Renewing the ugly battle with racism in Englewood

In what many commuters know as the "Passover Effect," there were plenty of seats available on NJ Transit trains to and from the city on Friday, and traffic in the region was mercifully light. Many commuters left the day before to celebrate the holiday with relatives out of state or took a long weekend. Passover begins at sundown Monday.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The front page of The Record today and Friday appeared to carry big local news for a change.

Editor Marty Gottlieb called for a large, black headline today to announce "the largest toxic cleanup in U.S. history," but downplayed that no part of the Passaic River in Bergen or Passaic counties is included (A-1).

On Friday, The Record announced that Hackensack had settled the last civil-rights lawsuit against Ken Zisa, the family's rotten apple, who stank up City Hall during his years as police chief and state assemblyman (A-1).

The cost to the city and taxpayers -- in legal fees and settlements -- was put at "more than $8 million," but the story doesn't say how much of that was covered by insurance.

More racism?

Still, the story that jumped out at me appeared on Friday's Local front, where Englewood's ugly school-desegregation battle was back in the news (L-1).

The small city has been struggling with segregated schools for nearly 30 years, and in 2002, Bergen County started a rigorous Academies program at Dwight Morrow High School to draw white students from outside Englewood.

But the proposal that is being denounced by some parents is to have "mostly minority Dwight Morrow students and more diverse Academies students attend classes in the same buildings" [italics added]."

Low-grade fever

The story doesn't raise racism as the possible cause of the opposition. 

In fact, the story reports the concern is "low academic achievement," as if poor grades are catching, like a cold.

Apparently, no effort is being made to integrate the lower grades in Englewood, which the Borg publishing family called home for many years, choosing, of course, to pay for private schools.

More screw-ups

Friday's paper also was noteworthy for two lengthy corrections on A-2, and an embarrassing production error on A-5, involving a broken photo caption in the story on the 50th anniversary celebration of the Civil Rights Act.

Maybe it's time for a typo in the paycheck of Production Editor Liz Houlton, who is paid six figures, despite all of the errors she and her staff miss.

Praise for Axia

In Friday's Better Living entertainment tabloid, Staff Writer Elisa Ung lavishes 3 stars (Excellent) on Axia Taverna in Tenafly, an expensive Greek restaurant that opened in 2006 (BL-18).

What did she wait eight years to visit the place?

Still, in her usual "let them eat cake" attitude, there is little about the origin of the food or how it was raised or grown.

"Though not cheap, you get quality for your money," the restaurant reviewer assures readers in the data box.

The fat lamb rib chops are from Australia and cost an astounding $40, but she doesn't say whether they are grass fed and free of antibiotics. Ditto for the Colorado loin chops.

A seafood clay pot ($26) apparently contained a single "pristine scallop."

And her description of the abysmally poor service during one of her visits, and the burned top of that seafood clay pot, makes you wonder why she didn't award Axia two and a half stars.

Inside journalism

Today, the paper pats itself on the back for winning a George Polk Award for its coverage of the political payback scandal involving lane closures at the George Washington Bridge (A-7).

Someone should buy a tie for Port Authority reporter Shawn Boburg, who looks like he just climbed out of bed for the photo on A-7.

I don't know who George Polk was, but his journalism prize is as flawed as all of the others, which should be awarded for a body of work, not just one series of stories.

For example, Boburg has had blinders on in his coverage of the Port Authority, ignoring the bistate agency's poor job of expanding mass transit and easing nightmarish traffic congestion.

Which reminds me that the silly wire service story announcing the Polk Awards claims two reporters who broke the Edward Snowden story weren't arrested at Kennedy International Airport, as feared.

But, the story said, "they were instead confronted by reporters and photographers before fighting through traffic" to receive the award in the city.

Of course, that usually is the case, but Friday was one of the lightest traffic days of the year, as I found out on two car trips, one to Manhattan and back, and the other to LaGuardia Airport.

Today's confection

The Record and Staff Writer Jay Levin also pat themselves on the back today for helping the Mortgage Apple Cake baker save her Teaneck home from foreclosure (L-1).

Levin's 2009 story about Angela Logan, based on a tip from a "mutual Teaneck friend," attracted hundreds of orders for her cakes, as he reports today in a story about a TV film airing on April 20.

That puts the spotlight on the Woodland Park daily's coverage of the foreclosure crisis in New Jersey, and whether the paper has fully exposed the roles of banks, real estate agents and Governor Christie.

Make room amid the doom and gloom

Image via Wikipedia

The Hackensack River as seen from Teaneck.

The only ray of sunshine on The Record's front page today reminds readers of how the editors make no special effort to tell us stories about our neighbors.


The update on Angela Logan -- the Teaneck woman who baked her way out of foreclosure -- is a rare find in the Woodland Park daily.


Instead, Editor Francis Scandale and head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes specialize in profiling and promoting politicians, entertainers, celebrity chefs, restaurant owners and fat-cat friends and business associates of the Borg family.


Sykes' assignment desk -- the laziest in the Northeast -- covers local news by covering meetings, so the only people reporters meet are gadflies and town officials. 


Never mind


Corrections don't get any more embarrassing than the one on A-2 today, declaring that the lead story on Sykes' Local front on Tuesday was totally erroneous. 


The reporting and the lead paragraph were wrong, and so were the headlines:

Feds pull plug on aid program

North Jersey to lose

millions for police

What is really lost is the credibility of the paper. 

Road kill

The same can be said for Road Warrior John Cichowski, who has been beating the same dead stories for years.

Cichowski appears to have formed an auto-erotic relationship with his car, as he notes in his L-1 column today: "When my Honda and I made our own inspection...."

Never mind the shredded truck tires on the highway. What about the trash his column peddles every day?

The weird front page returns

Image by Rachel from Cupcakes Take the Cake via Flickr

 











A week or more of natural and unnatural events drove The Record of Woodland Park to publish a series of hard-news front pages. Today, the lazy, incompetent editors commit such poor news judgment on Page 1 and elsewhere, it's clearly a return to journalism as usual.


What's with the lead A-1 story by Staff Writer John Brennan? He gets Governor Christie in front of the paper's "editorial board," but doesn't even ask him if the return of the so-called millionaire's tax on Christie's rich friends could generate enough revenue to prevent a battle over Bergen County blue laws, or why he doesn't agree to even a modest hike in the low gasoline tax.

Then, what's this story with the photo? The Navy is bringing back an airship program? Why is this on A-1?  What about the judge who rejected the deal to compensate 9/11 workers? Isn't that worth more than a few paragraphs outside?


On A-11 -- the editorial page -- why does it take a letter from reader Chuck Bailey, a former Closter resident, to expose Republicans' desperation and lies in the battle over passing health care reform? Isn't it the job of the media, including The Record, to sort out fact from fiction? But it's clear the former Hackensack daily's editors and owners are interested only in selling newspapers.

In Local  today, Teaneck reporter Joseph Ax has two education stories, but Deirdre Sykes and the other desperate editors resort to using the Dean's List again to flesh out "every day" coverage, ignoring schools in Hackensack, Englewood and many other Bergen County towns.

The L-6 story on an age-bias lawsuit by a Washington Township police sergeant speaks volumes about the folly of home rule and the buffoonish officials who run our lives and set our property taxes. The mayor apparently admitted to a "local newspaper reporter" he wanted to promote younger officers to "stabilize the long-term succession of leadership in the department."

Finally, why did the editors bury on L-7 an update about the Teaneck mom who saved her home from foreclosure by baking cakes? Like the original, no other paper had this success story from one of the core towns in Bergen County (photo: Zoe's Cupcake Cafe).