L.A. Zoo Has Pulled Out of Tailspin, Expert Panel Says

The downtrodden Los Angeles Zoo has pulled itself off the canvas and is fighting to be a world-class contender again, following a year in which the facility was hit by sagging attendance, a leadership controversy and reports of substandard maintenance and animal care, an expert panel said Tuesday.

The leaders of three of America’s top zoos completed a three-day tour of the Los Angeles Zoo and pronounced the animal park in much improved form. They pointed to marked progress in managing the animal collection, caring for the grounds and straightening out a tortured organizational structure.

But the zoo directors, 14 months after their highly critical initial report, said much more still needs to be done to bring the Los Angeles facility into the ranks of the nation’s preeminent zoos. Most important, they said, the zoo needs to substantially increase its fund-raising to rebuild its exhibits, which are nearly 30 years old.

“We believe the Los Angeles Zoo has begun its long march toward not just respectability, but excellence and leadership among zoological gardens,” said Terry Maple, the director of Zoo Atlanta. “But it will take a few years, a long-term effort and the sustained application of resources, both financial and human.”

It was more than a year ago that Mayor Richard Riordan and City Council President John Ferraro invited Maple to Los Angeles, along with David Towne, director of Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo, and Ed Maruska, head of the Cincinnati Zoo. The three were asked to assess the Los Angeles Zoo’s problems and plot a course for improvement.

Later, another team of zoo professionals came to Los Angeles, this one representing the American Zoo and Aquarium Assn. That group also found so many problems with the zoo’s maintenance and facilities that it postponed ruling on the zoo’s accreditation. Loss of accreditation would mean that Los Angeles would be hampered in trading animals with other zoos and in obtaining grants.

But the first panel of zoo consultants said Tuesday that their return visit left them convinced that Los Angeles should be able to pass this summer’s accreditation review by the AZA and to begin to shoot for loftier goals.

Los Angeles officials said they hope Tuesday’s report will mark the end of a series of setbacks that has plagued the zoo for most of this decade.

Hailed as a trend-setting zoological park when it opened new facilities in 1967, the zoo’s sterile, faux-rock exhibits have fallen into disfavor in a field that increasingly strives to place animals in natural settings.

By the late 1980s, the federal government was citing the zoo for filthy exhibits and contaminated animal feed, among other problems. Veterinarian Mark Goldstein was hired in 1992 to turn the zoo around. But Goldstein never won the confidence of much of the zoo staff or the city’s leadership and he left a year ago under the cloud of the critical report from the three zoo directors.

Zoo Director Manuel A. Mollinedo said this week’s review marks a new beginning for the facility.

“We hope we can use this as a building block,” Mollinedo said. “This is something we hope will assure we move toward retaining our accreditation and preparing for the future.”

Records show that the zoo will probably post a small attendance gain this fiscal year. That comes after five years of steady attendance declines that have seen the zoo’s visitor ranks decrease from 1.8 million to 1.2 million annually.

For the first time since the 1980s, the zoo is preparing to build a major new exhibit--a forest and climbing habitat for chimpanzees that will replace the bare rock outcropping that is one of the zoo’s most woefully outdated facilities.

Maple predicted that the “Great Ape Forest”--which is eventually supposed to include orangutans and gorillas--will be “the best of its kind in the world.” He added: “It’s going to knock people’s socks off.”

Such new attractions have been sorely lacking over the past seven years, since the “Adventure Island” exhibit opened with its display of cave and California creatures. The lack of improvements has hurt attendance and hampered fund-raising, which has remained essentially stagnant in the 1990s.

The three zoo directors in particular praised the improved maintenance of zoo exhibits, including the construction of new barns and drainage systems, brush clearance and a new perimeter fence to keep out coyotes and other predators.

In one of the final embarrassments to the zoo last year, a coyote breached the outer fence and killed several flamingos. All that was left of the birds was a sprinkling of pink feathers, forcing the closure of one of two flamingo exhibits.

That exhibit, at the zoo entrance, has since reopened. Another troubled habitat--where several prairie dogs drowned because of poor drainage--has been repaired and reopened on Adventure Island. Maruska praised those changes and the zoo’s move to ship out other animals that lived alone or in substandard quarters--including penguins in a colony that was overrun by malaria.

Towne also credited zoo Director Mollinedo for beginning to improve employee morale and relationships between the zoo and its private fund-raising arm and city officials. He said the organization was like a “dysfunctional family” a year ago.

The three directors urged the city to move more quickly toward formation of a new zoo department, removing the facility from the control of the city’s Recreation and Parks Department. They said the change will help refocus attention on the zoo and potentially improve fund-raising.

Even the zoo’s sharpest critics said Tuesday, at the end of the three-day tour by the three zoo officials, that they are pleased with the facility’s progress.

“We are talking a total turnaround,” said Gretchen Wyler, president of the Ark Trust Inc., an animal rights group. “I feel very strongly the animals would be very happy with what we did. I am very excited.” The Ark Trust helped to bring the three zoo chiefs to Los Angeles.

City Council President John Ferraro, whose district includes the zoo, also said he was pleased. He pledged that the council will continue its special appropriations for zoo improvements, which were increased to $8.5 million over a recent 18-month period.

A sustained financial commitment will be crucial if the zoo is to continue to improve, Maple said.

“Our main concern is whether the effort that has been developed so far is going to be sustained with vigor and with speed,” he said. “That is the unanswered question.”