Where exactly is the local news?

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What would The Record of Woodland Park do without Staff Photographer Tariq Zehawi? His work is all over the paper today -- big photos of two accidents and one tractor-trailer fire, taking up the space of local stories the rest of the staff never filed.


This Johnny on the Spot, one of the most talented photographers at the paper, must live in his car or at least spend all his time driving around, awaiting word over the police scanner about more traffic mayhem to bolster the tabloid quality of the former Hackensack daily.


Look at the size of his Page 1 photo today of a truck driver walking away from an inferno on Route 80 -- there's room for only three stories on the rest of the page. The photo is big on drama, but two reporters could manage to squeeze out only the barest details. I guess no other story was worthy of the front page today.


His two other photos appear in Local, which is packed with so much police, court, trial and higher education news there is no room for municipal stories from Hackensack, Englewood, Teaneck and a lot of other towns whose reporters apparently started the weekend early.


This is another "toilet seat" edition created by head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes, who has been telling readers for many, many months that tabloid-like police, court and fire news is good enough in the absence of any detailed reporting on what town officials are doing or not doing. Just eat this slop, Sykes says.

It's hard to believe Editor Francis Scandale did something right today -- pairing two stories about education aid on A-1 today. The story about Facebook's $100 million for Newark schools appears on top of  the story about the continuing embarrassment over the loss of $400 million in federal aid.


Governor Christie still has egg or worse on his face from the latter, so why is the headline on the former story praising the governor for trying "to fix bad schools"? He cut school aid drastically. The Record will do anything to stay in the good graces of this bully, who has visited so much misery on middle- and working-class state residents.


Just look at the moronic phrase seized on by Editorial Page Editor Alfred P. Doblin, who apparently knows jack about Newark. In his column on A-23 today, he praises the "Ironbound Alliance" of Christie and Newark Mayor Cory Booker (photo) to improve the city's segregated schools. 

But the Ironbound is an ethnic enclave of Portuguese, Spanish and Brazilian residents where the city's blacks have made few strides. In the 1980s, some Ironbound restaurants refused service to African-Americans. 

I guess Doblin is just trying to be cute again, acutely aware that without gimmicks, his columns would bore readers to tears. Is he a journalist or the governor's apologist?

In her three-star review of Sorrento in East Rutherford, Staff Writer Elisa Ung boasts of the restaurant's authenticity by saying there is no "parmigiana in sight" on the menu. But "parmigiana" means "from Parma" or "Parma-style," and isn't a reference to parmesan cheese.


Would she give three stars to the quality of the ingredients? We don't know, because this restaurant reviewer cares little about whether the "huge" salmon fillet she sampled is artificially colored farmed fish or wild-caught; whether the prosciutto is cured with harmful preservatives; or whether the pork dish she tried is pumped full of antibiotics. 

God forbid she'd put a restaurant owner on the spot, and ask such questions so readers concerned about where their food comes from can know before they go. Or does she imagine everyone is like her -- eating whatever is put in front of her? After all, it's the paper's money she's spending, not her own.

Also, it's disturbing to see how much space is now devoted to mouth-watering close-ups of food and how little space is left for text under a redesign of Friday's Better Living centerfold, where her reviews appear. 



There are so few restaurant health ratings today, the layout editor had to use a house ad to fill out the column. This is great food reporting: mystery fish and meat, and mystery restaurants.