Local-news assignment editors miss big Hackensack story

Critics say attorney Seymour Chase is upset that an Atlantic Street Park will eliminate a reserved space where he parks his Mercedes-Benz sedan with his firm's motto on the license plate, "TAKE US TO COURT," below.

On Monday night, Chase reminded city officials that his law firm has been in Hackensack for 55 years. Was he stating his undying loyalty to the city or saying his decision to buy a building near the Bergen County Courthouse has made him wealthier than anyone can imagine?

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Hackensack City Council on Monday night voted, 4-1, to adopt a bond ordinance appropriating $650,000 to build a park on a city owned parking lot downtown.

Now, the 44 parking spaces are used mostly by clients of law firms along Atlantic and Warren streets, as well as visiting attorneys and stenographers.

Attorney Seymour Chase, who owns 1 Atlantic St., called the park plan "ill-conceived," and reminded council members that many other lawyers on the two streets oppose it, raising the specter of litigation.

Other speakers denounced Chase for putting his selfish private interests ahead of the public interest as the city seeks to revive its moribund downtown with new apartments and a new park.

Those in favor of the park, including Jerry Lombardo and members of the Main Street Business Alliance he heads, noted the park plan includes 43 new parking spaces elsewhere.

"We need a central green space like the park," said an owner of Brothers Carpet at 392 Main St.

Chase & Chase is at 1 Atlantic St., at the corner of Main Street, above and below.

Where was The Record?

In May, Staff Writer Christopher Maag of The Record reported the debate over the park "comes down to an age-old fight: parks versus potholes."

At that May 6 meeting, attorney Arthur Zucker threatened to file suit against the city, comparing elimination of the parking lot (in favor of a park) to taking away the driveway of his home.

Maag's story never mentioned Zucker or Chase, who at that time claimed inadequate parking is hurting his business.

Maag was nowhere to be seen at Monday night's meeting, and today's paper doesn't carry a word about final approval of the park bond ordinance.

The park would be built on this triangular, 44-space parking lot between Atlantic and Warren streets. At left rear, a 222-unit apartment building is scheduled to be completed in May 2015. The city's planned performing arts center is at right rear.

Before the fireworks over the downtown park, Genesis Liu, left, and members of Kids' Safety Awareness Program (KSAP) asked Mayor John Labrosse and council members questions about how they do their jobs.

Today's paper

A bike path on a narrow and dangerous 9-mile stretch of Route 9W is no closer to reality, despite the photos and thousands of words in a story that takes up a quarter of the front page today (A-1).

What is the point of the story? To bring readers up to date? On what exactly?

Marty's rabbi

In 2009, The Record gave unprecedented coverage to Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, who bought an East Hill mansion next door to a Libyan-owned estate in Englewood, then complained about the planned visit of Moammar Gaddafi.

Boteach is back on the front page today, again giving a bad name to Jews (A-1).

Local news

Much of today's Local section is ripped from the police and court blotters.

McDonald's scam

A story on the first Business page today says "reporters and bloggers" ate a free McDonald's dinner "prepared by celebrity chefs using ingredients from the chain's menu" (L-8).

None of them were aware you can't polish a turd.

Cost cutting

To save money, the Borg publishing family has hired a couple of talent-less freelancers to write about food in Better Living, including Rita Cookson.

Today, Cookson tries to persuade readers they should drink certain beers with certain food, in yet another colossal waste of space (B-1).

Footnote

Even though Mike Kelly's column on Monday amounted to little more than a rewrite of all of the stories published on Robert Lintner, the burned-out reporter managed to screw up the man's first name twice on Page 1.

Lintner, you may remember, is the 65-year-old Saddle Brook man who was stabbed in the neck by his wife, leading police to find hundreds of guns and lots of ammunition in his home.

On Monday, Kelly called him "Richard," according to a correction on A-2 today.

$850 is chump change to Hackensack real estate moguls

How many weeks or months has this storefront on the 200 block of Main Street in Hackensack been vacant? The sleepy shopping street is showing few signs of renewal, even though city officials have approved a downtown redevelopment plan.

By Victor E. Sasson
Editor

Today's Page 1 story in The Record has readers speculating about just who could have lost $850 on Main Street in Hackensack, and not even tried to recover the money.

Staff Writer Hannan Adely reports the cash was awarded to James Brady, the formerly homeless man who found the money and turned it in to the Police Department, where it laid unclaimed for six months (A-1).

Jerry Lombardo, president of C.J. Lombardo Company at 355 Main St., appears to have money to burn, judging by the long-vacant storefronts owned by his real estate concern.

The same can be said for the principals behind the Alexander Anderson Real Estate Group of 14 Bergen St., which has its sign on a great many vacant buildings on or near Hackensack's Main Street. 

Big killing?

Are these and other real estate companies stockpiling empty properties, hoping to sell them to a developer who will demolish them and build residential and office buildings?

Lombardo also is chairman of the Upper Main Alliance, a public-private partnership that has failed miserably to revive Main Street in the years after the 2008 recession and the pullout of North Jersey Media Group and The Record.

The only other story on Page 1 today is about same-sex couples winning the right to marry in New Jersey, starting on Monday (A-1, A-6 and A-7).

Am I the only one who thinks this is way too much coverage for an estimated 24,112 same-sex couples in the entire state as of 2011?

On A-2 today, readers will find two more embarrassing corrections.

Christie's follies

A story on A-3 makes clear Governor Christie's decision not to set up an online marketplace under the federal Affordable Care Act is hurting New Jersey residents who have been stymied by technical glitches on the federal site.

On the same page, a story about a $38 million shortfall in state tax collections is more evidence the GOP  bully's repeated veto of a tax surcharge on millionaires is wrong for New Jersey (A-3).

In a letter to the editor today, Jeff Kirshbaum of Oradell calls U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz "a fraud and a clown," putting into perspective media fascination with the Tea Party crackpot (A-11).

On the Local front, Road Warrior John Cichowski answers questions from drivers who are as befuddled as he is, and if past columns are any guide, most of his advice is worthless (L-1).

Voter apathy stifles reform in Hackensack

Voters will find this flier in today's Hackensack Chronicle, which says it has a circulation of more than 20,000 in Hackensack and South Hackensack.

Victor E. Sasson and other reform candidates in the May 14 Hackensack City Council election are fighting an unseen enemy.

Voter apathy in "Zisaville" may prove to be more powerful than allies of the ruling family who are trying so desperately to hold onto power.

That 5-person slate is headed by alleged sign-stealer Kenneth Martin, a retired African-American police detective who boasts of having been the first resource officer at Hackensack High School.

His dumb move -- caught on Hackensack Market's video-surveillance camera -- is a cautionary tale for the few voters who are paying attention to the campaign.

Read it and weep

Another lesson in the sad state of democracy in Hackensack can be seen in the number of registered voters and the turnout in the 2009 and 2005 City Council elections.

On April 24, 2009, the number of Hackensack residents registered to vote totaled 19,868, according to figures released by City Clerk Debra Heck.

Only 3,731 of them voted in the May election, giving victory to all but one of the Zisa-backed candidates. 

That vote total was actually down from the May 2005 election, when only 4,568 residents voted out of about 19,000 who were registered.

On March 6, 2013, 21,090 people were registered to vote in Hackensack, Heck said.

Official apathy

Apathy isn't reserved for Hackensack voters.

Last week, an aide for state Sen. Loretta Weinberg told Sasson, the only independent cadidate, the senator does not get involved in municipal elections.

Sasson wanted Weinberg to pay for robo calls, urging Hackensack voters to back reform candidates in the May 14 election.

Sasson called Weinberg's Teaneck office again this week, hoping the senator would at least issue a neutral, get-out-the-vote message. But his call hasn't been returned.

Apathetic editors

More apathy is evident at The Record, which so far hasn't covered the Hackensack campaign, except to report on the arrest of Martin and related news.

The Woodland Park daily doesn't see voter apathy as the big story of the municipal election, because voters "everywhere" are apathetic.

Two other news outlets, News 4 New York and WNYC-FM (New Jersey Public Radio), also have declined to cover the campaign.

Borgs and Zisas  

Here is a fascinating glimpse into the relationship of the Borgs -- owners of The Record -- and the Zisas, including mention of Jack Zisa, Lynne Hurwitz and other Hackensack movers and shakers:

The Zisas and the Borgs 


End alliance now

The number of empty storefronts on or near Main Street in Hackensack and the limited jurisdiction of the Upper Main Alliance are two powerful arguments for disbanding the public-private partnership formed in 2004.

In The Record today, Jerry Lombardo, president of the real estate firm C.J.L. Lombardo and the alliance board chairman, discusses redevelopment efforts in Hackensack (L-8).

Lombardo doesn't disclose whether he owns property in the 163-acre zone and how much profit he will realize from redevelopment, which has been endorsed by the City Council.

When the alliance is disbanded, city employee Albert H. Dib, its executive director, should be ordered to devote his full time to economic development of the entire city, not just part of Main Street.

Dib also should be ordered to stop being the "Editor" of Hackensack Now.org, a Community Message Board.

Today's paper

Editor Marty Gottlieb devotes a huge part of Page 1 today to a "major heroin bust" that targeted spoiled brats from wealthy North Jersey suburbs who drive to Paterson to buy drugs (A-1).

You won't find a word in all this coverage (two stories, photos and a chart on A-1 and A-6) about the Paterson Police Department's lame efforts to control the drug trade or gun violence in the Silk City.

To be fair, 125 officers were laid off in 2011 after Governor Christie cut state aide to Paterson and other cities, part of the GOP bully's campaign against minorities. 

In June 2012, 37 were rehired.

More manure

Why is Gottlieb wasting precious front-page real estate on Ahmed Zayat of Teaneck, a multimillionaire gambler who gets high on the smell of horse manure (A-1)?  

And why does head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes keep on publishing anti-mass transit rants from Road Warrior John Cichowski, the self-appointed booster of drivers, cars, driving and related subjects (L-1)?

Today, Cichowski raises the "who will pay?" boogeyman in discussing extension of NJ Transit's successful light-rail system to Englewood.

He knows the real problem is not federal money, but lack of commitment to mass transit by Christie and Tenafly officials, and so-called journalists like himself.

Hackensack news

When I wrote this post, I overlooked an L-1 story on repairs to the Fanny M. Hilliers School, and an L-3 filler photo of the collision of a bus and "a vehicle" on Thursday at Summit Avenue and Passaic Street.

As usual, the photo caption is completely devoid of any information about whether either driver ran a red light or received a summons. 

Did business leader set a poor example?

Image by yourdoku via Flickr

Did a Passaic landlord know he wasn't getting a water bill for 20 years?

The owner of a Passaic city apartment building that didn't pay its water bill for 20 years is a business leader in Hackensack, according to an anonymous source.

Eye on The Record received this message after I posted commentary on Thursday's Page 1 stories:

 "Interesting comments on the water-bill story. The owner of that [Passaic] building is Jerry Lombardo, the chairman of Upper Main Street Alliance [in Hackensack]. How can you not realize you haven't gotten a water bill in 20 years?"

The A-1 story Thursday by Staff Writer Richard Cowen identified the building owner as Gregory Realty LLC, but didn't mention Lombardo or ask if Gregory Realty was aware for two decades it wasn't paying a water bill for the 96-unit building. 

An Internet search found a Gregory Realty Company of Passaic LLC at 335 Main St. in Hackensack, but that name doesn't appear on the door. "C.J. Lombardo Co. Realtors, Est. 1936" is written on a brown awning over the door. 

If Lombardo was aware the building didn't pay a water bill for 20 years, it would set a poor example for members of the Upper Main Street Alliance, a group of business owners who are assessed to help make the street more attractive to shoppers and diners.

Today's paper

You have to plow through the lead story on greenhouse gases and turn to the continuation page before you learn Governor Christie diverted $65 million from energy efficiency projects to balance the state budget (A-1 and A-8).

The state earned a total of $102 million from the regional program. Who do you believe on whether the initiative cut greenhouse gases -- Christie or the Sierra Club? 

Why was a municipal judge for three towns allowed to hold so many other public and private jobs, and why didn't the Woodland Park daily report the story the day after the May 19 filing of a state complaint (A-1) ?

Road kill

Commuters are keeping their fingers crossed the Road Warrior column will be one of the inevitable fatalities this Memorial Day weekend (L-1). 

Oh, I forgot, the editors kill your column only if you're a woman, Hispanic or black -- and error-prone John Cichowski is none of those. 

Head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes' Local news section is filled with still more police, fire and court stories today.

Clever but dense

Better Living's copy editors came up with a clever headline for the restaurant review today, "Chow bella."

But Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung is so blinded by her obsession with dessert nothing else seems to matter.

She spends more than half of the review boring readers with the chef/owner's resume and his plans to grow vegetables on the roof, but never tells them whether the pork and veal she sampled were pumped full of delectable antibiotics and growth hormones.