Calling all of you lazy, apathetic and stupid Hackensackers: You can vote from home

NO POSTAGE NEEDED: You were able to vote from home in the Hackensack school election, and no postage was necessary. I returned mail-in ballots for my wife, my son and I, marking them for the Three Dads: Michael R. Oates, Anthony F. Rodriguez and Christopher M. Coleman. We also voted "no" on the proposed $85.2 million tax levy.

NEARLY HALF YOUR TAXES: In recent years, the bloated Hackensack school budget has exceeded the city's own budget, and now accounts for nearly half of your property taxes.

Only 8.5 out of 100 residents
 had say in 2019 school election

Editor's note: The Three Dads were elected on May 12, 2020, to three 3-year seats on the Board of Education. See updated vote results in the comments section at the end of this post. 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

HACKENSACK, N.J. -- If you prize your right to vote, you might be shocked at how few residents bothered going to the polls in the 2019 school election.

Only 8.53% of registered voters -- or 8.5 out of 100 -- voted or mailed in ballots for the contest on April 16, 2019.

That means only 1,915 ballots were cast by 22,447 voters registered in Hackensack, according to the Bergen County Clerk's Office.

The turnout in 2018 was even lower: 

Only 1,638 ballots were cast by the 21,303 registered voters -- or 7.6 out of 100 -- in the April 17, 2018, school election.

The May 12, 2020, election set some sort of record, according to the Bergen County Board of Elections, which said a total of 3,071 mail-in ballots were returned.

Delayed election

The Covid-19 pandemic pushed back this year's election to May 12 from April 21, and all voting was by mail-in ballots.

So, the legions of lazy, apathetic and stupid voters in the city had no excuse for not weighing in on filling three seats on the 9-member Board of Education, as well as voting "yes" or "no" on the proposed $85.2 million tax levy.

Not only was your right to vote at stake in the election:

About 45% of your property taxes go to support the schools, so instead of constantly bitching and moaning about "high taxes," you should have gotten off your duff, mailed in your ballot, and had a say in how they are spent.

$131M budget

The proposed 2020-21 Hackensack school budget of $125.8 million grows to $131.7 million after federal and state aid, grants and entitlements.

The school budget totaled $117.8 million for 2018-19, and $128.6 million for 2019-20.

Pocketbook issues are supposed to bring voters out, but in past elections even fewer Hackensack residents weighed in on the proposed tax levy to support the school budget than voted on candidates.

The exception was a special election on Jan. 22, 2019, when the only item on the ballot was the school board's grandiose $170 million school construction and renovation plan.

To pay for a new junior high school and other work, taxpayers would have been hit with a tax hike of $308 to $650 and more a year for 30 years.

A total of 2,917 ballots were cast by 22,126 registered voters to defeat the plan, for a turnout of 13.18%.

2020 election

In the May 12 election, the candidates known as the Three Dads were running under the banner of Hackensack Smart Schools, the team that defeated the wasteful $170 million construction and renovation plan in January 2019.

And they were endorsed by Mayor John Labrosse and other City Council members, who in recent years have tried to wrest control of the school board away from officials loyal to the Zisa family political dynasty.

The Three Dads

Michael Oates, who was in ballot position 4, is a father of 3 children attending city schools, and a lieutenant in the Hackensack Fire Department.

His wife, Toni Imperiale, is an attorney.

Anthony Rodriguez, in ballot position 5, is a father of 3 (2 of whom are attending city schools), and a sales manager at a Fortune 500 company.

Christopher Coleman, in ballot position 6, is a trial attorney, and father of 3 children attending city schools.

Read more about them and their platform here: About the Smart Schools Team.

Their opponents for a 3-year term on the Hackensack school board were:

Jennifer Maury, who works in the Tenafly public schools; David Dungey, a Hackensack business owner; and Monica M. Pelaez, a surgical technician at Hackensack University Medical Center.

MAIL-IN BALLOT: The ballot had two parts, the candidates for 3-year seats on the Hackensack Board of Education, left; and the proposed $85.2 million tax levy, right -- about 45% of your property taxes. You could choose 3 candidates and vote "no" on the tax levy. If it was defeated, the City Council could review and possibly revise the budget.

ENVELOPES: Besides the ballot, voters received another envelope for the completed ballot, below; vote by mail instructions and a letter from Bergen County Clerk John S. Hogan.

DON'T FORGET TO SIGN: There were several places for your name, address and signature, above and below.

Hackensack's really lazy, clueless residents are major factor in school-budget elections

Frances Gogelja, center; Lance Powell, right; and Carlos Velez are challenging three incumbents backed by the Zisa family political machine in Tuesday's Board of Education and budget election.

CHALLENGERS WANT

 TO GET RID OF THE ZISAS

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

The next time you hear a Hackensack resident bitching and moaning about high property taxes, ask them if they vote.

No. I'm not talking about the general election in November, when the outcome rarely affects local property taxes.

I'm talking about the election 97% of the registered voters in Hackensack love to ignore:

The April election for Board of Education members and the proposed school budget -- which accounts for nearly half of all the property taxes residents pay.

In fact, many homeowners pay only a few hundred dollars more in municipal taxes than in school taxes.

Of course, not all of the 97% of registered voters who sat out the last school election paid property taxes, but many were parents of schoolchildren, so what was their excuse?

What's your excuse?

Tuesday's election

On Tuesday, the many thousands of property tax payers will have another chance to tell the school board they are unhappy with yearly increases in the budget and the local tax levy required to support seemingly unchecked spending.

Voters can say "no" to the proposed budget of $117,143,515 by voting against the $82,865,444 tax levy or property taxes the board proposes to spend in 2018-19.

A "no" vote would allow the City Council to review the proposed spending plan, cut it or leave it as is.

Ten years ago, the tax levy was $56,698,771, so about half of any increase in property taxes in the past decade was driven by higher school budgets. 

In the current tax year, one homeowner in the Fairmount section is paying $8,843 in municipal taxes and $8,495 in school taxes; county, open space and library taxes brought his total tax bill t0 $18,874.

Apathy or ignorance?

Whether from apathy, laziness or ignorance, only 642 ballots were cast in the last school election in 2017 -- that was 3% of the 21,307 registered voters at the time.

The tax-levy proposition passed 342-210; only 552 of the 642 residents who voted appeared to know they could say "yes" or "no" to the budget.

As of last Wednesday, 23,401 residents of Hackensack were registered to vote, Bergen County election officials said.

Turnout in prior school elections: 1,133 in 2015, 864 in 2014 and 1,929 in 2013.

Candidates

Residents can also vote against the three incumbents seeking another 3-year term: Mark A. Stein, Jason Nunnermacker and Daniel F. Carola -- all stooges of the Zisa family political machine.

Since 2013 and with the Zisas' backing, Nunnermacker, a lawyer who is the board president, has tried but failed repeatedly to get elected to the City Council.

So, why waste your vote on a board president who has been dying to get as far as possible away from the schools?

Difficult ballot

Voting in Tuesday's election won't be as easy as voting in the May municipal and general elections:

Polls on Tuesday won't open until 2 p.m., and will close at 8 p.m.

Although there are two groups of candidates running for seats on the school board, the three members on each slate aren't grouped together or allowed to use the name of their team.

So, you'll have to search for your choices.

See: School election issues: Zisas and higer taxes

On Tuesday's Board of Education ballot, challengers from "The Putting Our Kids First Team" -- Frances Cogelja, Carlos A. Velez, Lancelot Powell -- appear on Lines 2, 4 and 5.

Next to the column of candidates on Tuesday's ballot, parents and property tax payers will find the nearly $83 million tax levy proposition, which they can vote against and send the proposed budget to the City Council for review.

Kick out Zisas

The message from the three challengers is simple:

"Put our kids first ... and the Zisa Brothers last!"

Of course, the reference is to former four-term Hackensack Mayor Jack Zisa and his brother, disgraced former Police Chief Ken Zisa, who held onto power in the schools after reformers defeated Zisas-backed City Council slates in 2013 again in 2017.

See: Zisas stand for greed,

 nepotism, partisan politics

If anti-gun teens really turn out and vote, we'll witness a new American Revolution

The size of the March For Our Lives demonstration in Washington, D.C., on Saturday was estimated as high as 800,000, and if crowds in other cities are included, more than 1 million people turned out to demand action on banning assault-style rifles and taking measures to end mass shootings (Associated Press photo).

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Florida high school massacre survivors warned NRA-endorsed politicians to prepare for defeat at the polls in November by a new wave of teenage voters.

In Saturday demonstrations in Washington, D.C., and other cities in America and around the world, protesters called for a ban on assault-style rifles and passage of other gun-control laws in a bid to end mass shootings.

If they register and go to the polls, the anti-gun teens who organized the March For Our Lives could ease one of the most corrosive influences in our democracy:

Voter apathy in national, state and local elections.

Millions of new voters would be nothing less than a new American Revolution -- despite the best efforts of Republicans to suppress the vote, and the news media to divide us by reporting almost exclusively on politics.

Clinton defeat

Registered Democrats who sat out the 2016 presidential election were a major factor in the defeat of Hillary Clinton and the Electoral College victory of serial liar Donald J. Trump.

In 2013, voter indifference to the Democratic candidate in New Jersey led to the reelection of Chris Christie, even though his first term showed him to be the worst governor in state history.

And in Hackensack's April 2017 school election, only 642 out of 21,397 registered voters -- that's 3% -- weighed in on the $109 million budget, and elected three members to the nine-member school board.

Thus, the discredited Zisa family political dynasty retained control of the city's Board of Education after their candidates had been trounced by City Council reformers in 2013.

Trump in Florida

President Trump, who fled the White House and spent the weekend at his Florida golf resort, was silent on the extraordinary turnout to remember the 17 students or staffers killed on Feb. 14 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla.

At The Record of Woodland Park, my local daily newspaper, Columnist Mike Kelly didn't bother working on Saturday to cover similar demonstrations in Montclair, Newark and other New Jersey communities.

His Sunday column demanded an apology -- but not from Trump, who caved into the National Rifle Association after the Parkland shooting, and didn't call for new gun-control measures.

Instead, Kelly had readers eyes rolling with his column on Facebook's vulnerability to a data-mining firm working for Trump -- a story broken last week by The New York Times.

The major piece on The Record's Opinion front today -- pushing Kelly's column below the fold -- is about professional baseball (1O).

Give me a break.

'Trump drops dead and the nation rejoices' is the headline I can't wait to write for real

In this cartoon from Pat Bagley of The Salt Lake Tribune, the people of Puerto Rico are still waiting for real relief, but GOP leaders rushed to approve a tax plan that is little more than a $1.5 trillion giveaway to the super rich, including all those big corporations that threatened to withhold millions of dollars in campaign funds.

Cartoonist Jimmy Margulies, formerly of The Record of Woodland Park, my local daily newspaper, says the GOP tax plan means smaller deductions for homes and bigger deductions for Trump Hotels.

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

Editor's note: This post has been updated with a link to the "Mueller Baby" impeachment carol.

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

New York billionaire, con man, racist and tax dodger Donald J. Trump has held the office of president of the United States for only 11 months, but I long ago tired of hearing his voice.

His tweets -- taking credit for a robust economy and stock market records -- are filled with lies.

They are painful to read, and have me wondering why the news media keep on quoting and analyzing them, and seeking reaction to every idiotic word.

I probably wrote thousands of headlines on the night copy desk of The Record, when that once-great local daily newspaper was headquartered in Hackensack.

But the headline I'm itching to write still eludes me:

"TRUMP DROPS DEAD

 AND THE NATION REJOICES"

You'd think all that low-quality McDonald's food and steaks and Diet Coke would have done in the 71-year-old moron by now.

Instead, it looks like Trump will be bounced from office by the special counsel investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election or impeached by Congress when control swings to the Democrats after the November 2018 midterm elections.

Of course, the latter can only happen, if the tens of millions of Democrats who didn't bother to vote in November 2016 go to the polls next year.

See: 'Mueller Baby' impeachment carol

Cartoonist Dave Grandlund calls House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell liars after they claimed the tax overhaul would benefit "everyone ... even the middle class." But the pair were quoted endlessly by newspapers on the positive effects of the tax plan on the middle class, and their sound bites dominated TV news.

GOP tax overhaul

The tax overhaul pushed by the president and approved by Republicans in Congress was panned by the news media, including The New York Times:

"G.O.P Wins on

Tax Cuts, but

Faces a Brutal

Election Year"

News media, voter apathy

Let's hope that in 2018, we don't see the kind of voter apathy that sidelined millions of Democrats in the 2016 presidential election.

Voter apathy can be traced directly to the media, including TV and radio news, and newspapers big and small.

For more years than I care to remember, the media have been relentless in their political focus when covering elections. 

Everything is reported in terms of Republicans and Democrats, and reporters and editors seem unable to grasp the importance of exploring issues, and reporting what would be good for the country.

This is essentially "he said, she said" journalism that is of little help to readers.

Turnout falls

On Monday, a front-page story in The Record disclosed turnout in the Nov. 7 election for New Jersey governor "hit an all-time low" after steadily declining since 2001, even though more people have been registering to vote.

The Record has done a poor job of keeping up with Governor Christie's nearly 600 vetoes, but Monday's story reported that in 2015, the GOP bully vetoed a bill that would have made voting "more convenient."

The story didn't note that Christie and other Republicans are synonymous with voter suppression while Democrats want to widen voting.  

"Dubbed the Democracy Act, it would allow for early voting, including extended and weekend hours up to two weeks before a Tuesday election.

"Online, automatic and same-day voter registration. among other initiatives, were also proposed, under the bill sponsored by outgoing Assembly speaker Vincent Prieto," a Democrat.

The bill has been reintroduced, and action is expected after Democrat Phil Murphy takes office as governor on Jan. 16, replacing Christie, whose two terms of mean-spirited rule brought the state to its knees.

Please, I don't want to hear any excuses, just get out and vote in race for governor

The Bergen County Board of Elections in Hackensack is where thousands of mail-in ballots cast in Tuesday's election are recorded and counted. In the past few weeks, I hand carried our three mail-in ballots to the board office on the 3rd floor of the Bergen County Administration Building.

DON'T MISS BALLOT QUESTIONS ON LIBRARIES AND THE ENVIRONMENT

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

I still get sick to my stomach when I remember that millions of Democrats sat out the 2016 presidential election a year ago, allowing a con man, liar, racist and sexual predator to be elected to the highest office in the land.

Not the mention the tens of thousands of millennials and other Bernie Sanders supporters who actually voted for Donald J. Trump, and made the difference in three swing states.

There is no excuse for not voting, especially when President Trump and the Republican-led Congress are determined to destroy our democracy and our way of life.

On Tuesday, voters in New Jersey get to decide who will replace Chris Christie, a Trump crony who has been the worst governor in state history.

The choice for governor is between Democrat Phil Murphy and Republican Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, a Christie clone whose ads have used Trump-like lies and distortions.

Sheila Oliver is running for lieutenant governor, and other Democrats are seeking to be returned to the state Senate and Assembly, and the Bergen County Board of Freeholders.

Public questions

The first ballot question on Tuesday asks for approval of $125 million in bonds to provide grants to public libraries.

The second question, if approved, would prevent the governor from using monetary damages or fines from those who contaminate the environment for any other purpose than repairing, restoring or preserving the state's natural resources.

Get-out-the-vote efforts included reminders placed on front doors in Hackensack's Fairmount section.

Campaign coverage

In The Record of Woodland Park, my local daily newspaper, coverage of the Murphy and Guadagno campaigns has been poor.

Most of the reporting has been from Staff Writer Dustin Racioppi, whose objectivity is questionable in view of his permanent assignment, covering Christie.

Racioppi has repeatedly used Guadagno's description of Murphy as a "liberal," which amounts to a smear in our highly charged political atmosphere, and done little if any fact-checking when regurgitating GOP attack ads.

His final piece on the election appeared on Sunday's front page -- "Final push toward Election Day" -- where his first paragraph declared, "Times up."

Of course, it wasn't. Voters have today, as well, to decide who to vote for and how to vote on the two ballot questions.

But there is no election coverage today; for some reason, The Record remains silent on the day before an election.

Voter apathy

In the last gubernatorial election, The Record endorsed Christie over the Democratic candidate, then-state Sen. Barbara Buono.

Yet, turnout in 2013 was the lowest for any election for governor in state history.

Of course, the news media rarely reports on voter apathy, because they would have to examine their relentless focus on politics instead of issues as one of its main causes.

See:

Slanted reporting, voter apathy are election factors

Trump flip-flopped on jobless rate, Mexico paying for wall, Obama's golfing and more

Credit: DemocraticUnderground.com

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

On June 16, The Washington Post listed Donald J. Trump's flip-flops in the two years since he "descended on the Trump Tower escalator and announced he was running for president."

"For our two-year anniversary of fact-checking Trump, we compiled everything he promised in his announcement speech that he flip-flopped on as president," the newspaper's Fact Checker wrote:

• The unemployment rate (he called it "nonsense" on the campaign trail; now he touts it as legitimate);
• China currency devaluation (he no longer blames them for devaluing their currency, which was false to begin with);
• Mexico paying for the wall (he now equivocates, saying Mexico will pay "eventually," "at a later date," "in some form");
• Criticizing President Obama for playing golf (President Trump has golfed 17 times since Inauguration Day -- more than twice the number of times Obama golfed at this point);
• And immigration (he promised to end Obama's executive granting deferred action to children of undocumented immigrants, which he now says he won't do).

"Of course, when you're running for president, it's easy to lob baseless rhetoric..., The Washington Post reported. "It reminds us of the lyric in 'Hamilton' the musical: 'Winning was easy ... governing is harder.'"

Click on the following link for the paper's report:

Here's everything he flip-flopped on

Voter apathy

I applaud that great newspaper in the nation's capital for fact-checking the Liar-In-Chief. 

But how much space does The Washington Post and other news outlets big and small devote to emphasizing the importance of voting?

I never see anything in my local newspaper, The Record of Woodland Park, about voter apathy, even when around 18,000 of the 22,000 registered voters stay home in Hackensack's City Council and Board of Education elections.

And when Governor Christie was re-elected in 2013, the turnout was the lowest in any gubernatorial election ever, and that hurt the losing Democratic candidate.

Clinton, Ossoff

Millions of Democrats stayed home on Nov. 8, convinced that Hillary Clinton couldn't possibly lose to a racist, con man and tax dodger, but they were wrong, and the election was decided in the antiquated Electoral College.

In Tuesday's runoff election for a House seat between Democrat Jon Ossoff and Republican Karen Handle, CNN reported that more than 140,000 voters cast ballots early, but "more Republicans have voted early than Democrats," and that had Ossoff sweating.

Could Democratic apathy in a district that has been Republican for decades be the reason Osoff lost?

And can we forget all the nonsense about the election being a referendum on Trump's presidency?

Column from hell

In the more than 13 years Staff Writer John Cichowski has pretended to be The Record's commuting columnist, he's rarely interviewed long-suffering NJ Transit bus and train riders.

That's despite deep cuts in state aid to the mass-transit agency, the difficulty of finding rush-hour seats, and delays caused by mechanical failures, train crashes and only one express bus lane into the Lincoln Tunnel.

Today's overly dramatic column on expected summer delays caused by repairs to Amtrak rails and switches in Manhattan is too little, too late.

One quote on Page 1 tells you just how out of touch Cichowski is with growing traffic congestion at the Hudson River crossings, where rush-hour delays of more than 1 hour at tollbooths have become routine:

"People might as well drive into New York," said Jacklyn Elizabeth, who 'was returning home to California via Denville after visiting relatives.'

She added, "Does New Jersey want to kill mass transit?"

No, lady. Christie, our governor, already took care of that years ago. 

A selfie of Food Editor Esther Davidowitz.

Mystery meat

In a feature on the Better Living front today, Food Editor Esther Davidowitz is asking readers to play Russian roulette with harmful antibiotics, growth hormones and preservatives linked to cancer by eating sandwiches stuffed with mystery meat and cold cuts (1BL).

The headline: 

"9 GOTTA-HAVE NORTH JERSEY SANDWICHES"

Davidowitz says, "Here [are] special shout-outs to nine North Jersey sandwiches for being so darned awesome" (she doesn't mention that eight of them aren't good for you).

Thanks. I'll stick with the lobster roll from Jack's in Edgewater.

Francis Scandale

Francis "Frank" Scandale of Glen Rock, a former editor of The Record, was featured in Saturday's Better Living section:

"Grilling tips from one dad to another"

Although a photo of him grilling hamburgers appeared, his face wasn't shown, and he wasn't identified as a former editor of the paper in Hackensack and then Woodland Park.

On Sept. 11, 2001, Scandale caved in to the bean counters in Hackensack, relegating to a back page the iconic photo of firefighters raising the American flag over the rubble of the World Trade Center.

He was told it would be "too expensive" to remake the front page for The Record's exclusive image.

That decision likely blew the chances of the photographer, Tom Franklin, to win a Pulitzer Prize.

Scandale was shown the door by then-Publisher Stephen A. Borg a little over a decade later:

Good riddance to bad rubbish

Editor Frank Scandale's decade of failure

$81.2M Hackensack school tax levy OK'd by tiny fraction of 22,000 registered voters

Only an American flag marked the entrance to the Fairmount School cafeteria, which served as a polling location in Tuesday's Hackensack school and budget election, above.

Me and my wife voted after 4 on Tuesday afternoon, and there were no other voters in the school cafeteria, above. Polls were open from only 2 p.m. to 8 p.m.

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

In Hackensack, never have so few approved so many tens of millions of dollars in property taxes to support public schools.

Only 550 residents (out of 22,000-plus registered voters) said "yes" or "no" to the $81.2 million tax levy on Tuesday's school election ballot.

The vote to approve the levy -- which supports a $109 million school budget -- was 341, including 41 mail-in ballots, the Bergen County Clerk's Office said today.

The vote against was 209, including 25 mail-in ballots.

There are 22,732 registered voters in Hackensack, according to the Superintendent of Elections.

Hackensack officials say more than 44% of each homeowner's property taxes go to support the public schools.

The Record of Woodland Park reported the owner of a home assessed at $241,342, the city average, will pay $5,109.69 in school taxes (whether you have children in school or not).

Flawed reporting

Hackensack is the biggest school district in Bergen County, but The Record couldn't spare more than six paragraphs in the Local news section to report partial results of the school election.

Today's story on 3L doesn't include mail-in ballots.

Three three-year seats on the Board of Education also were up for grabs on Tuesday, but the highest vote-getter received only 466 ballots (out of 22,732 registered voters).

All three members of the Team Hackensack slate -- backed by the Zisa family political dynasty -- were elected.

They include two incumbents, Johanna Calle with 466 votes, including 51 mail-in ballots; and Robin E. Coles, also with 466 votes, including 58 mail-in ballots.

The third member of the Zisa slate, Leila T. Amirhamzeh, received 323 votes, including 30 mail-in ballots.

Although The Record provided no biographical information on the four candidates, challenger Patrick C. Allagoa received 199 votes, including 38 mail-in ballots.

Allagoa's name was listed in today's story as "Chimelozonam Patrick Allagoa," even though that was not how he was listed on the ballot.

Editorial apathy

The results of Tuesday's election weren't a surprise as Hackensack voters have always been apathetic about the April school balloting and the non-partisan May election for City Council.

For at least the past two years, The Record didn't bother reporting any biographical information for school board candidates.

Nor did the paper explore issues or provide any details of the proposed budget, which is $5 million higher despite declining enrollment.