So true, Healy had Hall of Fame Basketball Coach Bobby Hurley and after Bobby left, Joe Macchi, who spent his entire career delivering quality recreation programing in Jersey City. He replaced Joe, with Mohammad Akil's hand picked guy, Ryan, who is abusive and and inept. The mayor's business decisions and staff decisions have been awful. And you are right, he is unapproachable!! Really, in a state of denial! He already has one foot out the door! At least Cory Booker spent 8 years in the job, about 3 running the city. Steven has not even spent 1 year running the city, before he is out the door. amazing!

The real problem here is Mayor Fulop and his poor judgement. I voted for him because while he was with the council he always seemed to have the best interest of Jersey City in mind. He was friendly and approachable. Since being elected he has become aloof and even condescending. He is no longer friendly, and doesn't want to hear about any problems in the neighborhood. I tried speaking with him at an event but he wasn't interested in my concerns.
Also, he has made terrible choices of whom to put in charge. That is why he had to replace the Chief of Police, the DPW director, and the Chief of Staff. He is a poor judge of character.
If you read this entire article, you can see that he was aware of this situation for over a year, but instead of dealing with it, he just swept it under the rug. Poor judgement.
Joe Macchi was a great director and never should have been moved from that position. Maryanne Kelleher of Cultural Affairs should also have remained in charge, because it is obvious that Cultural Affairs has gone down hill since she was replaced.
Even without this incident, or the 6-8 other complaints that have heard have been put in against the recreation director for abusive behavior, it is easy to see that the department has gone down hill.

The Chief of Staff, Akil, put him in that position for using the HUB during the election. The fact is, the former director did a great job at Recreation. Strothers has run over budget 20%+ in the first year and has shown that he is completely clueless, like almost all of Steven's directors. The only exception has been Stacy F at HHS. Its been a nightmare not just for the long time city employees, but the residents of the city.

I couldn't agree more, Ryan did a horrible job at the HUB and in the end, never paid rent on the store that he rented. He made it a point to evict local tenants, like the woman who sold arts and crafts while he ducked out of paying the city rent. His reward, a directors job by the mayor and chief of staff.

I don't see how this is a matter for the EEOC, unless the complaint was alleging that the abusive environment was based on race, gender, age, or some other protected characteristic.

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That's an image that nobody wants to see...

They called the EEOC when the FDA stopped returning their phone calls. Whatever you think of the quality of Jersey City governemt, Shurin and McDonald are a testament to the quality of Jersey City reporters. LOL!

Parks and @#$%&! Rec: Jersey City rec director accused of filthy tirade aimed at city worker

By Terrence T. McDonald | The Jersey Journal
November 12, 2014 at 3:16 PM

Jersey City's recreation director is being accused of launching into a profanity-laced tirade against a city employee who reportedly snapped the director's teen son with a towel near the Pershing Field pool last year.

In a letter to the federal Equal Opportunity Employment Commission, city worker Diane Fleming said she witnessed a Aug. 27, 2013 incident during which Ryan Strother, the recreation director, scolded city lifeguard Christian Hernandez for accidentally snapping Strother's 13-year-old son with a towel.

In the letter, first reported by Hudson County View, Fleming claims Strother scolded Hernandez ? Fleming's grandson ? within earshot of recreation workers, saying, "what I can't overlook and will not f***ing tolerate are my f***ing lifeguards f***ing roughhousing around the f***ing pool."

Read more:
http://www.nj.com/hudson/index.ssf/20 ... _tirade.html#incart_river

While I voted for Fulop -- sorry to say, another disappointment. Not sure where Fulop got Strother; but looks like it is an example of the Peter Principle and Strother has reached far above his level of incompetence. As a Director of a department, you need to serve as a role model of how to act and need to be professional. I can understand his getting upset as a father; but that's when you take some time out and then deal with the situation as an adult and a leader. It's not a street brawl. Personally, I haven't seen improvements in the Recreaton programs that make this guy worth his salary. Most of the good programs were already in place prior to his taking over.
I think the City can do better.

Strother used shitty language? Shame on him. Better let Yvonne have her way with him.

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I doubt this story will stick around... Maybe you should do more research. This city does not have a track record of hiring city folks with higher education. Its all about who you know.

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It's newsworthy enough. I hope this is the beginning of the end for him. He has no college education, his only management experience is with that joke of a shopping center on MLK Drive where there was a store selling pirated CDs and movies in plain view, and on the Facebook page where he announced various Jersey City events, constant spelling errors were being made (though that seems to have improved lately). Somebody with his level of experience should not be running a large and important city department, nor does he deserve to earn $ 114,000+ a year. I'm sure there are plenty of other individuals that are far more qualified that could have been hired for a little bit less. He seemed like a nice person (until now), but he is not right for this job. This story won't go away so easily like it did for Brook Hannson because it happened while Mr. Strother was on the job, at a city facility and an EEOC complaint has been filed.

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Agreed - and the EEOC is not the agency to complain to about these matters. The timing of this release is very odd - the incident happened more than a year ago. I understand the family didn't receive any redress from the city, but why release the letter now?

Unless the city is looking for a convenient excuse to get rid of Strother, I don't see this going anywhere.

How is this newsworthy?