CEO at non-profit HUMC is being paid nearly $3M a year

Fort Lee has become known as a destination for affordable Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese and other Asian food. Now, The Record's food editor reports, a high-end Korean steak restaurant will open in July on the ground floor of the Hudson Lights development, left, serving a full menu of mystery beef.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Even as Hackensack University Medical Center defends its non-profit, tax-exempt status in its cash-strapped host city, CEO Robert C. Garrett is being paid nearly $3 million a year.

And Garrett's salary of $2.72 million was for 2012, according to a 2014 investigation by NJBIZ.com.

See: "Medical Millionaires"

Web site

The Web site of the tax-subsidized hospital lists Garrett, but contains no information on his current compensation.

NJBIZ.com identifies Garrett as head of the "$1.72 billion Hackensack University Health Network."

HUMC and other non-profits are defending a legislative proposal that would have them make "community service contributions" in lieu of property taxes.

The city of Hackensack, where several non-profits shift the property tax burden onto residents, would receive $690,762.50, if the bill becomes law, according to The Record.

HUMC is paying about $4,877,000 a year on its taxable property in the city.

But most of its property is tax-exempt. 

Those buildings would normally yield an additional $10,623,000 a year in taxes, Tax Assessor Art Carlson says.

Hackensack news

The Record's local assignment desk hasn't done any reporting on the compensation of Garrett or anyone else running HUMC nor has it been covering recent Hackensack City Council meetings.

But Staff Writer Todd South, the reporter assigned to Hackensack and Maywood, made sure he got a seat at a court hearing on Thursday involving a marriage license for Richard Salkin, the Hackensack Board of Education lawyer.

Today, South reports Judge Roy F. McGeady, presiding judge for the Municipal Courts, dismissed a harassment complaint by city Registrar Maria Tartaglione as well as a counter complaint by Salkin (L-1).

Mystery meat

The Better Living cover today puts the focus on the mystery meat that will fill the menus of North Jersey restaurants slated to open in the coming months -- "from a funky Mexican joint to a high-end American steakhouse" (BL-1).

Food Editor Esther Davidowitz does her best to promote eight restaurants sight unseen.

Most of them are expected to advertise heavily in The Record.

On Friday, the paper's chief restaurant critic, Elisa Ung, offered a lukewarm, 2-star review of the pricey Ho-Ho-Kus Inn and Tavern, saying the chef's "flavors are all over the map."

The restaurant also lost points for desserts she labeled "heavy," "dry," "bland" or "unremarkable."

Those same words could describe her review.

Christie: Vindictive leader or totally in the dark?

Fort Lee Borough Hall, where Governor Christie apologized to Democratic Mayor Mark Sokolich on Thursday afternoon for four days of politically inspired gridlock at the George Washington Bridge in early September. The visit by Christie and a media flash mob closed streets and caused traffic mayhem in the borough.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

Three more pages of Bridgegate coverage in The Record today is missing even an attempt to answer the biggest question at the center of the growing scandal.

Are we to believe that Governor Christie remained in the dark until this week -- despite hundreds of e-mails  circulating among his top aides and cronies at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (A-1, A-6 and A-7)?

Christie, the GOP bully who seems more suited to the roll of vindictive leader, claims he was lied to by a top aide and only learned about the plot to tie up Fort Lee traffic from a media report on Wednesday morning.

A victim?

Syndicated columnist Mark Shields, a commentator on PBS, said Friday night that Christie portrays himself as a "victim" in the Bridgegate scandal.

Shields recalled how Christie, on Aug. 26, 2011, was totally in control when he ordered Jersey shore residents to get the hell off the beach before Hurricane Irene hit.

Now, Shields said, Christie expects us to believe he was "detached, he was disengaged, he didn't know" anything about the plot to cause gridlock as a form of political payback to the Democratic mayor of Fort Lee.

Lack of concern

"He didn't once express real, genuine, authentic Chris Christie concern for the lives of people whose lives were disrupted [by the gridlock]," Shields noted.

Shields called the GWB lane closures "a ruthless act, a cheap political trick."

Don't you wonder why the editors, columnists, reporters and editorial writers at The Record aren't expressing the same concerns?

Another big error

Thanks to another major screw-up by six-figure Production Editor Liz Houlton, a Bridgegate editorial on A-11 today is a real mess:

The headline and sub-headline are broken -- headline words appear over and under a photo of former Port Authority bigwig David Wildstein -- and text is cut off in mid-sentence at the end (A-11).

Ex-clerk is engaged

In Hackensack news, residents learn Debra Heck, the former city clerk, is the fiancee of school board lawyer and former municipal attorney and prosecutor Richard Salkin, an ally of the Zisa political dynasty (L-3).

The story by Staff Writer Hannan Adely quotes from e-mails by City Councilwoman Rose Greenman, a member of a reform slate that swept the Zisa team out of office this year.

Salkin is now representing Heck, who has said she intends to sue the city, claiming her removal was based on her "perceived political views."

Editors' snow job

In Friday's Hackensack Chronicle, two photos reveal what a terrible job municipal crews did in cleaning up after the Jan. 2 snowstorm.

One shows a pedestrian trying "to figure out how to cross the Anderson Street Bridge [between Hackensack and Teaneck], which was snow and ice covered."

In decades of weather coverage in The Record, I haven't seen a similar photo from any one of the 90 or so towns in the daily's circulation area. 

Gritty and slimy

Yet another restaurant reviewed by Staff Writer Elisa Ung bombs.

What else would you expect from Biggie's in Ramsey, where fresh clams are fried and seafood is served on pizzas or covered in a pink cream sauce (BL-14).

You know the food is just awful when Ung devotes the first third of her review to history, decor and service.

The dessert-obsessed reviewer was even repelled by the "tooth-hurting" peanut butter pie and "slimy" cheesecake. Ouch.

Yet, she doesn't rate it "Poor." Go figure. A waste of money and a waste of our time.