Our worries are over, aren't they?

Image by babyknight via Flickr

If The Record of Woodland Park covered Hackensack and other important Bergen County communities, I wouldn't begrudge the editors covering the front page today with New Jersey winning the Super Bowl -- despite the stupid headline and the distance of the event.


If The Record's clueless assignment desk asked Jamaicans in North Jersey how they feel about gun battles in Kingston, it wouldn't be so bad that air-headed Staff Writer John Brennan quotes Governor Christie as saying the NFL decision is a "great vote of confidence in the government of New Jersey." What did government have to do with it? Why does Brennan allow Christie to hog the spotlight?


If The Record hadn't declined so much since Stephen A. Borg took over as publisher from his father, it wouldn't be so obvious the paper missed the real importance of the story, even to readers who aren't sports fans -- long overdue credibility for New Jersey after so many years of hosting New York teams.


So, are our worries over? Will Hackensack's Main Street suddenly recover from the move of The Record and North Jersey Media Group to Woodland Park? Will Hackensack readers now find coverage of education, development and municipal news in the paper every day?


Check out that Page 1 photo of Christie dwarfed by two football players. You'd think he went on the same crash diet he is demanding for teachers, police officer and just about everybody else in the state -- except for the Borgs and other wealthy residents. 


Brennan is such a great journalist. He launches his story by focusing on the reaction of the multimillionaire owners of the Giants and Jets, as they entertain visions of even greater riches.

Sort of reminds you how the focus at The Record during the recession has been on Stephen Borg buying a $3.65 million estate with a company mortgage just months before downsizing the paper and bidding farewell to a bunch of 20- and 30-year employees.

An editorial on A-22 conveniently ignores that it is Xanadu -- not the 2014 Super Bowl -- that has the greatest potential in terms of jobs and sales and income taxes to stimulate North Jersey. It's a puzzle why the editors and their chief spear-carrier, Brennan, are so down on the incomplete Meadowlands retail and entertainment complex, which likely will be a huge hit when it opens -- as well as a source for sorely needed display advertising in NJMG publications.
 
In Local, a Teaneck story appears today on the purchase of land along the Hackensack River, but there is no Englewood municipal, development or education news. A second day-care center was shut down in Hackensack, but today's story wasn't written by Staff Writer Monsy Alvarado, who is assigned to the city.

What does head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes have Alvarado doing now?