City Council Blocks Panel’s Action on Zoo Takeover

The Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday invoked a recently enacted City Charter amendment to block recreation and parks officials from taking greater control over the nonprofit group that helps operate the troubled Los Angeles Zoo.

On an 11-3 vote, the council said it will decide within 21 days how to resolve a decades-old power struggle between the Recreation and Parks Commission and the Greater Los Angeles Zoo Assn. over who should run the facility.

Although the city and GLAZA have jointly operated the zoo for decades, the commissioners voted last week to consolidate zoo operations under one director and sharply increase their authority over GLAZA and the millions of dollars it raises each year.

The commission also ruled that the city has the right to audit GLAZA’s books, and ordered GLAZA members to pay $2 each time they enter the zoo. Previously, members were offered unlimited free entrance in return for their annual membership fee of $35 for individuals and $45 for families.

On Tuesday, the City Council voted to review the commission’s action by invoking Charter Amendment 5, which passed June 4 and gives council members the authority over decisions by city commissions.

Stan Sanders, president of the Recreation and Parks Commission, called the council’s action “a power play” to flex its new muscles--in this case to assert greater control over the Parks and Recreation Department.

Camron Cooper, chairwoman of the 40-member GLAZA board, praised the council’s vote, saying it provided a deadline that could force the warring factions to break through a “stone wall” that has stymied negotiations between city parks officials and GLAZA members for years.

“If the commission’s action were allowed to stand,” she said, “it would be disastrous for the zoo, would cripple our fund-raising capabilities and remove a volunteer effort of 25 years.”

She warned that if the impasse is not broken, “I will resign and so will many of our trustees.”

But Commissioner Dominick W. Rubalcava suggested that such an exodus would not hamper zoo operations. “They’ve done a fairly decent job of fund raising, although they haven’t reached their potential,” he said. “If there was no zoo, there would be no GLAZA, but if there were no GLAZA, there would still be a zoo.”

The council’s action represented a defeat for Mayor Tom Bradley, whose office has lobbied hard in support of park officials’ efforts to take control of the 25-year-old zoo.

Bradley was not available for comment Tuesday. But his spokesman, Bill Chandler, said: “A number of reliable sources have described the need for a zoo director to have greater authority over the management of that facility.”

Consolidating authority under one director, he said, would give the facility a badly needed “competitive edge on other zoos such the San Diego Zoo, which have had a higher profile in the past.”

Beyond that, Chandler added, “every applicant for the zoo director’s position over the past year said he would not come here as long as there was a double-headed administrative structure at the zoo.”

In recent weeks, the City Council and Mayor Bradley have stepped up their efforts to resolve the management confusion and feuding before the arrival of new zoo director Mark Goldstein.

In a telephone interview at his home in Boston, Goldstein, who assumes the $116,448-a-year position in January, wished them luck.

“People keep talking of control, but I believe one person should be held accountable for day-to-day zoo operations,” said Goldstein, 39, a veterinarian and former executive director of Boston’s Franklin Park Zoo. “At issue right now is how to get to that point.”

Goldstein added: “I certainly would hope that a significant part of this problem is resolved before I come out to Los Angeles.”

Councilman Joel Wachs--whose Arts, Health and Humanities Committee will consider restructuring zoo management--said he was concerned that the Recreation and Parks Commission’s action would damage GLAZA, which has raised $27 million for the Griffith Park facility over the last 10 years.