When journalism and politics collide, readers are big losers

Cartoonist Dave Granlund speaks for tens of millions of people across the United States.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

In a major disservice to readers, Columnists Charles Stile and Mike Kelly of The Record aren't giving up their focus on partisan politics.

Stile's front-page piece discusses the coming political battles over a number of issues in Trenton and Washington, ignoring which outcomes would be good for the state and the nation (1A).

On the Opinion front, Kelly tackles Governor Christie's declining popularity, and such compelling questions as "can the Democrats [who control the state Legislature] find their mojo?"

'One nation'

The Record is part of Gannett's USA Today network, which explains why a woman in far-off Virginia is the first "exceptional American" featured in a new series, "One Nation" (1A and 1O).

The series will focus on someone "who unites, rather than divides, our communities" -- an apparent reference to the hate speech that got President-in-Waiting Donald J. Trump elected on Nov. 8.

Past and present

Today and Saturday, editors and reporters looked at the past year in "Remembering North Jerseyans we mourned in 2016" and forward in "17 people to watch in 2017."

On Friday's front page, an article discussed the medical basis for concluding that Debbie Reynolds died of a broken heart one day after the death of her daughter, actress Carrie Fisher.

But when Teaneck Mayor Lizette Parker died at 44 in 2016, as noted on Saturday's front page, The Record never attempted to explain in medical terms why she and so many other African-Americans die in their 40s and 50s.

'Oh shoot!'

In November, when Gannett launched an unannounced redesign of The Record, production of the paper was shifted to Neptune from Woodland Park.

As a result, errors have soared to a new level, especially in photo captions.

On Saturday, probably because of the enormous amount of space devoted to a fire in a garbage compactor chute in Paterson, one error jumped out.

"Chute" was spelled "shoot" in the caption for an enormous photo showing firefighters in front of a high-rise on Presidential Boulevard (3L on Saturday).

A second photo caption that day, this one on 6L, apparently was taken from NorthJersey.com, because it is in the present tense: 

"A wrong-way accident is causing traffic problems on Route 21 ....[italics added]." 

Also, the day of the accident is given as "Friday morning on Dec. 30, 2016."  

Group of the day

The editors continue to run Page 1 stories on groups:

On Thursday, a so-called Analysis declared environmentalists are "optimistic" about 2017. 

On Friday, adoptees were said to be looking forward to Jan. 1 and a new state law calling for the release of their birth certificates, which could identify their mothers.

Food crawl

Ridgewood and Englewood are two Bergen County towns known for their restaurants, but Friday's "food crawl" in the Better Living section suggested readers jump into their cars for a much longer trip to Nyack, N.Y.

The article carries the byline of Liz Johnson, and guess what, she is the former food editor at a Gannett newspaper who lives in Nyack, and helped conduct a similar food crawl in the town last summer.

How convenient for her, and how inconvenient for Bergen County readers.

Another problem is that Johnson provides no prices for any of the dishes she sampled at four restaurants.

Page 1 focus on minorities recalls discrimination of the past

A poster on the shuttered New Jersey Naval Museum in Hackensack, above, and the beached gangway that once gave visitors access to the USS Ling, below. The World War II sub is stuck in the mud of the Hackensack River, and tied up to property owned by North Jersey Media Group, publisher of The Record. 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Positive images of Native Americans, Muslims and African-Americans in North Jersey appear on the front page of The Record today in a rare focus on minorities.

The stories recall past instances when the editors marginalized those groups.

Ford pollution

The Record's 2005 series -- "Toxic Legacy" -- won journalism awards, but did little to prove Ford Motor Co. waste -- first dumped in 1967 -- was sickening and killing members of the Ramapough Native American tribe in Ringwood.

And in 2010, The Record urged the Ramapoughs to settle their lawsuit against the automaker for $12.5 million, allowing the lawyers to grab the lion's share of the money, and pay 633 adults and children only $4,368 to $34,595 each.

Today, the Woodland Park daily reports borough residents want to hold a referendum to kill a plan to cap 166,000 tons of contaminated soil in favor of removing it (A-1).

Still, the first reference to the Ramapoughs on Page 1 today is a mean-spirited description of their "low-income neighborhood."

Crime stories

Less than a decade ago, an African-American would have to be charged with a serious crime to land on the front page, unless the editors were running Black History Month stories.

Today, the funeral and burial of Teaneck Mayor Lizette Parker, 44, is Page 1 news, including a moving tribute from a Muslim councilman who once was part of a coalition that spurned her (A-1).

Still, The Record continues to ignore the hard-working, God-fearing Jamaican-American community in Englewood, Teaneck and Hackensack unless one of them is involved in gun violence or drug dealing.

Silk City Syrians

After the November terrorist attacks in Paris, Governor Christie wanted to bar Syrian refugees, even children, from New Jersey.

The editors' response took more than a week, but they finally published a positive story about Syrian merchants in Paterson decrying the governor's stereotype.

Today, Muslim leaders in New Jersey are quoted as "reacting warily" to an FBI plan to "cut terrorism off at its roots," as the headline states (A-1).

Still, The Record is the only major daily in the state that failed to call for Christie's resignation after he endorsed GOP presidential front-runner, Muslim hater and racist Donald Trump.

The USS Ling in a photo taken a week ago.

Local news?

Just one look at today's Local section tells Bergen County readers they won't find much news about their towns today.

On L-1, they find an enormous weather-related photo, and another column on the test for a learner's permit.

On L-3, a "Monthly News Quiz" wastes an enormous amount of space, and four major stories in the section are from Passaic County (L-1, L-2 and L-3), further cheating Bergen readers.

Healthier eating

In today's Better Living profile, Susan Ungaro of River Vale says she want the James Beard Foundation "to help move the needle on important food policy issues" (BL-1).

Celebrity chefs "can teach America how to eat better and be healthier and be socially conscious about important issues," says Ungaro, president of the culinary arts foundation.

Sadly, Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung, the reporter who wrote the profile, and Record Food Editor Esther Davidowitz don't see any part for journalists in that mission.

What else can readers conclude from Ung rarely telling them whether the food she samples is naturally raised or grown, and her obsession with meat and artery clogging desserts?

Meanwhile, Davidowtiz fills her food pages with promotions of restaurants, bakeries and other businesses that advertise in The Record. 

When incompetence is rewarded, readers are biggest losers

On weekdays, the parking lots at 150 River St., the old headquarters of The Record, are filled with cars from Hackensack University Medical Center, continuing the cozy relationship with North Jersey Media Group first established when Vice President/General Counsel Jennifer A. Borg sat on the hospital board. It's unclear how The Record can be objective about HUMC, a huge non-profit that increases the tax burden on every home and business owner in Hackensack. 

These booths for attendants were built after NJMG landed a two-year $777,660 contract through July 2015 to accommodate the cars of jurors, attorneys and visitors in the River Street lots during construction of a Justice Center and parking garage near the Bergen County Courthouse in Hackensack.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Less than a week before North Jerseyans have to make hefty quarterly property tax payments, the pages of The Record are filled with anything but local news.

Editor Deirdre Sykes' front page today has readers choking on state and national politics, sports and $2 gas (A-1).

And only a day after Page 1 reported the unexpected death of Teaneck Mayor Lizette Parker at 44, Sykes is so bored with the story she demotes the tributes and outpouring of grief to the Local front (L-1).

There isn't much else in the local-news section today except Law & Order news (L-1, L-2, L-3 and L-6).

You have to wonder why after the death of Parker on Sunday and Prince at 57 just last Thursday, the clueless Sykes hasn't assigned a story exploring why so many blacks die young.

In fact, why hasn't the paper's chief medical writer, Lindy Washburn, proposed such a story instead of wasting nearly two full Sunday pages on a man who is awaiting his second heart transplant in 20 years?

The damage of focusing on such medical freaks is that readers never learn tens of thousands of people who have cardiac surgery every year feel better than ever and go on to leave productive lives. 

Promotions

As head assignment editor, Sykes and sidekick Dan Sforza ran Local for years, scrambling to fill holes in the local-news report with accident photos, minor fires, crime and court news, and the Dean's List. 

As if to reward their incompetence, Sykes and Sforza were promoted in January, she to editor of the entire paper and he to managing editor, though all he seems to be "managing" is his free time.

Their promotions followed the elevation of Liz Houlton to six-figure production editor after she left a trail of typos and errors in Food and other sections when she was running the features copy desk.

Gannett bid

On the first Business page today, the editors censor a story on newspaper publisher Gannett offering to buy some of the nation's biggest newspapers (L-7).

Gannett owns six daily newspapers in New Jersey, and is rumored to have made offers to the Borg family for The Record.

Today, the editors don't mention those Gannett papers, just like the Woodland Park daily never reported they and the Star-Ledger called for Governor Christie to resign after he endorsed racist Donald Trump for president.

Cost-cutting

As the business story reports, Gannett long has been associated with cost-cutting and "shedding jobs" after acquiring newspapers (L-8).

But The Record's publisher, Stephen A. Borg, has done that on his own in the past decade.

Those moves include shifting the printing of The Record and Herald News to Rockaway Township, and firing more than 50 printers; a major newsroom downsizing in 2008 and the abandonment of Hackensack in 2009.

The downsizing saw the departure of employees who had worked for The Record for 20, 30 or more years.

Those cuts were made several months after Borg got a $3.65 million mortgage from his family's North Jersey Media Group for the purchase of a Tenafly McMansion, where he lives with his wife and four sons.

Freeze on raises

In the last few years, Borg froze newsroom raises and, more recently, stopped replacing reporters who leave the paper.

All of that has contributed to a drastic decline in the accuracy, quality and quantity of local-news coverage.

A recent example was how Sykes and Sforza ignored the candidates and issues in last Tuesday's school board and budget election in Hackensack, the biggest school system in Bergen County.

Meanwhile, the Borgs anticipate selling nearly 20 acres along River Street to an apartment developer after the Hackensack City Council declared the parcel in need of redevelopment, and awarded a multi-year tax break to the buyer.