Where is that editorial thunder?

Image by marco sickofgoodbyes via Flickr

The lead article in The Record of Woodland Park today might make you question the accuracy of the byline. Is it Staff Writer John Reitmeyer or John Wrongmeyer?


The story -- on the possible shutdown of state government -- reviews Republican Governor Christie's and the Legislature's positions on budget cuts and tax hikes, but completely ignores Christie's refusal to raise the low gasoline tax. Even a one-cent hike would generate millions for roads, bridges and mass transit -- and, more importantly, allow the governor to restore cuts in other areas.


But the reporter doesn't bring it up, and Editorial Page Editor Alfred P. Doblin can't be torn away from preening in front of the mirror to thunder editorially about the need for more revenue from the gas tax. Unfortunately, clothes horse Doblin has already made it clear he sides with Christie on not raising taxes on the Borgs and the state's other millionaires. No "shared sacrifice" for the fat cats.


The gushing oil in the Gulf is on Page 1 for a second day in a row, but The Record clearly is not ready to commit its own staff to assessing the magnitude of the damage to the fishing industry, beaches and so forth, and the outlook for the future. (There was a story in Business the other day on the impact of the spill on New Jersey seafood distributors by Staff Writer Hugh Morley.)


The third story on A-1 -- about an autistic man in Fair Lawn -- continues the paper's age-ism editorial policy of not covering Alzheimer's disease to anywhere near the same extent as autism. (Counting this story, Staff Writer Stephanie Akin has four bylines in the paper today from Fair Lawn or Saddle Brook. Some of her colleagues go a week or longer without one byline.)

The editors have already tired of the hunt for a reputed drug kingpin and gun runner in Jamaica. I had to ask another customer in a Jamaican restaurant in Hackensack about the latest news, which doesn't appear in the paper today. Nor were the lazy editors interested in what Jamaicans in North Jersey have to say about their island's violent reputation.


Local leads with yet another lawsuit against suspended Hackensack Police Chief Ken Zisa. The story, by Staff Writer Monsy Alvarado, is way too long, in view of how little other news about the city appears in the former Hackensack daily. I also wonder why The Record was completely in the dark about allegations that are at least five to six years old -- especially those relating to Zisa's campaigns for the Assembly. 

Was head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and her minions sleeping off their long lunches at their computers?


Two stories on Englewood appear under the byline of Staff Writer Joseph Ax and not Giovanna Fabiano, who was covering that city and Leonia. Ax is, or was, the Teaneck reporter. Karen Sudol, the Tenafly reporter, also wrote an Englewood story the other day. Sykes will pull a reporter off his or her beat at the drop of a hat -- a disservice to readers who look in vain for coverage of their towns.

(Photo: Kingston, Jamaica.)

Is Chief Zisa the new target?

Image via Wikipedia

The Record of Woodland Park today reports the increasing number of lawsuits filed against Hackensack Police Chief Ken Zisa, whose family has long controlled the city. The headline on Page L-2, in the Local section, says: 15 officers now suing Zisa.

What is surprising is that head Assignment Editor Deirdre "Laughs A Lot" Sykes, with the support of Editor Frank Scandale and the Borg family, squandered nearly three years and hundreds of thousands of dollars in staff salaries on an investigation -- not of Zisa and his family -- but of Michael Mordaga, former chief of detectives for the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office who worked for Zisa at one time.
 
But it was clear from the single, weak story on Mordaga that ran in the Local section Dec. 16 that this so-called investigation was actually a vendetta, because the paper had to employ guilt by association as justification for printing anything at all. Indeed, the conflict alleged in the story ended in February 2007 -- two years and 10 months before.

The Zisa family's control of Hackensack is a subject The Record and Hackensack reporter Monsy Alvarado have done everything to avoid. Although Alvarado has reported individual suits against the chief and covered disciplinary hearings for officers, she has failed to make any connections to the big picture -- how the Zisa family rules the city. Meanwhile, she has largely ignored municipal, education, development and most other city news.

You know there is no local news in the paper today by all the wasted space. And you know some of the columnists are just treading water.

Precious space on the front of the Local section is given over to a "Newstracker" item on two districts looking for new superintendents. Did the saga on a hawk that flew into a store really deserve both a big photo and a story? Is that really environmental news?

Road Warrior John Cichowski has a detailed column on the annoyance of high-intensity discharge headlights, but never tells drivers to turn their eyes to the edge of the road on their side until the other car passes -- what drivers have been advised to do for decades to avoid headlight glare at night.

Restaurant Reviewer Bill Pitcher gives three stars to an expensive Korean butcher shop-cum-steakhouse in Fort Lee, without telling readers of Better Living whether the beef served there is naturally raised or pumped full of harmful antibiotics and growth hormones.

In the restaurant inspection list on Page 18 of Better Living, you'll again search in vain for ratings from Wyckoff.

Seventeen days after the earthquake hit Haiti, the newspaper finally is sending a reporter and photographer there with a Saddle River doctor. Let's hope the lazy, incompetent editors assign someone to cover Teaneck while Staff Writer Joseph Ax is away.

New Year's resolutions?

On the last day of 2009, Page 1 of  The Record of Woodland Park focuses on politics in the Garden State and gives precious space to one of the biggest windbags around, former Gov. Thomas H. Kean, speaking about security lapses. On Page A-2, the former Hackensack daily continues its dishonesty by saying the paper is published at 150 River St., when it long has been printed in Rockaway Township and virtually all of its editorial staff  left River City this year.

Meanwhile, stories on the state's growing financial problems are played inside the paper. I can't remember when The Record has reminded readers of what a lousy job Kean did as governor, hiding a huge deficit from incoming Democrat Jim Florio.

The Local section finally has a story about Teaneck by Staff Writer Joseph Ax -- the community policing unit is being disbanded because of budget constraints. But the story is silent on whether the millions the self-insured township has had to pay to cover employee lawsuits could have saved the successful outreach effort.

The Englewood reporter, Giovanna Fabiano, was sent to cover a fatal fire in Ramsey, giving her an excuse for not having a story about her city, which has segregated elementary and middle schools; nightmarish downtown traffic and residents who awaken to gunshots from an open-air police firing range. There is no Hackensack story today.

I can only hope that the Borgs, who control North Jersey Media Group, and the lazy, incompetent editors of The Record get their heads out of their ample behinds and take a good look at what has happened in the past couple of years to a once-great suburban daily. Publisher Stephen A. Borg, who took over from father Malcolm A. Borg in 2006, seems intent only on personal enrichment at the expense of employees and retirees. "I'm not in this for the money," he told the assembled staff. What a joke.

I know he and sister Jennifer A. Borg are not journalists, but it might be time for them to seriously assess the job being done by the editors, including Frank Scandale, Frank Burgos, Deirdre Sykes, Tim Nostrand, Doug Clancy, Jim McGarvey, Liz Houlton, Barbara Jaeger, Bill Pitcher, Alfred Doblin and such sub-editors as Richard Whitby and Dan Sforza, and clean house. The paper doesn't need any of them to do its job of chronicling life in North Jersey, especially restoring the focus on Bergen County.

And I hope I see assignment editors do less hand-holding of reporters and give them more free rein to cover stories they feel are important.

Click on the link below for some of the low-lights of 2009

Decade in review: Our paper changed, 12/27/09