Stephen Borg is fingered as 'the real problem'

Publisher Stephen A. Borg in an undated image from a Web site called "Who Needs Newspapers?"

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Here is an eye-opening comment from an anonymous source about Publisher Stephen A. Borg, who just fired Editor Francis "Frank" Scandale:

"[Frank] Scandale may have been spineless and a poor leader. But you should know that the real problem at The Record is [Publisher] Stephen Borg, who personally dictates what beats the paper will cover, which stories will be written and how they will be written. 

 "Every important story is personally word edited by Borg. Any story that affects his wealthy friends is killed. 

"Even as we speak, Bergen County Executive Kathe Donovan is asking local officials to approve potentially risky PILOT bonds to finance the Xanadu shopping mall.  

"The plan is being pushed by her former campaign strategist, a lobbyist named Alan C. Marcus. At the same time Marcus is advising Donovan about this huge and costly project he is also working as a paid consultant for Triple Five, the developer who is now behind the Xanadu mall and stands to benefit if Donovan approves the financing scheme. 

"A conflict of interest? In Stephen Borg's world, Marcus' involvement on both ends of this deal is not even worth a story. I am told by sources at The Record that Marcus talks on an almost daily basis with the Borg family and had this story killed. 

"Marcus was also instrumental in pushing county reporter Mike Gartland off the county beat because Gartland tried to write stories exploring Donovan's policies, including the fact that Marcus' role in controlling access to the new executive. 

"Gartland, an extraordinary reporter, has now quit and is headed for the NY Post. The Record may have many problems, but none is more frightening than a publisher whose willful ignorance and bullyism has frozen the staff and instilled terror in editors whose daily decisions are overriden."

Is northern New Jersey standing still?

Image via Wikipedia

This is as close as The Record's editors want to get to Paterson.

Readers of The Record are learning to do without news of North Jersey and their town under the weak leadership of Editor Francis Scandale and head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes.


The lead story today is about health-premium hikes for state, local and public-school employees "next year."


War and pieces


Most of the media covered the 10th anniversary of the war in Afghanistan last week, and then there is Columnist Mike Kelly-come-lately.


His story about a soldier from North Jersey who is a public affairs officer in Kandahar is interesting, but what is it doing as the main element on Page 1 today? 


Maybe Kelly's anniversary story was delayed because his call to Afghanistan didn't go through until Wednesday.


And please don't tell me the story on the Hurricane Irene overtime controversy in Paterson is North Jersey news. 


How melodramatic can you get? A Paterson City Council hearing "dissolved into chaos," reports Staff Writer Rich Cowen.


Scandale has long portrayed Silk City as a center for drugs and prostitution, and coverage of Paterson increased only after The Record abandoned Hackensack and moved to Woodland Park.


Still, you won't catch Scandale or Sykes taking on the slumlords or the banks that redline Paterson neighborhoods. Neither has the balls for groundbreaking journalism.


Borg numbers game


In an A-1 blurb and refer, the editors take a dig at The Wall Street Journal, which supplies pages of content for The Record's Sunday Business section. 


The item reports The Journal allegedly bought up copies of its own paper to inflate circulation figures and bolster ad rates. 


How is that different than Publisher Stephen A. Borg reporting The Record's circulation figures without  telling readers and advertisers they include the Herald News, a so-called "edition" of the flagship daily?


Two more corrections on A-2 join this week's embarrassing parade of screw-ups.


All fired up


On the front of Sykes' Local section today, the best the assignment desk could do is a lame photo is of a fire in a Paramus house where "no one was home." That's what readers say of Sykes' desk -- no one is home.


On L-3, NJ Transit's plans to improve local bus service don't include new rolling stock.


Below that, Staff Writer Michael Gartland quotes Governor Christie as saying "additional steps are needed for the state to realize more significant cuts to property taxes."


What cuts in property taxes?


Hackensack news? Check back next month. Maybe Kelly will do a column on the 10th anniversary of the sale of 150 River St. to Wal-Mart.

Related posts

• More stale news on the front page (eyeontherecord.blogspot.com)
• Same-old flood photos are 'good enough' (eyeontherecord.blogspot.com)
• What's Christie got against Paterson? (eyeontherecord.blogspot.com)

Did they really mean to say that?

Image via Wikipedia

Township Hall in Teaneck. Are there any bodies buried there?

On the front page of The Record of Woodland Park today, Staff Writer Joseph Ax reports a Teaneck woman "was found stabbed and beaten by firefighters."

On A-11, a headline declares "Christie as a role model for governors" over an OpEd column by former Managing Editor Jim Ahearn, who is far less certain in the text.

On A-4 in Tuesday's paper, Staff Writer Michale Gartland reported "$100 million in proposed Republican cuts at a Hackensack unemployment office" ...that ..."could lead to the elimination of more than 20,000 jobs in New Jersey."

In the case of the two news stories, just moving around a few words in one sentence would have cleared up the fractured, ambiguous writing. 

But after years of hearing higher-ups on the news side scold them for editing stories aggressively, the news copy desk is on autopilot. 

Laughable errors like this show just how incompetent Editor Francis Scandale, head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and her sub-assignment editors are: They fail to turn out sparkling, clear writing every day. Even their lead paragraphs are flawed.

Today's front page

Page 1 today has another strong New Jersey focus in all four stories, but sloppy assignment-desk editing really stands out.

In the A-1 story about a Teaneck resident who was shot dead before his house was set on fire, Ax reports the 59-year-old victim "lived alone," but on A-6, the continuation page, readers are told he is separated from his wife. 

They're not mutually exclusive, but why wasn't his wife mentioned right away or, for that matter, his two grown daughters?

And isn't it weird how the victim's autopsy results were disclosed a couple of days after his death -- in contrast to the autopsy of Teaneck Police Officer John Abraham, who died in a high-speed crash of his police cruiser on Oct. 23, across Teaneck Road from headquarters.

Those results were never released by Teaneck Police Chief Robert Wilson and Ax never tried to get them from other sources. Was Wilson trying to hide something about Abraham's condition the night he died?

Local yokels

Police news about a mosque break-in and a story on evidence in the official misconduct trial of suspended Police Chief Ken Zisa is all Hackensack residents get today. 

But Sykes loved the story about the first pink-footed goose sighted in New Jersey, and put it on the front of her Local section, with a map and photo, and plenty of text on the jump page. 

The story doesn't answer an obvious question: What color is its poop? Yellow? Green?

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Sushi made from yellow-fin tuna.

Eat your mercury

If you think that goose would make good eating, don't miss the recipe for yellow-fin tuna, from Food Editor Susan Leigh Sherrill, who doesn't tell readers the fish she feels "good about" has elevated levels of harmful mercury (F-1).

Restaurant inspections return

Image by quinn.anya via Flickr

How clean is the kitchen that turned out the meal you are being served?

They were yanked unceremoniously from the Better Living section, followed weeks later by a letter to readers from the food editor. Now, restaurant health inspections have reappeared in print, though I couldn't find them at northjersey.com under Food & Dining.

Still, today's list in The Record of Woodland Park is positively skeletal. I counted 52 towns (out of the 90 or so in the circulation area), but most report "no activity."  

There is no explanation or note in the Better Living tabloid for the list's reappearance. But readers are urged to contact their health departments for more information.

Hospitals fight over profits

The nasty fight among three big, profit-making hospitals over the reopening of Pascack Valley Hospital in Westwood is back on the front page today.

The lead story -- on conservative and liberal opposition to extending Bush tax breaks to the wealthy -- conveniently omits any mention of Governor Christie's tax break for New Jersey millionaires, despite the state's unprecedented fiscal crisis.

Christie's refusal to extend the Corzine tax on the wealthy is a topic The Record's Editorial Page and news columns have avoided like a plague in recent months, probably under orders from Publisher Stephen A. Borg and his puppet, Editor Francis Scandale.

Rare byline

The third A-1 story today carries a rare byline from Staff Writer Jean Rimbach, who doesn't explain why the paper has never reported before that some police recruits pay their own way through training academies.

Rimbach is one of the pets of Deirdre Sykes, head assignment editor. She is among several local reporters whose low productivity is overlooked by editors and managers. 

Last-gasp Democrats

On the front of Local, Staff Writer Michael Gartland reports on continued hiring by the Democratic majority on the Bergen County Freeholder Board. 

The story doesn't say whether Kathleen Donovan -- a Republican who takes over as county executive in January -- will have the power to rescind the appointments of such lightweights as the mayors of Dumont and Little Ferry.

Italian 'fantasyland'

I'm not sure why Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung considers a dining room that resembles a moonlit Italian square to be a "fantasyland." In Italy, restaurant owners give as much care to interior decoration as to buying, preparing and serving fresh food.

She complains about the service at Bella Notte on a busy night, crab cakes and two of the four desserts she sampled, and gives the Little Falls restaurant only two stars (Good) -- equivalent to her rating of Bahama Breeze in Wayne, a faux-Caribbean chain restaurant.

News or advertisement?

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Is that a news story or a lavish advertisement for Hackensack University Medical Center's new cancer building on the front page of The Record of Woodland Park today? Like all hospitals, HUMC is big business, and this one is a big advertiser in The Record and on northjersey.com. 

And it's no coincidence that Jennifer A. Borg, Esq., was a board member at the hospital while it spent tens of thousands of dollars on advertising in the paper. (Borg, one of the two Tarnished Silver Spoons running North Jersey Media Group, is a lawyer whose iron fist is well-known in the newsroom.)

Over the years, the medical center has been treated deferentially in the former Hackensack daily, notably while Francis Scandale has been editor and chief seller of the front page to the highest bidder. Recall the Page 1 story this past July 25, promoting a new venture by John P. Ferguson, who had resigned as medical center president during a scandal.

And the frequent expansions of the hospital's campus in a residential neighborhood -- despite loud and determined opposition by neighbors -- gets nowhere near the coverage that The Valley Hospital's expansion proposal in Ridgewood does, even though Valley plans to stay within the borders of its property. 

You couldn't rouse head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes or Hackensack reporter Monsy Alvarado from their deep slumber to cover those protests in recent years.

You call this recycling? 

Teaneck reporter Joseph Ax has a story on the front of Local today on plans to expand recycling, because the township lags behind others. But he doesn't compare Teaneck's effort to other communities. 

If he did, he could tell readers Teaneck has a long way to go on recycling. Hackensack collects all recyclables weekly, compared to once a month for some recyclables in Teaneck and twice a month under the new plan.

And Hackensack residents can bring electronics, computers and other items to the DPW -- a program that few other North Jersey towns have.

There is no Hackensack or Englewood news today, but be sure to check out the story on the Kinnelon police (L-7). Sykes and her clueless assistants continue to do a great job on local news -- if you live in Passaic and Morris counties.

Hold the cow feces

There is more junk food and cupcakes promoted in Better Living today, thanks to Staff Writer Elisa Ung, the restaurant reviewer, Sunday columnist and dessert addict. 

Ung, who returned recently from maternity leave, has been eating an enormous quantity of cupcakes, cheesecake, pizza and other crap, according to her Twitter tweets and articles in the paper.


Today, she reports the Food Network will be comparing sliders at White Manna in Hackensack and White Mana in Jersey City, and cupcakes on another program.

But Ung doesn't tell us anything about the ground beef used in Hackensack beyond saying is it 10% fat. What I really want to know is whether this ground beef, like much of the conventionally raised ground beef produced at the big packing houses in the United States, contains cow manure.

Miss something?

The political profile of Bergen County Executive Dennis McNerney that ran on Sunday had an interesting tidbit that wasn't addressed in the story by Staff Writer Michael Gartland, who did an otherwise good job comparing the incumbent to his Republican challenger.

The bio box noted McNerney was "vice president [of] derivatives with UBS, Paine Webber" from 2001-03. Wasn't it trading of derivatives that caused the financial meltdown, failure of big banks and the recession? Do we really want to reelect this fat cat to office?

 

 

Eight reporters, no information

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Why did eight reporters at The Record of Woodland Park work on a single story about school board candidates? And why does the story, on the front of Local, contain only one paragraph about Hackesnsack with nothing more than the hopefuls' names?

That one paragraph appears to be the only mention of Hackensack in the entire paper today except for the erroneous listing of the paper's address on Page A-2. (Photo: The Meadowlands.)


The lead Page 1 story -- "Cop shot; woman killed" -- is so poorly edited, readers don't know if she is an innocent or a suspect until they pore over the continuation on A-6. The story came in late? That's no excuse.

Given outrageous ticket prices and exorbitant fees on their purchase, is anybody really upset by the $25 million ticket scam that is all over A-1 today? The only problem is that the ticket sellers might raise fees to make up the lost revenue, if they weren't insured for the theft of 1.5 million tickets.

On A-8, an editorial gives Staff Writer Michael Gartland well-deserved credit for exposing financial abuses at Bergen County school districts, a story he won't let drop.

Why does the front of Business carry a wire service story about the credit and job woes of an auto mechanic in Wisconsin? Is no one in North Jersey in a similar fix?

Three-day weekend for staff

If you thought, after looking at Saturday's edition, the staff of The Record of Woodland Park started its weekend on Friday, today's paper only reinforces the impression. Except for a Michael Gartland story on lavish spending by a non-profit Bergen County agency on Page 1, you'll find barely four inconsequential stories about Bergen towns in the entire paper.

You know there is no municipal, development or education news of Hackensack, Teaneck and Englewood -- or many other Bergen towns -- in the former Hackensack daily by looking at Page L-6 and the three, long, wire-service obituaries of people you may have never heard of -- that's what the lazy, desperate, incompetent editors call "filler." You also know it by a brief on L-2 about kindergarten registration in Ramsey -- a waste of precious space for information that goes home in every kid's backpack. Does reporter Allison Pries really think this is education news?

So what do you find in today's former Bergen Record? Stories about the Passaic County Sheriff's Department, a possible festival in West Milford, budget woes in that sprawling township, smoking at a Morris County college and a deer hunt on Garret Mountain -- near the paper's new headquarters. The incompetent editors put a story about three New Milford Eagle Scouts on L-1. Wow. That's real news.

There isn't much in the rest of the Sunday paper, which squanders most of the front page on a stupid football game and the endless palaver over a guard who left his post and a man who entered a secure area at Newark airport to see his girlfriend off. On the front of Better Living, a copy editor must have thought it clever to say: "Where North Jersey chefs go to get their eats on." How ridiculous.

It's hard to believe Publisher Stephen A. Borg can read the paper day after day and not wonder why it consistently fails its Bergen County readers or what the editors and some of the reporters are doing to earn their salaries. When I still worked in the old Hackensack newsroom, other staffers reported that sports reporter John Rowe overheard the wealthy, arrogant Borg say his goal in cutting costs was a news staff where no one made more than $40,000 a year.

I doubt Borg achieved his ridiculous salary goal for the staff, but since he took over and promoted Editor Frank "The Fish Stinks from the Head Down" Scandale to vice president, The Record and North Jersey Media Group's laughable Web site -- northjersey.com -- sure read like they are being put together by demoralized, low-paid workers.