In Englewood, annual parade celebrates past, not present

Strutting to the beat of a New Orleans-style brass band, above and below, was a musical high point at Englewood's Memorial Day Parade today.

Spectators gathered in front of City Hall on Palisade Avenue. As he does every year, Dwight Morrow High School graduate and attorney Frank Lucianna, 92, marched in today's parade.

Despite the construction of hundreds of luxury apartments on Palisade Avenue and on Route 4, plus multi-million dollar mansions on the city's East Hill, Englewood's downtown merchants continue to struggle. That's a story The Record of Woodland Park has never told.

The only businesses that thrive consistently are the realty companies and landlords, below.

On South Dean Street, Poached operates next door to a vacant storefront, above and below.

Charles Hamade's U Pie Company and Clam Bar on Palisade Avenue, opposite his old restaurant, is flanked by vacant storefronts.

Moosavi Rugs moved into the building where Mitchell Simon Co. operated a hardware store for seven decades, closing in February 2013, above and below.

Across from the old Mitchell Simon building, a storefront is vacant next door to Cassie's, one of the city's most popular restaurants.

North Dean Street has its share of empty storefronts, above and below, as counterpoints to the street's expensive boutiques.

An unwelcome addition to this year's parade was a group of the noisiest and smelliest motorcycles I have ever had the displeasure of seeing and hearing.

An Auburn Speedster was an oasis of calm when compared to the motorcycles, which are modified to make as much noise as possible.

The city's many black churches were well represented, but children attend public elementary and middle schools that remain segregated.

A new firehouse is being built next door the police headquarters and Municipal Court. Yet Englewood officials balked at the expense of turning the old Lincoln School into a community center.

--VICTOR E. SASSON

Either way, Christie will leave New Jersey in shambles

This nondescript patch of asphalt -- three local access lanes to the George Washington Bridge -- was quiet on Monday afternoon, but Fort Lee police responded in force to the Washington Bridge Plaza shopping center nearby and arrested a robbery suspect.

At the intersection of traffic and the Christie administration's political retribution against the Democratic mayor of Fort Lee. Closure of two of the three access lanes to upper level tollbooths occurred one year ago Tuesday.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Governor Christie, his aides and his cronies on the Port Authority managed to cover up their involvement in the massive traffic jams at the Fort Lee end of the George Washington Bridge for a good four months, well past the November election that gave the GOP bully a second term.

There was no hint in the media the Christie administration had anything to do with closure of bridge access lanes on Sept. 9-13, 2013, until January, when this e-mail from the governor's deputy chief of staff was uncovered:

"Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee."

Endless speculation

Today, the front and editorial pages of The Record carry two more attempts to measure the damage to Christie's presidential ambitions, but what difference does it make (A-1 and A-11)?

Whether Christie leaves office to run for president in 2016 or at the end of his term in 2017, New Jersey will still be in shambles.

By any measure, the Garden State is far worse off in the first year of his second term than it was when he took office in January 2010 -- tax revenue, job creation, roads, mass transit, the shore, Atlantic City and, most important, pride.

Under Christie, the Jersey jokes have returned with a vengeance.

Just look at the photo from late March news conference the governor called to unveil his legal team's cover-up, which has already cost taxpayers more than $7 million (A-6).

The sheepish look on Christie's face screams, Get me out of here!

Law breakers

More than 1,000 motorcyclists broke every local anti-noise ordinance on the books, and still managed to land a glowing story on the Local front today (L-1).

Some of the Fort Lee police officers who responded to the Washington Bridge Plaza shopping center in Fort Lee on Monday afternoon, above and below.

A couple having lunch at the Binghamton Bagel & Deli reported a white man in a hoody with his pants worn low on his buttocks walked in and asked, "Who has the money?" They called police.

North Jersey Syrians

A rare story about Syrian exiles also appears on the Local front today, where Staff Writer Hannan Adely reports on the support they are receiving from the long-established community in Paterson and other towns  (L-1).

On L-3, the skeleton newsroom staff in Woodland Park made no attempt to find out if "a person" who jumped "from the Terrace Avenue Bridge onto southbound Route 17 [in Hasbrouck Heights] on Sunday morning" was killed.

But the caption does tell readers who are blind "the investigation caused traffic to be diverted."

Corrupting corn

Leave it to one of The Record's clueless freelancers to take wonderfully sweet Jersey corn -- which needs little more than steaming and a sprinkle of salt -- and recommend two ways you can prepare it and clog your arteries (BL-1 and BL-2).

Here's a wealthy family that out-litigates the Borgs

The Great Falls in Paterson. See letters to the editor on Page A-9 today.

By Victor E. Sasson
Editor

The sensational story of millionaires and billionaires battling over an heiress' inheritance dominates Page 1 of The Record today, as well as nearly a full inside page (A-1 and A-6).

Much is evident in this tortured tale by Staff Writer Kibret Markos, but many other questions remain.

Clearly, the Cohens and Perelmans spend far more money filing and defending lawsuits than Bergen County's most litigious family, the Borgs, who own North Jersey Media Group. 

Ronald Perelman may have billions, but the A-1 photo of him shows a fashion-challenged klutz in ugly shoes who couldn't find matching jacket and pants.

Breaking news

Since 2008, the litigants have been fighting over the fortune amassed by Hudson News founder Robert Cohen of Englewood, where Chairman Malcolm A. "Mac" Borg also lives.

Is it possible NJMG and The Record had no business relationship with the newspaper delivery and newsstand giant, and if they did or do, shouldn't that be in the story, perhaps to explain why so much attention is being given to this prolonged legal battle.

The Borgs and Cohens do use the same Hackensack law firm, Pashman Stein.

Markos is a lawyer and the full-time reporter assigned to Superior Court in Hackensack, one of the busiest in the state, and he can be seen taking frequent smoking breaks outside the 10 Main St. courthouse entrance.

Although the reporter is fresh off the August court recess, you'd think he'd be a lot busier than his bylines indicate.

Two things he doesn't write about are the outrageous hourly rates charged by law firms -- cutting down on public access to the courts -- and all of the age-discrimination lawsuits that were generated by layoffs during the recession.

Oh, that face

Look at the photo of state Sen. Barbara Buono on A-3 today, and tell me you wouldn't rather look at that gorgeous face for four years over Governor Christie's ugly mug.

Then listen to Buono on "the culture" that grew under the GOP bully:

"This is a culture where the rich pay less than their fair share and the rest of us struggle ... where women are told that politicians are better fit to make our health-care decisions and that we don't deserve equal pay for equal work.

"The poster boy for this culture is none other than Chris Christie," Buono said.

Beer and donuts

On the front of Local, head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes celebrates the tailgating tradition of overwight, beer-guzzling football fans (L-1).

Another L-1 story reports Montvale Police Chief Jerry Abrams has no college degree, violating departmental policy.

You'd don't need a 4-year degree to find Dunkin' Donuts.

'Good' noise

On L-3, readers learn how thousands of North Jersey motorcyclists get away with routinely breaking every anti-noise ordinance on the book:

Once a year, 1,300 of them get police to close roads to cars so they can raise money for charities with a 70-mile ride that likely woke the dead (L-3).

Related articles

• The Borg siblings to Hackensack: Drop dead!
• Blurring the line between business and journalism
• Stephen Borg finally comes clean