Sloppy, incomplete reporting is continuing to cheat readers

WBGO-FM, the 24-hour jazz station in Newark, celebrated the "Rhythm Review" -- which broadcasts classic soul and rhythm-and-blues every Saturday -- with a 30th anniversary dance party on Wednesday night at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, above and below.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Remember Bethany Koval, the Fair Lawn High School student who described herself as an "Israeli Jew" amid the social media uproar over her saying Palestinians are being mistreated?

Well, she is back on Page 1 of The Record today, and readers finally learn that description may not be accurate, if they manage to plow through thousands of words and get deep into the story on the continuation page (A-8).

More troubling than that is here is yet another Record story about the hate campaign against Koval that doesn't quote any of the thousands of North Jersey Jews and Israelis themselves who believe peace with the Palestinians is long overdue.

Deep on A-8, Staff Writer Hannan Adely finally tells readers Koval's father is Catholic, and her mother "was raised Jewish" and converted to Catholicism.

And Koval is quoted -- possibly for the first time in months -- as saying her connections to Israel "are uncertain and came from genealogical research she had done on her mother's family."

End of editing

The blame for all this fudging is Deirdre Sykes, who was promoted to editor in January after a decade or more of mismanaging the local-news section.

Sykes and her minions have simply given up on challenging reporters and columnists, who are encouraged to write on and on to fill space.

No editor challenged Staff Writer John Cichowski's description of a big ethnic supermarket in Clifton as Irv Gerber's "favorite farmer's market" (Road Warrior column on Wednesday's L-1).

In winter? Sorry. Corrado's Market on Main Avenue is a supermarket, not a "farmer's market," and the addled Cichowski is a laughing stock.

Frank Sinatra Jr.

The placement of the story on singer Frank Sinatra Jr. tells you Sykes doesn't care one way or another that he died of cardiac arrest at 72 and his famous father died of a heart attack at 82 (A-8).

This could be an opportunity for The Record to emphasize that heart disease is the No. 1 killer in the nation -- in contrast to all the artery clogging food the paper's Better Living editors promote day after day.

Local news?

Here's a salute to Staff Photographer Kevin R. Wexler for the gorgeous photo of Agnes Kyei and newborn son Elijah Adu Gyamena at Hackensack University Medical Center (L-1).

They share the page with lots of police and court news, and news about the police.

Today's Local section continues Sykes' boycott of Hackensack news.

Editors turning N.J. affordable housing law into dirty words

An NJ Transit train stopping at Hackensack's Anderson Street Station. For commuters, a strike or lockout is a moving target, according to The Record. The deadline was reported initially as "March 13," then "Sunday at midnight" and now "Saturday at midnight." 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

In the front-page coverage of a builder's plan for 142 apartments in Dumont, you'd never know a 1985 law requires New Jersey towns to accommodate their fair share of affordable housing.

In fact, Wednesday's Page 1 story in The Record and today's front-page follow-up don't even mention the Fair Housing Act or the two state Supreme Court Mount Laurel rulings, in 1975 and 1983, on which the law was based.

But Editor Deirdre Sykes is hiding more than that from readers, because mostly white North Jersey towns have long tried to subvert the requirement for low- and moderate-cost housing, and they've found a champion in Governor Christie.

According to the 2010 census, nearly 76% of Dumont's estimated population of 17,863 were white.

But the stories by Nicholas Pugliese don't even explore whether residents oppose the plan because 18 of the 142 apartments would be rented to minorities.

Today's paper

Sykes' front page today is another snoozer, dominated as it is by a suit over the Dumont apartments, the Republican Party primary ballot, college basketball and a state Supreme Court ruling on "burner phones."

The editor gets point for putting local news on Page 1, but she continues to neglect many stories from Hackensack and other towns.

Bethany Koval

I've been reading the stories about Bethany Koval, 16, the Fair Lawn High School student "who caused a firestorm ... with multiple Twitter posts criticizing Israeli treatment of Palestinians," according to an editorial today (A-10).

School officials wisely decided her political opinion is not bullying, "even if that viewpoint stirs opposition."

But the editorial, and every story before it, reported Koval "describes herself as an Israeli Jew."

Well, is she or isn't she? The way it's been put makes readers think the Woodland Park daily is skeptical.

Local news?

Sykes leads today's Local section with yet another crime story (L-1).

And a big feel-good photo of a circus clown visiting a bald 12-year-old patient is just more P.R. for Hackensack University Medical Center, the hospital taxpayers love to hate.

The hospital's questionable non-profit, tax-exempt status denies the city more than $10 million in taxes, raising the bill of every homeowner and commercial property owner.

An L-3 story reports on the proposed $100.4 million Hackensack budget, introduced Tuesday night, but The Record hasn't had anything on the city school board's $104 million spending plan, which was approved on March 1.

School taxes make up 44% of a Hackensack resident's property tax bill.

Mystery meat edition

Wednesday's Better Living section promoted nine dishes of mystery meat at North Jersey restaurants, including meatballs, hamburgers and a pork shank ($8 to $24).

Readers couldn't find a word from Food Editor Esther Davidowitz or Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung on whether the turkey, veal, pork, beef or lamb was raised naturally or pumped full of harmful antibiotics and other additives.