Is Waldwick chief still sending cops on suicide mission?

An aerial photo from PIX11 TV news after a tractor-trailer smashed into the unmarked car of Waldwick Police Officer Christopher Goodell, who was parked at the side of Route 17 south on July 17, 2014, operating radar to catch speeders. He was killed instantly, authorities said.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

With speed cameras readily available, posting a police officer at the side of a highway to catch speeding tractor-trailers and other vehicles is nothing less than a suicide mission.

But that's exactly what Waldwick Police Chief Mark Messner did, leading to the death of Police Officer Christopher Goodell, who was little more than a sitting duck at 1:30 a.m. on July 17, 2014.

Now, a Bergen County grand has declined to indict truck driver Ryon Cumberbatch on a vehicular homicide charge, The Record reports on Page 1 today in a story that leaves many questions unanswered.

Was driver asleep?

The story by Staff Writer Allison Pries and Jim Norman says it isn't clear whether Cumberbatch was speeding, but there is nothing on whether he fell asleep at the wheel (A-1 and A-8).

Prosecutor John Molinelli is quoted as saying at the time of the crash "Cumberbatch drove directly into the police car without stopping or attempting to stop."

Still, no one knows whether the grand jurors decided they couldn't find the truck driver acted recklessly in causing the death of Goodell, as they would have to do to hand up a vehicular homicide indictment.

The story also errs in comparing an indictment to "a finding that there is enough evidence of probable guilt to go to trial" (A-8).

Many grand juries are said to be rubber stamps of prosecutors, and one judge noted grand jurors will, if asked, "indict a ham sandwich."

More holes 

Today's story also is silent on the inevitable lawsuit Goodell's family can file, seeking damages from the driver and truck's owner, J.B. Hunt Transportation Services.

Road Warrior Columnist John Cichowski, who wrote several columns about Goodell's death and people who own homes on the edge of the highway, must have been fast asleep when news of the grand jury's decision broke on Tuesday. 

Stile on Christie

In the last line of his Page 1 column today, Staff Writer Charles Stile says Governor Christie "is perhaps the most desperate" of the candidates seeking the GOP presidential nomination (A-10).

Of course, few readers will get that far after glancing at another front-page headline and Stile column that seems little more than an apology for Christie's racially inspired scree against President Obama, Syrian refugees and black victims of police shootings (A-1).

Daibes and Borgs

Another Page 1 story today -- on a proposed deal between the state Department of Environmental Protection and multimillionaire Fred Daibes -- is the second major story about the developer and restaurant owner since Saturday.

The proposal is called lenient and a slap on the wrist, with Daibes required to pay only a third of a drastically lower cash penalty (A-1).

Daibes dropped out last year as developer of 19.7 acres along River Street in Hackensack owned by North Jersey Media Group, publisher of The Record.

Local news

Christie isn't the only one who is desperate.

Local Assignment Editors Deirdre Sykes and Dan Sforza really scrambled to fill today's thin section, with two major Paterson stories on the front (L-1).

Police, court and non-fatal accident news can be found throughout the section.

There is some relief in the obituary of Alice Ramsey Burns, 105, "the product of an early Hackensack family prominent in the realms of politics and motoring," but that story is buried on L-6.

Healthy recipes

Congratulations to Food Editor Esther Davidowitz for publishing a few healthy recipes among the usual mindless promotion of fatty pork and artery clogging desserts (BL-1, BL-2 and BL-3).

Three of the recipes, all free of butter and cream, are from freelancer Kate Morgan Jackson, who has been known to use those artery clogging ingredients with abandon.

Page 1 goes tabloid on robbery of builder tied to Borgs

Hackensack will lose Costco Wholesale on South River Street after a bigger warehouse store opens next month in the Teterboro Landing Shopping Center. This is how the Teterboro Costco looked last Friday.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Would you look at the hysterical woman in the photo centerpiece on Page 1 of The Record today.

That's not all, as readers find out if they turn to the full story and more photos of the suspects and their lawyers (L-1 and L-6).

The woman and two men, including the father of her son, are being held in the 2013 home invasion and robbery of Fred Daibes in his luxury Edgewater penthouse.

"Tuesday was the plea cutoff date for the four defendants in the case," which is alleged to have been an inside job, Staff Writer Peter J. Sampson reports.

Why is this procedural court hearing on A-1 today?

That may have something to do with Daibes, a developer who once proposed to build apartments on 19.7 acres North Jersey Media Group owns in Hackensack, site of The Record's old headquarters.

Of course, the story is silent on Daibes' relationship to the Borg family, which controls NJMG.

Woman hit by car

Another front-page story today seems to gloss over the actions of the driver who struck Jo-Ann Hans, 60, a Bergenfield crossing guard who was helping worshipers around 8 a.m. on the second day of the Jewish new year (A-1).

"On Tuesday night, she was unconscious and on life support in a hospital bed," The Record reports.

But the identity of driver and the charges against him don't appear until deep on the continuation page (A-8).

That's also where readers find complaints about speeders, the reason a crossing guard was needed in the first place on New Bridge Road and Westminster Avenue.

"Pedestrians mean nothing," Shimmy Stein is quoted as saying.

Stein, chairman of Bergenfield's zoning board, was referring to drivers, but his observation also can be applied to local Assignment Editors Deirdre Sykes and Dan Sforza.

On another slow-news day, calling all morons

On Friday morning, this bicyclist and a friend made better progress along narrow, antiquated Passaic Street in Hackensack and Maywood than did many drivers, who are slowed by traffic backing up at intersections without turn lanes.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Burned-out reporter John Cichowski long ago ran out of ideas for his commuting column in The Record, and he's too lazy to cover mass transit.

So, in desperation, he sent e-mails to loyal readers, seeking comment on the plan to shift Route 17 exits from the left side of the Garden State Parkway to the right in a bid to end long backups and a high number of crashes.

Inevitably, as today's Page 1 Road Warrior column shows, the morons came out in droves with inane alternatives, including one man who wants a pothole near his home repaired (A-1). 

Most of Cichowski's readers are interested only in seeing their names in print, and they've been playing him like the fool he is for more than a decade.

Well, at least two of his readers are aware of a huge problem Cichowski has ignored: 

Declining state police enforcement of speeding and aggressive driving.

"The problem is ... a lack of police ticketing seeders," said Peter Peirano (A-6).

"The state should set up speed cameras," Steve Gigante of Hackensack said, to which I say, "Amen."

More wasted space

Virginia Rohan, another columnist who ran out of ideas, revives the finale of "The Sopranos" nearly seven years ago, and asks creator David Chase whether Tony Soprano died in the final episode (Better Living front).

Who the f--- cares? What a waste of space.

Playing catch-up

Since the George Washington Bridge scandal exploded in January, The Record has reluctantly reported that Governor Christie's first term was pretty much a disaster and that so far, his second term hasn't been any great shakes (A-1, A-3, A-4 and A-7).

On Page 1, Staff Writer Hugh R. Morley reports "New Jersey ... has lagged behind the nation in job creation."

On A-4, Staff Writer Melissa Hayes, one of Christie's chief boosters, says, "New Jersey is struggling to create jobs, maintain its credit rating and balance its budget."

In the continuation of Morley's story, the reporter says, "While the nation has added on average 215,000 jobs a month this year, New Jersey has yet to gain jobs in 2014" (A-7).

What the Woodland Park daily doesn't attempt to explain -- in view of Christie's dismal record on the economy and other areas -- is how he managed to win a second term last November.

Or why nearly every editor, reporter and columnist at The Record has spent so much time promoting Christie's presidential ambitions.

A Honda CR-V seen on Cedar Lane in Teaneck on Friday carries a license plate I haven't seen since I left The Record in 2008. "BER" stands for Bergen Evening Record.

Big Hackensack news?

On the Local front today, there is big news for Hackensack residents, I guess.

Stephen A. Borg, the Silver Spoon publisher of The Record, says a deal to develop the 19.7 acres that served as the daily's home for decades is off, but another developer is waiting in the wings (L-1).

Apartment developer Fred Daibes is out and a mysterious national firm is in, a city spokesman said.

One of the few new things in the story is the $23.44 million value of the land along River Street in Hackensack, according to state taxation officials.

Of course, the story contains a major error.

Staff Writer Christopher Maag claims the property is "one block east of Main Street," when it is, in fact, two short blocks away from the city's depressed shopping district.

The parking lot of the old Record headquarters -- part of a notorious flood zone -- is being used for the cars of visitors, attorneys and jurors who were displaced by construction of a new building next to the Bergen County Courthouse.

Editors don't I.D. crime victim as NJMG developer

On River Street in Hackensack, customers actually line up and wait for a seat at White Manna, where they pay for the privilege of eating mystery meat and other unhealthy food.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

Is the deal off between North Jersey Media Group and multimillionaire Fred Daibes for development of 20 acres in Hackensack where The Record prospered for more than 110 years?

A story on the sale of Daibes' luxury St. Moritz high-rise in Edgewater appeared in Friday's Local section (L-3), but there was no mention of whether he still plans to build apartments on the River Street property.

Despite all his wealth, Daibes apparently cut corners on security at the St. Moritz, and was a victim of a home invasion last November.

Four suspects yanked him from bed, broke his ribs and shoulder blade, and made off with nearly $2 million in cash, gold bars and other valuables, according to county prosecutors.

Daibes' luxury and exotic car collection was photographed for Bergen.com in the driveway of the St. Moritz.

The rental building, at 100 Daibes Court, boasts of hotel-like amenities, but its Web site doesn't mention security.

Today's paper

In today's edition of The Record, front-page stories speculating about the whereabouts of a missing jet and the fate of 239 people on board have been replaced by a story on the Jets (A-1).

Would four people killed by fire in a shore motel that was a refuge for Sandy survivors still be alive, if Governor Christie hadn't bungled the distribution of federal aid (A-1)?

Christie's mismanagement of state finances gets gentle treatment in another Page 1 story, which avoids discussing his inflexible stance against taxing the wealthy or raising the low gasoline tax to revive the bankrupt Transportation Trust Fund (A-1).

Local yokels

Today's Local section is heavy on Law & Order news, including a dramatic photo of a Norwood DPW garage fire that injured no one and whose cause eludes the talented local staff (L-6).

The Better Living editors waste their cover today on a half-dozen Jersey bimbos. A seventh bimbo wrote the piece (BL-1).

We've read, seen and heard this ad nauseam

The construction of booths in the parking lot of 150 River Street in Hackensack appeared complete on Sunday. Bergen County apparently will begin charging attorneys and visitors for spaces at the old headquarters of North Jersey Media Group, publisher of The Record, which left Hackensack in 2009. The spaces have been free since the lot opened in late July to make way for a new building on the old Bergen County Justice Center parking lot opposite Pep Boys.

By Victor E. Sasson
Editor

A week ago, the front page of The Record was dominated by an assessment of how business at the shore was affected by Superstorm Sandy under this headline:

"A toss-up on Shore success"

Then, in the following days, the same story was covered on TV and radio news, with lots of interviews with Governor Christie, who gave his take on lagging business at the shore.

You'd think that would be enough.

Shore weary

But Columnist Mike Kelly decided he had something unique to say, and raced down to interview an ice-cream shop owner in Asbury Park for today's front page.

Instead of landing a great story, the columnist known as "The Shit-Eating Grin" got sun stroke.

And he just added hundreds of wasted words to the avalanche of shore coverage that has alienated North Jersey readers since last October.

T&A on Page 1

Meanwhile, the photographer who made the photo of ice-cream seller Eddie Catalano that runs with Kelly's column seemed distracted by the tattooed woman in the bikini.

A few other things are apparent: 

Production Editor Liz Houlton finally has abandoned the silly "superstorm Sandy" that was used for months after the storm; the style on lower-case shore has been changed to "Shore," and Kelly burned out long ago.

Above the fold, today's front page looks a lot like last Monday's -- shore-Sandy coverage and the off-lead on Syria.

Parking news

At the old headquarters of The Record in Hackensack -- where Bergen County is leasing 540 spaces for visitors, attorneys and jurors -- the free ride appears to be over.

Two booths have been built, and the county is poised to begin charging for spaces that have been free since the lot opened in late July.

The county apparently will recoup part of the $777,660 it is paying to lease 540 spaces owned by North Jersey Media Group, publisher of The Record of Woodland Park.

Why the county agreed to pay that much for parking spaces that had baking in the sun for years is a mystery.

Flood zone

The lease will end in July 2015, apparently delaying any plans by Edgewater developer Fred Daibes for luxury apartments, retail and possibly a hotel on the 19.7 acres he reportedly has agreed to buy from NJMG.

NJMG, the Borg family and Daibes haven't explained why they think it is a good idea to build hundreds of luxury apartments in a notorious flood zone.

Many of the spaces the county is leasing will be flooded during fall and winter storms, potentially damaging vehicles.

When The Record's newsroom was at 150 River St., staffers kept Hackensack River tide tables handy, and announcements were made, alerting staffers to race out to the lot and move their cars.

Still, employees' cars were flooded and, in some cases, ruined.

I recall one year when me and other employees reporting for work were instructed to board newspaper delivery trucks on Moore Street, a block from River Street.

The trucks delivered us to the employees' entrance -- which was surrounded by several feet of water.

More Christie P.R., LTACH and the Zisa curse

Patrons can park for free in a lot or at the curb when using the U.S. Post Office in Teaneck, above. In Hackensack, the post office has no parking lot and patrons have to fight over 4 metered spaces out front or for others around the corner. The Hackensack Police Department is across the street, and tickets are not uncommon.

By Victor E. Sasson
Editor

Check out the phony photo of Staff Writer Herb Jackson with his NJ/DC political column on The Record's front page today.

Jackson -- the Woodland Park daily's so-called Washington correspondent -- is trying to give the impression he carefully considers every word, when, in fact, he writes off the top of his highly partisan head (A-1).

Jackson is part of the paper's public relations machinery for Governor Christie and other conservative Republicans.

Who can forget his Page 1 story on a Tea Party rally in Washington a few years ago, when Jackson conveniently ignored a large photo of dead Jews the Republican crackpots were using to compare health-care reform to the Holocaust?

Despite what Jackson says, Christie's true, partisan  nature is well-known. 

He set back a mass-transit expansion by decades when he killed two Hudson River rail tunnels.

And the GOP bully went to bat for wealthy business owners by vetoing a hike in the minimum wage (A-3).

Hackensack updates

Two Hackensack stories on the front of Local today update readers on long-running controversies (L-1).

As expected, a Superior Court judge ruled the developer of a proposed 19-story hospital on Prospect Avenue got "a fair hearing" before the city's zoning board turned down his application, 5-0, in January 2012.

A lawyer says the backer of the Bergen-Passaic Long Term Acute Care Hospital (LTACH) will appeal the decision (L-6).

The Borgs, Zisa curse

Of course, the Borgs and North Jersey Media Group could have offered to sell their 19.7 acres along River Street to LTACH's developer, defusing the long-running controversy.

But the greedy publishing family has chosen developer Fred Daibes, who promises to flood the area with luxury apartments, putting further strain on the city's public schools.

In return, The Record fills its news columns with favorable coverage of Daibes, a multimillionaire from Edgewater.

The second story amounts to the curse of former Police Chief Ken "I Am The Law" Zisa returning to haunt Hackensack.

Another lawsuit

Zisa is under house arrest while he appeals convictions for insurance fraud and official misconduct, but now he is suing the city and the former president of its police union.

It is city residents who should be suing former City Council members and other city officials for not firing Zisa years ago, when problems in the Police Department first surfaced.

As it is, the LTACH and Zisa cases prove once again only the lawyers win as they rake in unconscionably high legal fees from both sides.

Boring columnists insult readers' intelligence

It's smooth driving after years of slow going over roughly patched pavement on Hackensack's Euclid Avenue, between Main Street and the railroad tracks.

By Victor E. Sasson
Editor

The Christie Apologist (Charles Stile). The Shit-Eating Grin (Mike Kelly). The Vagina Monologue (Tara Sullivan). The Addled Commuter (John Cichowski). The Momma's Boy (Bill Ervolino).

The Record's sorry lot of columnists are on full display in today's Sunday edition, with two of the morons on the front page.

How can Charles Stile call Governor Christie "the Jersey savior" and a "moderate" or compare him to Bill Clinton after the GOP bully used numerous vetoes to get his way, and broke his promise to lower local property taxes (A-1)?

Egypt, trollies

Why is Mike Kelly writing about a Jersey City jewelry store owner who can't retire to his native Egypt, and ignoring thousands of Jamaican-Americans in North Jersey whose island homeland has been in crisis for far longer (A-1)?

And the A-1 photo that accompanies Kelly's column is initially confusing. That's not the "Ahmed" he is writing about.

Why is the increasingly irrelevant Road Warrior waxing nostalgic over a form of mass transit that hasn't run for more than 80 years or is this just another way John Cichowski can avoid getting out of the office and doing some legwork (L-1)?

Selling out

You have to sympathize with Your Money's Worth Columnist Kevin DeMarrais, a lone voice for consumers in The Record, which continues to promote business and developers, including those with ties to the Borg family (B-1).

A couple of years ago, DeMarrais himself wrote a story for the Business section about a woman who sold a multimillion-dollar private jet to Chairman Malcolm A. "Mac" Borg and his pal, real estate mogul Jon F. Hanson.

Today, the Real Estate cover story eagerly quotes Edgewater builder Fred Daibes, without ever telling readers the multimillionaire who has skirted environmental regulations has agreed to buy the Borg family's 20 acres in Hackensack to build luxury apartments (R-1).

Farm to garden

It's only been a few weeks since Elisa Ung returned from her second maternity leave, but the restaurant reviewer has quickly abandoned the consumer focus of her Sunday column, The Corner Table (BL-1).

The chef and restaurant she writes about today is in Princeton. Hey, let's jump in the car and drive almost 60 miles for dinner.

Don't we all have 150 cookbooks and throw dinner parties?

You'd think so from the Better Living cover story by the new food editor, Esther Davidowitz (BL-1).

On BL-3, in another boring column about his family, Bill Ervolino writes about homeowners who grow huge zucchinis or what amounts to penis envy among gardeners.

The Borg siblings to Hackensack: Drop dead!

The Record's eyesore property in Hackensack, above and below, stands in stark contrast to the flattering photo that appears on Page 1 of the Woodland Park daily today.

A developer likely will pay more than $20 million for North Jersey Media Group's 19.7 acres along River Street. The terms of the deal weren't disclosed in The Record's story.

No dumpsters in this view, similar to the A-1 photo.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

If developer Fred Daibes follows through on plans to raze The Record's old headquarters and build apartment buildings, Hackensack's public schools won't be able to accommodate the children who live there (A-1).

The residential development would be the third to be built in the city in three or four years, and the schools are already bursting at the seams.

Avalon, a Hackensack Avenue complex, is now renting, and another developer just broke ground on a 222-unit State Street building.

The Borg family's North Jersey Media Group gave Hackensack a good screwing in 2009, when it abandoned the city where The Record had prospered for 110 years.

Now, the Borgs are telling city and school officials to drop dead.

Better uses for land

The wealthy publishing family could have offered the 19.7 acres to another developer, Richard Pineles, defusing a huge legal battle over a 19-story acute-care hospital  proposed for a small Prospect Avenue parcel.

Or, they could have sold the land to a retailer, such as Costco Wholesale, which is rumored to be leaving Hackensack to build a larger store in Teterboro.

Questionable deal

Instead, they are selling to Daibes, a restaurant owner and bank founder who has allegedly violated numerous state and federal regulations, and who has been treated gently by The Record. 

Publisher Stephen A. Borg claims in today's story,  "There always has been, continues to be, and always will be a separation between the business side and editorial" (A-7).

But that doesn't go for friends, lawyers and others who do business with the Borgs, judging from all the promotional stories about them in recent years.

Just the other day, Jon F. Hanson was identified as Governor Christie's chief adviser on the retail-entertainment monstrosity known as American Dreams Meadowlands (Sunday, A-7).

Hanson also is a real estate mogul who co-owns a private jet with his best friend, Chairman Malcolm A. "Mac" Borg.

Apartment plan

Daibes will need all the public relations skills of his politically connected spokesman, Alan Marcus, to market what today's story describes as "upscale high-rise apartment buildings along the Hackensack River."

The Record's old 4th-floor newsroom afforded a sweeping view of the Manhattan skyline in the distance -- as long as you overlooked a hulking industrial building and oil tanks in the foreground, and the elevated New Jersey Turnpike in mid-distance.

No pollution?

Also in today's story, Jennifer A. Borg, NJMG's vice president/general counsel, pledges there are "no environmental issues that will prevent redevelopment."

Christie budget

The $33 billion state budget approved by the Legislature doesn't include expanded preschool acess, women's health care or a tax credit for the working poor (A-6).

Ex-Hackensack mayor blasts independent candidate

The entrance to the polls at the Fairmount Elementary School on Grand Avenue in Hackensack, where independent City Council candidate Victor E. Sasson voted for himself this morning, below.

"X" marks a vote for Sasson (Line 11), editor of Eye on The Record.

On a beautiful day for voting, independent City Council candidate Victor E. Sasson drove down to his polling place this morning, and was blasted by ex-Mayor Jack Zisa and Open Government candidate Joseph Barreto, one of "the Zisa slate" puppets.

Zisa -- standing on the street corner with Barreto -- was incensed that Sasson's campaign flier urged voters "to end the corrupt rule of the Zisa family."

Zisa saw one of the fliers on Monday night, when Sasson's wife and teenage son distributed them on Poplar Avenue, where the former mayor lives.

Barreto followed Sasson to his car, and criticized him for telling voters the Zisa-backed candidate doesn't send his children to the public schools, calling that an attack on Baretto's religion.

Lara L. Rodriguez, left, who was elected to the Board of Education in April, leaving the voting booth this morning at the Fairmount School. Her candidacy was backed by Hackensack's political machine, which has controlled the city for decades.

 

State Sen. Loretta Weinberg refused to "get involved" in Hackenack's non-partisan municipal election, opening the way for Newark Mayor Cory Booker to make a robo call backing candidates from the Coalition for Open Government, also known as "the Zisa slate."

Open Government candidates also are backed by Lynne Hurwitz, the city's Democratic boss and the power behind Ken Zisa, the disgraced former state Assemblyman and convicted ex-police chief, and brother of Jack Zisa, who served as mayor for 16 years, until 2005.

Another Democratic party figure, the widow of state Sen. Byron Baer of Englewood, also sent out a letter mounting a scurrilous attack on the Citizens for Change slate of reformers.

The letter from Linda Baer, a former state Administrative Law Judge and Bergen County freeholder, carried a Clinton Street address.

Residents may have wondered why Linda Baer would get involved in a Hackensack election.

It turns out Lara L. Rodriguez, one of the successful machine candidates for Board of Education last month, is Byron Baer's daughter.  

How cozy everyone is in Hackensack.

Dissing Hackensack

The Record hasn't mentioned the election since a front-page story last Thursday.

Today, the Woodland Park daily finally publishes a story about the approval of Hackensack's $91.9 million budget a week ago.

Of course, property taxes are going up, piling on a 65% increase in recent years under the current City Council, which has raped the taxpayer.

The story on L-3 is a reprint from the weekly Hackensack Chronicle, and fails to mention today's crucial election.

The polls are open until 8 p.m. today.

Hackensack voters, throw off your chains.

Multimillionaire banker and developer Fred Daibes has expressed an interest in the 20 acres along River Street in Hackensack owned by the Borg family, publishers of The Record and Herald News, according to rumors circulating today.

Borgs, Daibes et al.

The Record and the Borg family were the subject of Election Day rumors in Hackensack.

Fred Daibes, founder of Mariner's Bank in Edgewater, apparently has expressed an interest in developing 20 acres on River Street, former headquarters of The Record, which moved out in 2009.

That might explain why Daibes -- one of the county's most politically active developers -- came out smelling like a rose in Sunday's Page 1 expose of unsecured Mariner's Bank loans to Democratic Party bigwig Joseph Ferriero and others.

The story was written by Jean Rimbach, whose rare byline exposes her as the least productive member of the newsroom.

Rimbach keeps her job, because of her friendship with head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes, a lifer who seems immune to being fired, despite the drastic decline in local news in the past decade.