L.A. Zoo Director Resigns Day After Critical Report : Recreation: Mark Goldstein ends three-year tenure amid complaints of poor animal care, outdated exhibits.

Los Angeles Zoo Director Mark Goldstein said Thursday that he will step down as head of the troubled facility, ending a three-year tenure that failed to resolve many of the concerns about poor animal care and outdated exhibits that have dogged the Griffith Park institution.

Goldstein probably will remain at the zoo as a consultant for six to nine months at about the same pay he has received since he arrived in Los Angeles from Boston, where he directed that city’s zoos, his lawyer said late Thursday.

His decision to leave ends an often tumultuous reign that was marked by the accidental death of an African bull elephant, controversies over the living conditions for chimpanzees, penguins and other animals, and declining attendance. At the same time, Goldstein was credited with repairing relations with the zoo’s private fund-raising wing, building a new elephant barn and restoring tram service.

But a report released Wednesday by a panel of zoo experts said many exhibits are so substandard that animal health is jeopardized and that the zoo could lose its accreditation. Although the panel did not criticize Goldstein, it repudiated much of the ambitious spending plan that he had approved for the zoo. The panel recommended directing most of the zoo’s resources toward animal exhibits and away from a new front gate and classrooms that Goldstein had endorsed.

“I wish we could have done more, but at the same time I am excited about the possibilities for the future,” Goldstein said in an interview. “It allows for some new leadership to come in.”

The exact terms of the consulting contract with Goldstein, who made $116,447 a year, remain to be resolved, his attorney, Michael Faber, said.

The offices of Mayor Richard Riordan and City Council President John Ferraro had no comment on Goldstein’s announcement late Thursday. But Steven Soboroff, president of the city’s Recreation and Parks Commission, which oversees operations at the zoo, said he will recommend that Goldstein be hired as a consultant to help implement recommendations from the panel of zoo experts.

Soboroff also pledged to begin a national search “to find a world class director to turn around our zoo.”

Before Goldstein announced his resignation late Thursday, several officials in the city government had said that they believed the zoo needed new leadership to enact the plan by three zoo directors for revamping the animal park. Goldstein had alienated many of his employees, animal rights groups and some city bureaucrats.

“We have a new plan. Why entrust it to someone with his history?” said one official, who asked not to be named. “A fresh plan needs fresh leadership.”

*

Goldstein met Wednesday night with the Recreation and Parks Commission, but none of those present would say whether they had asked the 42-year-old veterinarian to resign.

Such a departure would have been hard to imagine in January, 1992, when Mayor Tom Bradley heralded the arrival of the young veterinarian as the beginning of a new era for the zoo. The facility had been cited numerous times in the late 1980s by the federal government for filthy exhibits, contaminated animal feed and other problems.

Just three months after he arrived, Goldstein was thrown into crisis when an African bull elephant named Hannibal died while being crated for shipment to a zoo in Mexico. A city commission appointed to review the incident found that moving Hannibal was justified and that the problems could not have been foreseen. But it also suggested that drugs might have been administered over a longer period of time and alternatives should have been considered.

The incident became the focal point for complaints by some keepers, which became more intense with time. They painted Goldstein as indecisive and too preoccupied with political maneuvering and his relationship with the zoo’s private fund-raising organization rather than the improvement of cramped and outdated exhibits, most of which dated to the opening of the “new” Los Angeles Zoo in 1967.

Other employees defended Goldstein, saying he was a victim of a culture of poor morale and backbiting that has poisoned the zoo’s operation. They said Goldstein communicated better with employees than his predecessor, was better organized and has patched up the city’s once rocky relationship with its private support group, the Greater Los Angeles Zoo Assn.

“There doesn’t seem to be any in between,” said one official at the Department of Recreation and Parks. “People seem to either love him or hate him.”

A city report found a “communication gap” that Goldstein tried to resolve by forming several employee committees and holding scores of meetings. But many employees complained that this seldom seemed to lead to decisive action.

In the meantime, the zoo’s popularity and income have been slipping and there has not been a major new exhibit to tout in six years. Attendance was less than 1.4 million for 1994, a nine-year low and more than 25% below the 1989 mark. Total income for the Greater Los Angeles Zoo Assn. has remained essentially stagnant. And the 1989 opening of Adventure Island, a cavernous habitat for mammals and birds, is the last that was a major draw. Even that addition fell on hard times with many of its animals escaping or being lost to flood or illness.

When it came time to debate how best to spend $23 million from a bond measure for zoo facilities, the internal strife at the zoo erupted into the open. A Goldstein-backed plan included proposals for a veterinary hospital, a new front gate and educational center, as well as a new polar bear and penguin exhibit. Many keepers believed that all the money should be directed toward animal exhibits. They felt vindicated by Wednesday’s report by directors of the Atlanta, Cincinnati and Seattle zoos, which recommended redirecting most of the money toward exhibits while maintaining plans for new veterinary facilities.

“I’m just glad that all our work was not for naught,” said Gretchen Schultz, a keeper who left the zoo last year. “The money should have gone to the animals.”

The greatest concern about animals has centered on penguins and chimpanzees.

*

The zoo’s small and dwindling collection of African penguins has been a particular frustration to several keepers and the zoo’s chief curator. For months, they called on Goldstein to shut down the exhibit because of repeated deaths from malaria and other maladies that have reduced the collection from more than two dozen to just four birds.

But Goldstein has argued that the animals are an important part of the zoo’s menagerie. Outside experts he called in to study the exhibit said improvements could be made to safely house the birds. But one curator said: “If all the birds die when we are trying to make a decision, then the decision is worthless.”

Several zoo employees also complained that Goldstein was not moving quickly enough to improve a chimpanzee exhibit that has been widely criticized as too small, too hot and too unstimulating for the zoo’s chimp troop.

Goldstein said he has moved ahead wisely with the commission of a $100,000 study, but several keepers said he could get results more quickly by turning to his own staff. Head curator Les Schobert, a recognized expert on chimp care, is frequently asked to design exhibits for other zoos.

But the zoo director insisted last year that he “was not shy about making decisions,” citing as examples his reinstitution of a tram system, construction of a children’s playground, enrichment of a tiger exhibit with waterfalls and pools, and improved safety in the elephant compound with new electronic gates.

* AT THE ZOO: Most visitors and workers welcome proposed revamping. B1