Challenge to Mother Hen Deirdre?

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Mac Borg, who stayed behind at The Record's Hackensack headquarters after his two spoiled brats downsized the paper and scattered just about everyone else to Woodland Park and other offices, has resurfaced in connection with plans for the nearly 20-acre parcel on River Street.


Business finally got around to reporting on the future of stalled development near the Hackensack River in Hackensack -- a story that has long been neglected by head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and Staff Writer Monsy Alvarado, who is supposed to cover River City.


On Page L-10 today, former Publisher Malcolm A. "Mac" Borg is quoted as saying North Jersey Media Group plans to complete the move out of 150 River St. by March 2011, "relocating within Hackensack to maintain a strong presence in the city." The reporter goes on to paraphrase Mac, who adds that many editorial and sales personnel will work out of the company's new office.

I wonder what Mac, now chairman of the NJMG board, means by many. If he moves too many reporters and editors to the new Hackensack office, it likely will be seen as a challenge to Mother Hen Deirdre, who likes to keep Alvarado, Staff Writer Jean Rimbach and many others close at hand to do her beck and call.

Was the sensational trial of the nanny ever on Page 1 before she was cleared by a Superior Court jury of having sex with a 12-year-old boy? Why put it on the front today? Did coverage of this Passaic County trial so damage the woman's reputation the desperate editors felt only the lead story could clear her name?

The rest of A-1 is covered by the fourth part of the way-too-long youth baseball series -- when the paper should be devoting that kind of space to the obesity epidemic, which every editor has ignored.

Despite Page 1 stories about the right-wing Tea Party by Washington Correspondent Herb Jackson, its candidates did little in yesterday's primary elections to justify that coverage.

In Local, the only Hackensack news is yet another story about Police Chief Ken Zisa, and a hearing on whether he should be paid during his suspension. There are stories about the Tenafly and Ramsey municipal budgets, but still nothing about the proposed tax hike in Hackensack.

In Better Living, Food Editor Bill Pitcher tells readers he's "wandering the region's farmers' markets" and will have "a new dispatch" every Wednesday. Dispatch? Are we to imagine him on horseback? In view of his size, can he even mount a horse?