Editors commit more crimes against readers

Bergen County Courthouse in Hackensack (joseph a)

There are four interesting, newsworthy stories on the front page of The Record today, but the editors of the Local news section continue to rely too heavily on crime stories.

Local is dominated by a not-guilty plea from the suspect in the arson murder of a widow, and the testimony of a suspended police officer who is charged with altering "his license plates."

License-plate alteration? Is that big local news, even if a cop is charged with doing it?

Corrupt editing

Meanwhile, head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza downplay two stories about Bergen County Executive Kathleen Donovan, who vetoed an attempt to water down the county's pay-to-play ordinance.

That important story is buried on L-3 -- a crime against Bergen readers, who lived for too many years under disappointing Democratic county administrations.

Time to go

If Sykes and Sforza aren't deciding the best "play" of stories, The Record can save tons of money by kicking their lazy, incompetent asses off of Garret Mountain.

If they decided to bury this anti-corruption story, the Borgs should certainly kick them out. 

Editorial treats


Look at the L-1 story on Daniel Rochat, suspect in the murder of Barbara Vernieri, whom he had known for decades -- a follow-up on his arrest (Page 1 on Friday).

As usual, Bergen Prosecutor John Molinelli is giving out information on the investigation and Rochat bit by bit, and Sykes and Sforza are acting like lap dogs yapping for treats.

He gets mail

On the front of Friday's Local section, most of the Road Warrior column is based on e-mails from readers -- another sign Staff Writer John Cichowski ran out of ideas long ago (L-1).

Commuting by car, bus and train is a daily ordeal in the metropolitan area, but Cichowski devotes his thrice-weekly column to issues that have nothing to with the daily trek to and from work.

Oh, on the continuation page, Cichowski does mention how some commuters can take their bicycles aboard trains (L-10).

But he fails to note that all of the new local buses operated by NJ Transit (they're painted white) have front-mounted bike racks.

That omission is typical of Cichowski's incomplete, often inaccurate columns.

(See previous post, "Reader blasts Road Warrior errors.")  

Uneducated news play

With five pages of Friday's Local section devoted to higher education, there is little local news.

Sykes and Sforza buried a preview of Donovan's veto all the way back on L-10.

At the top of that page, a story on an NJ Transit bus driver who was charged with vehicular homicide -- allegedly killing one of her passengers -- doesn't even include the number of her local bus line.

Was it the No. 780 bus, which runs from Englewood through Hackensack to the city of Passaic, where the 49-year-old man was killed? Let the guessing game begin.

Welcome profile

Also buried in Friday's Local section is Staff Writer Denisa R. Superville's wonderful profile of Teaneck institution Lou Schwartz, 100 (L-11).

Usually, thanks to Sykes and Sforza, we only read about people like Schwartz after they're dead.

Stranding readers

If I was stranded in Mahwah and starving, I wouldn't eat at the mediocre Zaytoon, the subject of a full-blown restaurant review on Friday (Better Living, BL-20-21).

Why does Staff Writer Elisa Ung bother to write about places like this? Couldn't she do capsules under the heading: "Certainly not worth the detour"?

She got paid for eating there, and The Record picked up the check, but that's no reason to waste our time.

Free hot air today

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Road Warrior Columnist John Cichowski needs to get off his duff and take a first-hand look at the problems of commuters -- both drivers and mass-transit users.

Instead, he spends hour after hour in the office poring over e-mails he gets from readers of The Record of Woodland Park and often takes his lead from them, because he has to turn out three columns a week and is desperate for material.

Today, on the front of Local, his column is hung on a single e-mail, and he enlists the aid of other readers to answer her question: Where can a driver find free air to keep tires inflated properly. But he doesn't go far enough and completely ignores a related issue: Gas stations that don't hit you with a surcharge for using a credit card.

Properly inflated tires improve gas mileage, but if you pay 5 cents to 10 cents more per gallon for using a credit card, the savings are canceled. I use the Shell station in Teaneck he lists as having free air, but do so because it charges the same for cash or credit, especially important for drivers like me who hold a cash-rebate card (I get 5% back on gasoline purchases).

John, you'd be a much better, more relevant columnist if you come down from Garret Mountain and rub shoulders with many of the commuters you have long ignored -- the rail and bus riders who often are ill-served by NJ Transit. You need to pay more attention to them, especially at a time when they are facing 25% fare hikes and service cuts. Now, your columns seem frivolous.

The Page 1 story on the jobless problems of returning veterans is told in the pictures -- all of the vets featured appear to be minorities, but Staff Writer Harvy Lipman doesn't discuss whether they are having a harder time than other vets finding work.


Yet, the other A-1 story is about a shortage of black donors for lifesaving stem cell or bone marrow transplants. 


I noticed a number of typos today, starting on A-1. The level of news copy editing continues to decline.

In the other sections, the best I found was Virginia Rohan's interview in Better Living with the flamboyant ex-Patersonian who scripts the Oscar show, especially his memories of Silk City in the 1950s and his anecdote about the city of Garfield after the Kennedy assassination.

Did anyone bother reading wind bags Mike Kelly and Bill Ervolino today?

Printed in Rockaway, published where?

Although it's been several years since printing of  The Record was moved to Rockaway Township, Page 2 of the paper still lists 150 River St., Hackensack, N.J., as the daily's home, under a new motto: "The Trusted Local Source."

The giveaway is the telephone number with a 973 area code -- the new headquarters on Garret Mountain in Woodland Park, where top managers and editors, the legal staff and most of the reporters and copy editors were moved.

Elsewhere on Page 2, it says, "Published daily by North Jersey Media Group Inc. at 150 River St., Hackensack, N.J. 07601-7172" and "postage paid at Hackensack, N.J."