Hear the one about the farmer's daughter?

Image by kahala via Flickr

The farmer's daughter, nephew, cousin, hired hand and the farmer himself won't be bringing fresh produce to Hackensack this summer, as in previous years, when the market was set up on Wednesdays in Johnson Park. (Did you expect a dirty joke?)

Food Editor Bill Pitcher, who was writing about farmers' markets before he left the paper Friday, didn't let on that Hackensack's market is no more. The city's Web site doesn't carry an explanation, either, though it has lots of other news I didn't see in the former Hackensack daily.


When The Record of Woodland Park ignores the city where it was founded and where it prospered for more than 110 years, it means residents have to rely on their own devices to find out both the big stuff  (city budget, tax hike, new mayor) and the little stuff (farmers' market, park projects, new signage for visitors).


Occasionally, head Assignment Editor Deirdre "Mother Hen" Sykes and Hackensack reporter Monsy Alvarado do come out of their holes, but they often play the same tune -- another legal pissing match between suspended Police Chief Ken Zisa and the police union over legal fees (L-1 today). It seems that Alvarado is finished for now writing about the parking-garage collapse and school board appointments, virtually the only two subjects outside the chief and the union she has tackled since June 2009.


Her story today describes the chief as "deposed." That's OK. Reporters often use words without knowing what they mean (and the news copy editors are in a deep sleep). Staff Writer Dena Yellin on Friday described "a throng of dogs" (a multitude, a large number), when in fact she was referring to 26 kept in a filthy Clifton house, revised to 25 in today's lavish coverage, which starts on Page 1.


Did anything else on A-1 interest you? Staff Writer John Brennan talked Editor Frank "Castrato" Scandale into allowing his story to lead the paper -- it's the battle between Atlantic City and the Meadowlands for gamblers' dollars. Wow. I'm riveted. Al-Qaida's new leader lived in the U.S. for 15 years. Gee-whiz. I'm shaking in my sandals.

Meanwhile, Scandale buried Staff Writer Elise Young's eye-opening tale about the possible state takeover of Trenton and the new mayor's huge financial problems. 

The inside of the A-section is filled with national and international news I saw on TV both Friday night and the night before. Where is the New Jersey news? Where is the local news?


The front of Local has to blow up a photo of an ex-New York cop gone wrong as big as possible to fill space the local staff couldn't. Englewood reporter Giovanna Fabiano apparently is subbing for the vacationing police reporter, so Englewood readers can expect the drought on news from their city to continue. Nothing happened in Teaneck on Friday.


Have you ever heard of Marilyn Buck, Lorene Yarnell and Ole Ivar Lovaas? You can read all about their lives in three expanded wire obits that desperate editors had to use to plug the half-page hole left by the lack of local news from many of the 90 or so towns in the paper's circulation area.


The food editor's name no  longer appears on Page F-2, but he left behind his disdain for healthy eating. Pitcher's recipe for melon salad on the front of Better Living today calls for 1 cup of heavy cream, one-third cup of sugar, 8 ounces of cream cheese and a quarter-cup of mayonnaise. Those poor melon balls. Readers are running for their cholesterol pills.