Lindsay’s Health Raises Storm Warnings : City Hall: Councilman, 89, victim of stroke, concedes he doesn’t always understand what goes on at meetings. Some colleagues wonder if he can still do his job.

On the good days, Gilbert Lindsay inches his way into the Los Angeles City Council chamber, hesitating at the entrance to squint at the television lights and get his bearings.

More often than not, his colleagues already are well along with the day’s agenda. Sometimes they are rising to adjourn.

On the bad days, the 89-year-old councilman does not make it to City Hall at all, and his absences have become more frequent. Since he suffered a mild stroke in 1988, he has missed one of every five council meetings.

Now council members are openly questioning whether Lindsay, who made history when he became the city’s first black council member in 1963, is capable of performing the job. And some community leaders are suggesting it may be time for him to step down.

“It’s a sad situation and it’s having an impact on public policy,” Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky said recently.

“The constituents of the 9th District deserve to have a City Council representative who is physically able to be there and be a part of the give-and-take,” said John Mack, president of the Urban League and a longtime Lindsay supporter.

Lindsay said he has no plans to resign and has not yet decided whether he will run for another term. Members of the City Council can be removed by a voter recall. But there has been no move to do so by Lindsay’s constituents. With more than three years to go until the next election, he poses a touchy problem for the 14 other council members.

Lindsay rarely speaks at council meetings, and he conceded recently that he does not always understand what is happening during the sessions. His aides say he has trouble focusing his attention on issues. And the council has found it necessary to assign a special staff member to help him with routine tasks.

His late arrivals and frequent absences have at times interfered with city business in recent months, council members said. Because 10 of the council’s 15 members must be present to constitute a quorum, the unscheduled absence of any individual can delay a meeting or cause its cancellation.

Last August, the council reorganized its committees in large part to remove much of the workload of the Public Works Committee, which Lindsay chairs. Important sewer and construction projects had hit a bottleneck there, council members said.

And when the vote is close on controversial issues, Lindsay becomes the target of intense lobbying efforts by council members and aides who hover around his chair to coach him.

Although Lindsay’s health long had been discussed privately among council members, it became a public matter after an ethics-reform package was approved last month.

In a behind-the-scenes maneuver, supporters of the measure attempted to arrange for Lindsay to write the opposition ballot argument. The maneuver failed after Yaroslavsky complained publicly that Lindsay is incapable of composing a “coherent argument” for the opposition.

“I love Gil Lindsay,” Yaroslavsky said. “I see him as the grandfather I never had. But Gil has been physically incapacitated since his stroke and he’s not the same Gil he was beforehand.”

Yaroslavsky has since refused to discuss Lindsay publicly.

The Times recently contacted all 14 of Lindsay’s colleagues on the council. Most noted some deterioration in his condition but were unwilling to publicly criticize his performance. Privately, however, most questioned whether he was up to the job.

“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that he doesn’t know what’s going on,” said one council member who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Councilman Marvin Braude called Lindsay “very remarkable for a man of that age,” but said he has “lapses” in comprehension and attention.

“He goes in and out,” Braude said. “When he’s out, it’s very hard for him to be connected. . . .

“I think it would be better if he were not there” and Lindsay’s district were represented by “someone who could comprehend more thoroughly,” he said.

Councilwoman Joy Picus said: “I remember following him down the hall before his stroke and thinking how remarkable he was for a man of his age. He never recovered his vigor.”

Council President John Ferraro said he is reluctant to discuss Lindsay’s health, but said he has noted a slight improvement in his condition in recent months. “The old Gil Lindsay was really a feisty character,” Ferraro said.

In an interview, Lindsay brushed off the criticism.

“I never felt better in my life,” Lindsay said. “I can run a 100-yard dash and challenge anybody to beat me. . . . I can do anything I want.”

But he acknowledged that he does not always comprehend what is happening at council and committee meetings and sometimes votes by watching what certain colleagues are doing.

On issues he does not understand, Lindsay said, “I follow pretty closely with (Councilman) Mike Woo. He’s a very sensible and rational-type person.” Sometimes, he added, he follows the lead of council members Joan Milke Flores or Hal Bernson.

“When I really want to hear something that’s of benefit to me and my district, I’ll hear it,” Lindsay said.

Born in Mississippi in 1900, Lindsay left home as a teen-ager and served in a segregated Army unit during World War I. Later, he went to work as a janitor for the Department of Water and Power.

Eventually, Lindsay was hired as a deputy to county Supervisor Kenneth Hahn and in 1963 became the city’s first black councilman when he was appointed to fill an unexpired term.

Lindsay’s 9th District encompasses the extremes of the city, from the crime-ridden slums of South-Central Los Angeles to the glass-and-steel skyscrapers downtown.

With the backing of black leaders, Lindsay has won reelection handily since the 1960s--most recently last year.

But some are now saying that the poorer areas of Lindsay’s district are suffering because of his inattention.

Mack of the Urban League said that it has become difficult for Lindsay to properly represent the district, which “desperately” needs housing, social service, job-training and other programs.

“The other 14 (council members) are . . . vigorous and active advocates for their constituents,” he noted.

Mark Ridley-Thomas, director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, said the run-down condition of Lindsay’s district beyond downtown is “intolerable.”

Lindsay’s competence is the subject of frequent discussions among black leaders, yet they are hesitant to criticize him publicly because it might seem “unkind or uncharitable,” Ridley-Thomas said. “But some of us have decided to bite the bullet (and criticize him).”

The councilman said his district is “not hardly any worse than any other area of the city” and that he believes his attendance is not much worse than that of most other council members.

Lindsay expressed surprise when a reporter showed him attendance records. “I missed the council? These days?” he asked.

Records from the city clerk show that Lindsay has missed 32 of 167 council meetings--more than 19%--from the beginning of 1989 to the end of last month, 21 of them without explanation. Under council rules, members are expected to schedule absences in advance to ensure a quorum.

In the first 10 months of 1988, Lindsay attended 87% of the council meetings, missing only three without explanation. But he missed 16 of 19 meetings in November and December of that year, mostly because of illness.

Only Councilman Robert Farrell missed more meetings during that period--33--but on most of those occasions he was attending commission meetings, according to his staff. All but one of his absences were excused in advance, the records show.

Of 14 Public Works Committee meetings since last August, Lindsay missed half, the records show.

“There are times when I have requested my vice chairman . . . to chair the meeting for me,” he said. “Many times I’m present but I don’t really feel like chairing the meeting, maybe, but I’m present.”

In his absence from committee, the vice chair, Flores, generally takes over.

“He has missed meetings, but that’s understandable,” Flores said. “He hasn’t been well. It’s too bad he doesn’t have somebody close to him . . . who he could talk with and determine what’s the best for his future and his health.”

Lindsay’s second wife died in 1984, and he has not been close to his two children from his first marriage, according to Bob Gay, the deputy who, in the view of many at City Hall, actually runs Lindsay’s office. The councilman’s son, who was in his 60s, died recently and his daughter lives in Chicago, Gay said.

Some City Hall insiders say Lindsay remains politically savvy.

“The man has a tremendous amount of wisdom and insight,” said former councilman Art Snyder, an influential lobbyist who represents developers. “Certainly he continues to have, when I talk to him on specific issues, quite a good grasp of what’s going on.”

Snyder acknowledged that he drafted a letter last fall for Lindsay to the city Planning Commission endorsing the Watt City Center development, which Snyder represents.

Within the last month, Snyder said, he had a lengthy discussion with Lindsay about complex litigation involving the Community Redevelopment Agency. Even so, Snyder said, “He tires more easily and with tiring comes a letup in mental activity. . . . If you catch him at the wrong time, his years tell on him severely.”

After Lindsay’s stroke in late 1988, the council’s office of the chief legislative analyst assigned a staffer to work virtually full-time for Lindsay. It was an unusual step for the office, which provides legislative and technical assistance to the council as a whole.

The staffer, Emma McFarlin, is paid $79,500 a year and has spent much of the last 18 months escorting Lindsay around City Hall.

William McCarley, who heads the office, said McFarlin is assigned to assist the Public Works Committee and its chairman, but declined to comment further.

McFarlin is rarely more than a few feet away from Lindsay during council meetings. She said recently she got the assignment because of her “ability to communicate with him.”

McFarlin was at Lindsay’s side in January while reporters interviewed him about his role in a tumultuous session on the ethics package.

Lindsay had taken a call in the council chamber from Mayor Tom Bradley, who urged him to move for reconsideration of a campaign-financing provision that had been voted down.

Lindsay complied with the request, but only after a council aide placed a sheet of paper in front of him with words printed in big red letters. Lindsay studied the paper, then slowly read it aloud.

Less than an hour later, Lindsay’s memory about the incident seemed to have failed.

Reporter: “Did the mayor call you about campaign financing to ask you to have it reopened?”

Lindsay: “The mayor talked to me about several things, I suppose. (Turning to Gay, his aide) Was that one of the things he talked to me about?”

Gay: “I wasn’t in the conversation, but he called you.”

Reporter: “What did the mayor want you to do?”

Lindsay: “I don’t remember.”

McFarlin said last week it had been an act. “He just has a way of pretending he doesn’t see or hear,” she said. “He’s an old fox.”

Once a fiery orator, Lindsay rarely speaks at council meetings these days and shows little interest in the proceedings.

Although Lindsay’s staff is frequently asked when he plans to retire, no one has attempted to persuade him to step down, Gay said.

“They’re afraid the old lion has enough strength in him to rise up and slap them down,” Gay said. “It would kill him to leave.”

Gay, 36, has been working for Lindsay for 15 years and concedes he now finds himself facing some conflicts about his role. While attempting to remain loyal to his boss, he has decided to seek the council seat himself, he said recently.

Gay acknowledges that Lindsay does not recall as much as he once did.

“He’s focusing (on issues) as a person who’s in the twilight of his career and it’s his last term,” Gay said. “You don’t come to Gil Lindsay with some 10-year master plan for the 9th District. He’s not going to focus on it.”