Is northern New Jersey standing still?

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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)

More lessons in bad journalism

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Readers who once laughed at Lou Costello now are laughing at The Record.

How could The Record's front page promise "full coverage of school board elections" today when it never published the candidates' positions on issues facing districts?

Head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes couldn't muster the energy or staff to brief readers before Tuesday's election -- something the paper had been doing for decades -- so they were forced to rely on campaign literature. 

Basically, she told them to vote blind.

How about the three standard photos of voters and a kid at the polls (A-1 and A-8). They are as exciting as watching paint dry.

Language barrier

Another A-1 story in the Woodland Park daily reports a group of students from the Dominican Republic got a democracy lesson in Passaic County. 

If readers managed to get through the story, they realize the reporter also needs a lesson -- in the English language.

Staff Writer Richard Cowen, who is no novice, reports the students showed up at a freeholders meeting "dressed in formal attire" (A-5). Does he mean tuxedos and gowns or just suits and dresses? 

Errors 'R' Us

On Wednesday, a Page 1 story by Staff Writer John Gavin peddled the preposterous notion that a train station would be an invasion of nearby residents' privacy. 

The reporter said one man lived a "few feet" from the proposed station in Wood-Ridge. Is that even possible? Three feet from the proposed stop?  He must be homeless.

On A-2 today, an embarrassing correction notes Wednesday's lead story made two serious errors.

Snow job

Former Gov. Jim McGreevey and folk-jazz singer Phoebe Snow couldn't be more different, so how could Mike Kelly lump them in the same L-1 column today?

Jerry DeMarco on The Record: 'Pathetic'

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 Here is a comment e-mailed to me by former Breaking News Editor Jerry DeMarco, who was reacting to some Hackensack history I lifted from a community message board and posted under, The Zisas and the Borgs:

"This long-timer stuff is priceless. The Record can replace bodies, they can replace salaries, but they can't replace institutional memory. And with so many reporters moved around like so many pieces over the years, they've lost institutional memory.

"Rich Cowen, for instance, was the last reporter to have Englewood nailed. Then they shipped him out to what was then the Passaic bureau. Markowitz was the last to REALLY know Teaneck, but they made him a business reporter. And on and on....


"How much you want to bet, after reading your post, they have their incompetent CAR [computer-assisted reporting]  lab scouring records to find retired Hackensack cops -- when all they'd have to do is track down Jack Terhune or Roger Breslin, if they're still alive. Shoot, they could raid the clip file and find former reporters who knew the city's politics.

"Pathetic."