Hackensack, city attorney in showdown over $3M Zisa deal

Alexander H. Carver III, a former Superior Court judge, was appointed Hackensack city attorney on Sept. 30, 2015 (Credit: Harwood Lloyd law firm).

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

This week, Hackensack's City Council is prepared to vote on a resolution terminating the services of City Attorney Alexander H. Carver III, a former judge who has had the job for only 13 months.

In a letter to the editor of The Record today, Mayor John Labrosse and Deputy Mayor Kathleen Canestrino complained Carver agreed to pay nearly $3 million to former Police Chief Ken Zisa "without informing the mayor and council" (O-3).

"We knew the matter was being discussed -- but not decided," they say in the letter.

"Why did the city settle the case without insisting Zisa drop his $30 million tort claim against taxpayers?

"Why did the city settle before the deadline the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office had set for deciding whether to file administrative charges against Zisa, even though we specifically asked Carver to wait for that decision?

"Why did Carver agree to pay Zisa more than $1.2 million in legal fees without first reviewing the detailed invoices himself or have another attorney review them?

"Why did the city cut a $600,000-plus check to Zisa without a vote of the council or an appropriation?

"We have lost faith in Carver. If he won't resign before [this] Tuesday's [regular council] meeting, we will have to terminate his services."

Carver is not a city employee and doesn't have a signed contract. He is being paid $175,000 a year -- equal to Governor Christie's salary.

Zisa is a member of a family political dynasty that ruled Hackensack for decades. The city once was referred to mockingly as "Zisaville."

Mayor John Labrosse, seated, and other members of the City Council, including Deputy Mayor Kathleen Canestrino, second from left.

Manager OK'd deal

As reported on Oct. 5 by Eye on The Record, Carver and David R. Troast, on his last day as city manager, agreed to a deal that would pay Zisa nearly $1,755,000 in back pay, vacation and sick days, and other job-related compensation.

Zisa, who was suspended in 2010 after 34 years in the Police Department, had been tried and convicted in 2012.

A Superior Court jury found him guilty of official misconduct and insurance fraud, and he was sentenced to 5 years in prison.

But he was placed under house arrest during appeals, and those charges were eventually dismissed.

Carver and Troast, who said he reviewed the "legal bills and invoices" submitted by Zisa's lawyer, also agreed to pay the former chief nearly $1,203,000 to cover fees through Sept. 30.

At a special meeting on Oct. 25, the City Council passed a resolution indicating officials hope to hire a new city attorney by Dec. 1.


Bridgegate trial

If you aren't already sick of The Record's wall-to-wall coverage of the Bridgegate trial, the Sunday edition should do the trick (A-1 and O-1).

The lead Page 1 story is by Paul Berger, the Port Authority reporter who need a navigation system to find the federal courthouse in Newark.

After six week of testimony from 34 witnesses, Berger declares, "several large questions remain unanswered."

Readers have their own questions, including why Berger and Dustin Racioppi, another court novice, was assigned to perhaps the most important federal criminal trial in decades.

On the Opinion front, the editors came up with a provocative headline for Carl Golden's take on the trial:

"AND THE VERDICT IS ..."

Golden is former press aide to Tom Kean and Christie Whitman, who were the worst New Jersey governors before GOP thug Chris Christie came along to claim the crown.

Below Golden's wordy column, Record Columnist Mike Kelly declares:

"Thanks to the Bridgegate trial, we now know that Christie's version of history is, at best, threadbare and highly questionable. At worst, it's a damnable lie" (O-1). 

Other stories

Page 1 has two other stories that could distract readers sick of all the repetitious Bridgegate trial stories and columns.

Retailing reporter Joan Verdon recalls Donald J. Trump's grandiose plans in 1989 for "the finest shopping center in New Jersey and beyond" at Routes 4 and 17 in Paramus (A-1).

Trump gave North Jersey residents "a preview of some of the talking points of his presidential campaign, including blustery claims about his building prowess and his ability to fix long-standing government problems, lawsuits and insults against the competition, and an allegation that the approval process might be stacked against him."

Trump hired Thomas Wells, a Paramus attorney. In July, Wells wrote a piece for The Huffington Post. Here are excerpts the reporter doesn't mention:

"After the initial interview, my client contact with Donald was actually not very much. One low point I do remember (actually will never forget) is a limousine ride to a meeting with the editorial board of a New Jersey newspaper in which my married client sought to regale me with the number and quality of eligible young women who in his words “want me.” I was just plain shocked and embarrassed, but I kept smiling. I wanted and needed this client happy. 

"While I was working for Donald, various press reports had Trump and his then-wife Ivanna living in a personal apartment in the Trump Tower of 8, 16 and even 20 or 30 rooms. Genuinely curious, I once asked him how many rooms the apartment actually had. I will never forget his response to me: “However many they will print.”

No trick-or-treat

Below the tortured Trump tale, local obituary writer Jay Levin reports no trick-or-treaters ever come to the door of the Kostka home, because "the house is inside a cemetery" (A-1).

Guy Kostka, superintendent of Valleau Cemetery in Ridgewood, has lived on the grounds with his family since 1982.

Road Warrior column should be labeled 'FANTASY'

The Johnson Public Library on Main Street in Hackensack.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

There are plenty of news stories on Page 1 and elsewhere in The Record today, but on the Local front you'll find the musings of a madman who has to make it up as he goes along just to fill space.

The Record has been printing Road Warrior columns by Staff Writer John Cichowski based on false premises and false information for years now.

For more than a year, a retired engineer has been sending e-mails to everyone from Vice President Jennifer A. Borg on down with the results of his fact-checking, and posting those e-mails on a Facebook page for Road Warrior Bloopers.

Few of the hundreds of errors, distortions or omissions detailed in the e-mails have ever been corrected, and the columns are as cockamamie as ever.

Nut on the loose

Today, Cichowski puts himself in the head of a reader who heard about the loose wheel and tire that smashed through the windshield of a bus on Route 17, and wondered "what your chances are of being killed this way" (L-1).

Frankly, I didn't, but did wonder why news stories about the bus passenger who was critically injured by the flying wheel didn't say why it came off a fairly new car, a 2009 Lexus.

Still, Cichowski can't answer the question he poses, and can't find many examples of fatalities "in our own backyard."

Fast-food fatal

He goes all the way back to 1994 to find a high school senior killed by "a 200-pound tire that sailed off a tractor-trailer," but the victim wasn't in a vehicle.

He was walking into a McDonald's in Paramus. Thus, Cichowski inadvertently confirms many readers' belief that fast food can kill you.

(In the column, headlines and photo captions, "tire" is used interchangeably with "wheel," but, of course, he must be referring to a tire mounted on a wheel in nearly all instances.)

The next example of a flying wheel in Paramus didn't kill the driver.

And then Cichowski finds himself citing a fatal accident in Syracuse, N.Y.; and a double fatality all the way out in Indiana.

Lost in the woods

Then, having run out of fatal wheel-tire incidents, Cichowski reports on a smashed window at a car dealership, and a pickup's loose wheel and tire that rolled into the woods in Sussex County.

If it's possible, his column last Sunday on the Port Authority Bus Terminal in midtown Manhattan was even worse, because Cichowski left out a crucial piece of information that would have exposed the addled columnist.

Cichowski dashed commuters' hopes that there is any relief in sight for them, if they use the obsolete bus terminal.

But he never mentioned a major, Port Authority funded study that began in mid-2013 to recommend plans for expanding or replacing the crowded terminal.

He also got the age of the bus terminal wrong and in one instance, the number of commuters who use it.

See:

Road Warrior John Cichowski is obsolete 

Hey, Editor Marty Gottlieb.

It's time to start labeling Cichowski's columns "FANTASY," if you are not going to force the turkey to retire.

Another loose nut

None other than Food Editor Esther Davidowitz is the author of a long, promotional story about Callahan's unhealthy hot dogs, now sold from a truck by Daniel DeMiglio, the third generation (Better Living cover).

Here is one editor who needs editing to stop her from cramming so many words and facts into one sentence.

She describes DiMiglio as "the dark-haired, super-energetic, currently Old Tappan, soon-to-be Fort Lee resident, who bided his time working in the NBA's entertainment division ...."

Sounds like a woman north of 60 who has the hots for a guy half her age.

These editors again fail to deliver hometown news

The quality of life in North Jersey -- including aircraft noise over Hackensack and other towns near Teterboro and Newark airports, above, or gaping potholes that damage car tires and wheels -- are of no interest to the editors of The Record's Local news section who appear to spend most of their time reading tabloids in the newsroom toilet.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

I'm shocked by the amount of Law & Order news in The Record's Local section today and Friday.

Police, fire, accident and court news and photos dominate almost every page.

But readers also find stories about the police, including Friday's report on raises for the Pal Park chief and today's solemn piece on a vigil for Daniel Breslin, the hospitalized Bergen County police officer who was severely injured by an allegedly drunk driver (A-1 and L-1).

Sforza stumbles

Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza was so desperate to fill his pages today he ran a freelance shot of a Route 80 accident in Hackensack from inside the photographer's car (L-3).

Now that's chintzy hometown news coverage. Still, Sforza stands proud, shouting, Who says we don't cover Hackensack? 

Sforza's stumbling around for the last several months would seem to call for the return of head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes after a prolonged convalescence.

On vacation?

When is the last time readers saw Hannan Adely's byline on a Hackensack story? Has she been reassigned, sent to cover the Syrian civil war or what?

On Friday, the weekly Hackensack Chronicle reported the City Council on Monday night approved a $760,000 bond ordinance to repave streets and perform related work.

After the meeting, resident Steven Gelber's Hackensack Scoop blog reported that Mayor John Labrosse announced former campaign manager Thom Ammirato will no longer be writing press releases for the mayor or Deputy Mayor Katherine Canestrino.

But Labrosse said Ammirato's salary of $6,500 a month wouldn't be adjusted at this time, Gelber reported.

Following Gelber's lead, Adely of The Record has reported that Ammirato also has a full-time position with Bergen County, and serves as public relations consultant to at least three Republicans in the state Legislature.

But the Woodland Park daily hasn't reported on this latest wrinkle in the Ammirato story or approval of the street-paving bond ordinance.

The woefully short list of streets listed in the Chronicle story continues to omit Euclid Avenue, between Prospect and Summit avenues, a potholed block that hasn't been repaved for decades. 

Euclid Avenue potholes, above and below.

Friday's Record

Editor Marty Gottlieb led Friday's paper with a long report on the incredible mess Governor Christie has made of road, highway and mass-transit improvements by refusing to hike the low gasoline tax to fund them.

This is basically a four-year-old story The Record has ignored until now, especially increasingly congested traffic, and crowded trains and buses.

Barf bags

In Better Living, Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung pans Port of Call American Fusion Buffet and Sushi in Hackensack.

Still, she feels it necessary to tell readers the all-you-can eat format "would be good for people with big appetites."

The data box on Friday's BL-18 lists only four recommended dishes, two of them desserts, but omits other dishes Ung praised in the text. 

Did anyone edit the piece?

Today's paper

Gottlieb's Page 1 today includes another story on the agonizingly slow investigative and legal process in the wake of January's explosive revelations in the George Washington Bridge scandal.

Since members of the GOP bully's inner circle in Trenton and at the Port Authority admitted they orchestrated four days of gridlock in Democratic Fort Lee, all readers have seen are firings and resignations, and targets lawyering up and taking the Fifth.

Christie himself hired a friendly law firm at taxpayers' expense to produce a whitewash declaring the governor had no knowledge or involvement in the lane closures.

Other stories and columns appear designed to help Christie repair his battered image (A-3).

The slow legal process is designed to ensure greedy lawyers who charge exorbitant hourly rates will walk away with literally millions of dollars in fees no matter who is found to be at fault for an apparent pattern of political retribution.

Paramus woes

Today's front page also includes a story on a "big change for Paramus," which has eased rules on retail signs along Routes 4 and 17.

This piece continues The Record's ad-fueled focus on major retail chains over Main Street merchants.

The last story on local merchants reported on a few record stores, as in those selling vinyl recordings, and continued to ignore struggling downtowns in Hackensack, Englewood, Teaneck and other towns.

Are residents fleeing Christie's New Jersey?

Extensive patching of Euclid Avenue, above, and other streets in Hackensack have encouraged some drivers to start speeding and blowing through stop signs again.

Good luck trying to make any sense of today's Page 1 story in The Record on North Jersey allegedly dealing with "reverse migration" to New York City.

This poorly edited story tries to wring meaning from just about anything -- including "The Tonight Show" returning to Manhattan and two sports teams setting up camp in Brooklyn.

It is completely devoid of statistics, and it's so poorly edited, readers are exhausted after the first few paragraphs of back and forth, as the story jumps from one topic to another.

Editor Marty Gottlieb -- a veteran New York Timesman who traded Paris for Paramus -- must have hounded Stephanie Akin, the reporter who wrote this essay, to make numerous changes, including packing the piece with New York City history dating to 1957.

Reverse migration caused by Governor Christie's conservative policies on everything from mass transit to taxing the wealthy doesn't earn a mention.

Defensive lawyer

Readers who turn to Local find a story on courts banning smart-phone photos -- written by Staff Writer Kibret Markos, who covers the Bergen County Courthouse in Hackensack (L-1).

Markos, a lawyer, has yet to report on what is really cutting down access to the courts -- high legal fees.

Tear-jerker

You'll find one of the best stories in the paper at the bottom of L-1 -- a local obituary on Rose Fernandez of Wyckoff Florist & Gifts.

This is a real tear-jerker about a generous woman who didn't let family tragedies dampen her spirit. 

The "CONTACT US" box on BL-2 of the Better Living section no longer lists Susan Leigh Sherrill as food editor, so readers can assume she is history.

No tears are being shed over her departure.

Campaign follies

Victor E. Sasson, the independent candidate in the May 14 Hackensack City Council election, today was approached by a voter, who said, "I see you were caught in the act." 

The man apparently confused Sasson with Kenneth Martin, a retired Hackensack police detective who is charged with removing lawn signs put up by rivals in front of Hackensack Market on Passaic Street.

Martin heads the Coalition for Open Government slate, which is backed by the Zisa family political machine and Lynne Hurwitz, the boss of the city's Democratic Party.

The last I saw of the man he was going home to check the story in The Record on Martin's scheduled trial.  


 

Why gyms and bars don't mix

A disoriented driver did an awful job this morning of parking the Mercedes-Benz SUV, above right, at 24 Hour Fitness in Paramus, and may have hit the black Acura sedan.

If it wasn't 8:45 in the morning, I would have guessed the driver of a Mercedes-Benz SUV had one too many at Miller's N.J. Ale House, which is next to 24 Hour Fitness in Paramus.

I noticed the sloppy parking job as I walked to my car in the gym parking lot, which is off Route 4 east.

I couldn't tell whether the Mercedes ML 350 had hit the black Acura sedan.

The owners of Bergen Town Center send a poor message to gym customers by putting the bar-restaurant next to 24 Hour Fitness, especially in view of its menu of unhealthy food.

Miller's Ale House offers valet parking, and often in the morning, I see parking-lot stanchions blocking what appears to be a fire exit from the cavernous gym, a former tenplex movie theater.

Giving heroes a bad name

Image via Wikipedia

Paramus is the "center of the baseball world," The Record reports.

If the losing team of Paramus Little Leaguers are "heroes," as the Page 1 headline in The Record declares today, what would the players be if they had won -- 'gods'?


Combine the desperation of Editor Francis Scandale for local news and Liz Houlton's inept news copy desk, and you get a story that is blown way out of proportions.


The word "hero" or "heroes" appears nowhere in the Paramus story, so how did it get in the headline? Did Scandale order its use to sell papers? How do real heroes feel to be lumped in with these losers?


Blowhard mayor


Paramus residents are expected to launch a recall of Mayor Richard LaBarbiera for knocking its famous malls, which keep property taxes low.


"Paramus has always been known as the center of the shopping world," the mayor said. "After this year and this team, we're now known as the center of the baseball world."


What hyperbole. What B.S.


Far better choices for A-1 would have been the hearings on the Port Authority's   toll-and-fare hike plan (A-3) and the foreclosure story (L-7).


Newsroom tensions


Staff Writer Andrea Alexander hasn't covered Teaneck that long, so you can't blame her for not knowing tensions between Orthodox Jews and minorities surfaced years before the recent debate over school busing (A-1).


But you can blame Editor Deirdre Sykes and her minions, who run the laziest assignment desk east of the Mojave and Sonoran deserts.


Page A-2 carries two embarrassing corrections from Local.


On the front of Local, Hackensack reporter Monsy Alvarado gives a soapbox to gadflies who want the city to hire a civilian police director.


Alvarado has written more stories about the Police Department than any other agency -- even though less than one-tenth of the officers have been accused of wrongdoing.

Editor says never mind

Image via Wikipedia

Today's earth-shaking, Page 1 news in The Record of Woodland Park is about gas-pipeline infrastructure in North Jersey -- so many supposedly ticking time bombs under our streets and homes. Yawn. A terrorist bomb plot in Oregon? Yawn. An animal shelter in South Jersey. Now, you've put me to sleep.


Saturday's earth-shaking news -- more spending by Black Friday shoppers -- was plastered all over Page 1. But today, you'll have to turn to Page A-7 to find out sales were up only 0.3% -- no big deal.


Still, Editor Francis Scandale and Editorial Page Editor Alfred P. Doblin know retail advertising revenue helps pay their inflated salaries, so there is a long editorial on O-2 today, frowning at the way Paramus officials put the kabosh on opening stores any earlier than 7 a.m. Friday.


Doblin doesn't even have the balls to acknowledge the paper's selfish interest in longer shopping hours and the extra ads they'd generate.

Also in the Opinion section (O-1), a Washington journalist who has written about the Hudson River rail tunnel project killed by Governor Christie lists its many good qualities, including the coveted one-seat ride into Manhattan and direct corridors to 13 subway lines.


In view of all the negative press the tunnel project got from Doblin and others at The Record, why weren't readers given a more-balanced picture months ago?

Head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes' Local section is almost devoid of municipal news today, in view of the 90 or so towns in the circulation area. But to compensate, she is running a lot of feel-good stories for the holiday season.


Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung didn't file a Sunday restaurant column for Better Living, so readers get only a wire-service story on "healthy" holiday cookies. How can they be healthy with a stick of butter in the recipe?

I know she is busy stuffing her face with desserts, baking cupcakes at home and eating restaurant leftovers for breakfast, but she could take a lesson from chief space-filler John Cichowski, who files extra Road Warrior columns before he goes on vacation. Any drivel will do.

Selling out for Thanksgiving

Image via Wikipedia

Route 4 west in Paramus will look like this when Black Friday shopping starts.

The major story on Page 1 of The Record of Woodland Park seems to have commercial tie-ins that put advertisers first over readers.

Are the opening hours of Paramus stores on Black Friday really A-1 news or is the former Hackensack daily hoping to cash in big on retail ads?


Far more people will benefit from the tough anti-bullying bill passed by the Legislature (bottom of A-1) or the extension of the No. 7 subway line, which was endorsed by Governor Christie (A-8), but those stories are downplayed by Editor Francis Scandale, who surrenders once again to the business side of journalism.

Sports betting leads head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes' Local section.

Hackensack reporter Monsy Alvarado filed two police stories from there and a third from Wayne. There is no Englewood or Teaneck news today. 

In the Better Living story on what Pilgrims might have eaten at their first harvest meal, let's hope "venison courtesy of D'Artagnan Inc." doesn't mean the meat was supplied free in return for a plug.

Are we in trouble yet?

Image via Wikipedia

The state's huge financial problems are back on the front page as The Record of Woodland Park continues its now-you-see-it, now-you-don't coverage of  the  "mountain of debt"  in New Jersey -- third highest in the nation.

The onetime Hackensack daily's lazy, incompetent editors finally acknowledge former Gov. Chirstie Whitman's "borrowing spree" after running a column by her a while back that blamed everyone but herself for the mess the state is in. And, on Page A-12, the focus is taken off politicians and put on taxpayers, who  are criticized  for approving bonds to preserve open space. This reflects the Borg family's long-held goal of  covering  North Jersey with shopping centers and keeping the ones in Paramus open on Sundays to boost the paper's advertising revenue.

You won't find any development, education or municipal news about Hackensack, where the paper was founded in 1895, but the front of the Local section today has the juicy details about a municipal court appearance by a bimbo complainant from Wayne.

Inside, you'll find the second story in less than a month about establishment of a "green team" in Englewood that will apparently duplicate the work of the city's Environmental Commission, but no mention about whether this will lead to recycling of  TV sets, computers and other electronic devices, something Hackensack has been doing with little fanfare for more than a year.

In Better Living, Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung gives two out of four stars to Cafe Amici in Ho-Ho-Kus, but such a rating is meaningless after she gave the same number of stars to Bahama Breeze, a chain restaurant that serves fake Caribbean dishes in Wayne. And while she continues to obsess over the quality of desserts, missing for another week are any health inspections of Wyckoff restaurants.

She describes a "giant" cupcake as "impeccable," "dense and moist with a thick cream cheese," then adds, innocently, "We're guessing it wasn't low-fat." Indeed. Readers likely are guessing that she isn't "low-fat," either.

'Stupid' food coverage

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If you live in Hackensack or many other towns in Bergen County, you stopped long ago relying on The Record for municipal news. In the more than two years since I moved to River City, which was the onetime local newspaper's home for more than 110 years, I can't recall seeing a story about what the City Council did the night before.

You just have to drive by the paper's landmark building at 150 River St. and count the relatively few cars in the sprawling parking lot to realize The Record has virtually abandoned the city, moving printing and staff as far as 30 miles away. The consolation prize for local news hounds is the copy of a low-quality weekly called the Hackensack Chronicle that is delivered with the daily paper on Fridays. (The Chronicle is also owned by the powerful North Jersey Media Group.)

In The Record's Local news section today, I count four stories from Paterson, two from Wayne and one each from Kinnelon, Clifton, Morris County and Montclair (total of 10 stories). That's twice the number of  Bergen stories in the paper that missed landing in my Hackensack driveway.

In Better Living, food coverage is a 15-minute recipe from the Miami Herald, a list of cooking classes and a highly promotional, staff-written story about a new cookbook by a chef from Cleveland.
 
Does anyone pay $109 to learn how to cook Thai food? For that money, a family of three (two adults and a child) could have two great meals at Wondee's, the best Thai place in Hackensack. The recipe, unlike many the paper runs, looks like you might just be able to prepare the meal in about 15 minutes.

But of what value to readers is the story about the chef's book? This story, written by restaurant reviewer Elisa Ung, is just another in a series of gushing pieces about so-called celebrity chefs. Recall the ringing endorsement Ung gave Bobby Flay (photo top) when he opened a hamburger restaurant in Paramus -- without mentioning that the nail-biting Flay put profits before his customers' well-being by settling for beef raised with antibiotics, growth hormones and animal by-products.


It's no wonder Eric Levin, senior editor of New Jersey Monthly magazine, has called The Record's food coverage "stupid."