbara Jaeger.