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Philadelphia Inquirer - NJN staffers get ready for final sign-off
"The process for me is still fascinating," Aron says. He needs to know the names of the Democrats who voted for the benefits bill, so the anchor, Jim Hooker, e-mails a Democratic spokesman and runs over a list. Forty minutes until showtime...Hooker offered Aron a chance to give his own comments on NJN's situation."I think it's all been said," Aron said. "I think it's time to say good night." Hooker looked at the camera: "In Michael's way - that's the way we do it here." Then NJN faded to black.
North Jersey-The Record - Stile: Political ties hard to ignore in NJN demise
Philadelphia Inquirer - NJN staffers get ready for final sign-off
The state's public station is unlikely to get a reprieve.
June 19, 2011|By Matt Katz, Inquirer Trenton Bureau
TRENTON - Legislators met in a raucous hearing room to consider extraordinary cuts to public-employee benefits. Protesters were arrested en masse. One union leader called Gov. Christie a Nazi.
Thursday was a busy day in Trenton. Reporters were scrambling in and out of the Statehouse, filing stories, photos, and videos.
But for one media outlet, which had more people on the ground than any other, this may have been the last big story of their journalistic careers.
New Jersey Network will be shut down at the end of the month after 40 years as the state's public station unless the Democratic Legislature provides a reprieve. In what is called a cost-saving move, Christie, a Republican, is transferring the TV operations to WNET, a New York public broadcasting outlet. NJN's nine FM radio licenses also are to be sold, including five to WHYY in Philadelphia.
In the meantime, NJN and its already depleted crew continue to report the news in a way no one else does, out of a studio that hasn't had a makeover in 15 years.
The story that led Thursday's 6 and 11 p.m. newscasts about the showdown at the Statehouse lasted five minutes - a length virtually unheard of in today's slice-and-dice coverage. It was more than twice as long as the segment on Philadelphia's 6ABC Action News.
Designed for a state divided between the New York and Philadelphia markets, NJN is the only media entity that covers "every corner" of New Jersey, as anchor Jim Hooker says. Its saturation was on display Thursday as 10 staff members were deployed to the Statehouse, including two cameramen to film the hearing live for TV and online.
WNET promises that the new network, NJTV, will provide even better New Jersey-centric news. Nightly newscasts will continue with more of an interview focus and less on-the-spot news, the station says. But it has not guaranteed positions to NJN's 130 state workers, who stand to be laid off, transferred, or forced to retire.
Among the most recognizable faces whose fate remains unknown is senior political correspondent Michael Aron, a tall, mild-mannered, and deep-voiced former Rolling Stone editor with two Ivy League degrees and more institutional knowledge than almost anyone under Trenton's gold Statehouse dome.
Known as the dean of the Statehouse press corps and the host of Reporters Roundtable, Aron is a modern-day Walter Cronkite - trusted, comforting, a consummate reporter.
"He is a New Jersey treasure," said Assemblyman Lou Greenwald (D., Camden). "He could have gone many, many other places, but he believed in what he was doing here, about promoting public-policy initiatives and ideas, some controversial, some good, some bad, but to give the public insight on what they were about."
In the 1970s, Aron was a left-wing print journalist running around New York City's Lower East Side with the band Talking Heads (until one of his Rolling Stone reviews angered band members).
With no TV experience, in 1984, he was hired at NJN to do five-minute question-and-answer segments. When he moved on to reporting, he said, Gov. Tom Kean's administration tried to persuade his boss to fire him for being too liberal.
"I let it hang out more in those days than I do now," Aron said.
He no longer has any interest in opinion.
"I just want to capture the dialogue," he said, "and NJN facilitates dialogue."
On Thursday, Aron is the welcoming face at the hearing, greeting legislators by first name. Soon enough, State Sen. Barbara Buono (D., Middlesex) pulls him aside to whisper in his ear.
He sits in the front, wearing his typical pin-striped suit and tie that goes long below the belt, white hair slightly mussed, and legs crossed. A reporters' notepad rests on his lap.
He listens - for hours. Immediately after the union activists are arrested, Aron rushes back to the studio to piece together his segment. "It's still a challenge every night," says Aron, 65.
Outside the Statehouse, 24-year NJN veteran Jerry Henry, 55, covers the union rally.
"I learn every day I work," Henry says. "I logged 400 miles . . . to tell the story about the girl who fell off" the Ferris wheel in Wildwood.
Henry's cameraman, Tim Stollery, won an Emmy with Aron in 1986. Aron "lifts our game with his level of knowledge," Stollery says. "He is always looking for more information; he always has his ears open."
At the studio, Aron is in one of several glass-walled editing bays going through tapes, snapping his fingers, and saying "boom" at the spots where he wants to cut a sound bite.
"The process for me is still fascinating," Aron says.
He needs to know the names of the Democrats who voted for the benefits bill, so the anchor, Jim Hooker, e-mails a Democratic spokesman and runs over a list. Forty minutes until showtime.
Aron begins his voice-over: "A crowd of union members packed Room 4 at the Statehouse Annex. . . . To the unions it's about further belt-tightening for their members, and what feels like a dose of disrespect."
When he reads those words - dose of disrespect - is he talking about himself, too? Aron seems befuddled by the question. Instead, he muses: "This is going to be a good piece. The sound bites are wonderful."
Hooker opens the newscast, just as he has since 2008, in front of a bank of eight screens, next to a table hidden from the camera with Aqua Net and a notebook. Hooker is a former newspaper reporter who doesn't know what's next for him.
"It's like having a decent meal with all the veggies as opposed to fast food," Hooker says, "and I haven't had fast food, journalistically, in 16 years."
On this day, Hooker anchors not just coverage from the Statehouse, but also reports about state unemployment, natural gas prices, a food festival in Jersey City, and special hospital rooms for Alzheimer's patients.
But it is political coverage that NJN is known for, and that came through two weeks ago during live coverage of the primary election. It might have been the last election NJN covered, and so the panel of experts and operatives who assembled in the studio heaped praise on the network at the broadcast's close.
Hooker offered Aron a chance to give his own comments on NJN's situation.
"I think it's all been said," Aron said. "I think it's time to say good night."
Hooker looked at the camera: "In Michael's way - that's the way we do it here."
Then NJN faded to black.
North Jersey-The Record - Stile: Political ties hard to ignore in NJN demise
Sunday, June 19, 2011
By CHARLES STILE
COLUMNIST
Steve Adubato Jr. is comfortable with television cameras bearing down on him each week. He's not so comfortable being under a microscope.
But that's where Adubato, operator of a mini media empire, finds himself since Governor Christie unveiled his plan — a gamble, really — to dismantle the state-run New Jersey Network and hand over the operation and assets to New York's WNET. It's being renamed NJTV.
Under the terms of the deal, Adubato's non-profit television production company, Caucus Educational Corp., will provide programs for the new, revamped enterprise, namely the array of public affairs talk shows that, in one way or another, include Adubato's name — "Caucus New Jersey with Steve Adubato," "One on One with Steve Adubato," and "New Jersey Capital Report with Steve Adubato and Rafael Pi Roman." They beam into Jersey living rooms through NJN, WNET, a public broadcasting station in Philadelphia, and other cable outlets.
The arrangement will widen Adubato's Jersey stage. Although WNET will run the station and its daily news, Adubato is poised to become NJTV's dominant presence. He will be Jersey's face on an out-of-state operation.
"Our track record of New Jersey-centric content is something that we're very proud of," Adubato, 53, said in a testy interview Tuesday. "We are excited about the future as long as we continue to raise underwriting support to produce New Jersey-centric programming."
Adubato — columnist, consultant for corporations, and author of career-betterment books like "You Are the Brand" — has thrived at the intersection of media, politics and corporate power
in New Jersey. But the WNET deal also puts Adubato at the forefront of Christie's crusade to turn over government-run programs to private entities. Privatization is an article of faith among conservatives, and if the deal survives legislative review, Christie will further burnish his government-cutting credentials among the party's right wing. Not only did he privatize, but he pulled the plug on public broadcasting, which Republicans failed to do on a national level.
The 130 pink-slipped New Jersey Network employees, the union that represents them, and longtime NJN supporters believe that the respected 40-year-old news organization is a pawn in Christie's ambition — but it's Adubato's prize. And it's a prize awarded to him largely because of his political connections, critics say.
He is the son of "Big Steve" Adubato, the Democratic powerbroker from Newark with statewide influence in the Christie era.
The Robert Treat Academy, the celebrated charter school and crown jewel of Adubato Sr.'s political-social services complex in the city's North Ward, was the first stop on Christie's postelection victory lap in 2009, a move signaling the forging of a political alliance that has helped Christie eke out political successes through the Democratic Legislature. Big Steve's protégé, Essex County Executive Joe DiVincenzo — a power broker in his own right, with three state legislators under his control as Essex County employees, including Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver — was deployed by Christie to help kill a version of a union arbitration bill in the Assembly.
One critic told the Assembly Budget Committee earlier this month that the WNET/Caucus plan had all the "hallmarks of a wired, inside deal."
"Last September Steve Adubato Jr. confidently told several of our NJN members that he and WNET would be taking over NJN," said Dudley Burdge of the Communications Workers of America, which represents NJN employees. "Through a process with marked lack of transparency, that's exactly what happened."
Adubato called the charge "ludicrous."
"The process was set up by the Legislature, together with the executive branch, and the decision was made to select WNET … and CEC is proud to be publicly listed in that bid," he said.
Christie also says he had no discussions with Adubato Sr. And during an appearance Thursday night on Adubato's live "On the Line" call-in show, Christie dismissed the accusation as just a "typical conspiracy theory" that the media like to indulge in.
Adubato also says his father had nothing to do with the bid. Still, Caucus Education Corp. has had ties to his father's North Ward operation. Caucus Education's board of trustees includes Adrianne Davis, the longtime Essex County clerk, who is also the executive director of the North Ward Center; and Ralph Ciallella, a member of the Robert Treat Academy board, according to federal tax filings. Both Ciallella and Davis' terms expire later this month and they will not be offered new terms, said Ray Bramucci, the board president and a former state labor commissioner.
And the CEC board recently included a member of Christie's inner circle: William Palatucci, Christie's former law partner and trusted political adviser, was a CEC trustee until late 2009.
With those kinds of connections, a question looms: Can Adubato be counted on to be impartial on issues that are near and dear to his father's heart and Christie's agenda, such as charter school expansion and education reform? And what about other Christie priorities that require Big Steve and Joe D's political support?
Adubato Jr., who drew a salary of $341,000 in 2009, says his shows have a "reputation of airing out all points of view. If there was something other than fair and balanced points of view, I'm sure we would have heard by now." He also asserts that corporate and foundation donors would not want to back a program that was viewed as one-sided.
During a discussion about charter schools in Thursday night's show, Adubato disclosed his father's work with Robert Treat Academy. He then pressed Christie to defend his dramatic expansion of charter schools, given that for "every charter school that succeeds, there are also many, many that fail."
"It's a silly question, Steve," a rankled Christie responded.
"No, it's not," Adubato replied.
The New Jersey Education Association, the powerful teachers union, is locked in a bitter war with Christie over charter schools. And it is a co-sponsor of his programs, Adubato noted during the program.
Steve Wollmer, an NJEA spokesman, doubts that Adubato will use his new platform to promote his father or Christie's interests.
"I think he does a good job balancing those shows," Wollmer said. "I don't think he's marching in lock step with his father, at least in terms of education issues. Generally, he gives us a very fair hearing."
Adubato also operates Stand and Deliver.com, which conducts "communication, team building and executive coaching" workshops with the elite of New Jersey's corporations and institutions, including PSE&G, Rutgers University, Hackensack University Medical Center, QualCare, and others. Adubato says he routinely alerts viewers of his associations with clients or sponsor if officials appear on his show or are the subject of discussion. "Everything is disclosed. It always has been and always will be," he said.
Opponents hoping to block the deal have focused their scrutiny mostly on WNET. Critics question whether WNET will offer the same quality of coverage as NJN, with only 15 to 20 employees in New Jersey, and by relying more on extensive interviews rather than straight news segments.
WNET's President Neal Shapiro promises to do things "faster, quicker, cheaper" by using video content from other media, video conferencing, and other technology that requires less manpower. Critics dismiss that as unrealistic. And they repeatedly remind legislators of WNET's takeover of WLIW as a cautionary tale. Despite promises to maintain local programming, WNET stocked the Long Island cable station with New York-based shows and nationally packaged Public Broadcasting Corp. shows.
But legislators have avoided criticizing Adubato's involvement.
"In my mind, actually, [Adubato's involvement] is one of the best aspects of the deal. Steve Sr. and Jr. care about New Jersey," Assemblyman Patrick Diegnan said at a news conference held to criticize the WNET/Caucus plan.
Diegnan didn't elaborate, other to say that the Adubatos have deep Jersey roots. It's quite possible that he simply does admire Adubato Jr.'s work. Or maybe it's not smart to publicly criticize "Big Steve's" son — poised to be the new face of public television in New Jersey.
E-mail: stile@northjersey.com
