The New York Times - October 31, 1985
Joyce Purnick

The Mayor, surrounded by lawyers and advisers at a hastily called news conference shortly after 5 P.M., declined to explain how the city would carry out a policy that he had the same day described as riddled with problems.

Despite persistent questioning from reporters in his City Hall office, he would not be specific. In contrast to his normal conversational style, he spoke in a careful fashion that avoided statements of fact.

But last night, mayoral aides said city inspectors, working undercover, would enter bathhouses and other places where homosexuals congregated. If they found evidence of what they regarded as unsafe sexual activity, the city would try, ultimately but not immediately, to close those establishments, as it is allowed to do under the new state policy.

'Interim Report' Due Nov. 13

Mr. Koch said only that an "interim report" on the city's progress would come out no later than Nov. 13.

"The plan that has been agreed upon by the various agencies of government is being implemented as of today," he Koch said. "Whatever occurs, if something occurs that is worthy of being announced, it will be announced at that time."

Mr. Koch - under public pressure and reported criticism from state officials that the city appeared to be taking too much time dealing with the politically difficult issue of acquired immune deficiency syndrome - insisted that to say anything more would be imprudent because law-enforcement was involved.

He bridled when one reporter asked if perhaps his announcement about enforcement had less substance than the Mayor was suggesting, and threatened to end the news conference if the questioning continued in that vein.

The mayoral announcement came at the end of a confusing day filled with shifts, contradictions and signs of growing tension between the city and the state over the emergency regulations, which Governor Cuomo announced last week. The new policy empowers local governments to close bathhouses and other establishments where "high risk" sexual activity -defined as oral and anal intercourse -takes place.

Problems With Guidelines

The new policy took effect last Friday, but on Tuesday, even as Mr. Cuomo was saying that he would be "disappointed" if a bathhouse was not closed by the end of this week, Mr. Koch was announcing that the city needed up to 10 days just to come up with guidelines to carry out the policy.

Early yesterday, at the first of three news conferences about efforts to thwart the usually fatal disease, Mr. Koch spoke at length about the city's problems with the guidelines.

"What is the sense in our doing something that is going to be thrown out of court?" he asked in the corridor of City Hall just before noon. "What would it look like if we take action and close a bathhouse and two days later a court opens it up? Then we look like jerks."

At about 2:30, he said the city could complete its guidelines within two days. Shortly after 5 o'clock came the news that a plan was in place and being implemented.

"I don't think anything has changed," the Mayor said when asked what had accounted for the apparent shift. He said he was not responding to the Governor's remarks or reported criticism from the State Health Commissioner, Dr. David Axelrod, that the city was dragging its heels.

Mr. Koch declined to say whether he had spoken to the Governor. According to top advisers, the two men did speak yesterday.

In answer to a question, he acknowledged that he was concerned about the perception that he was not acting quickly and decisively enough on so sensitive and politically risky an issue.

"I am concerned that people know exactly what we are doing," Mr. Koch said. "We want people to know that we are not letting grass grow under our feet but what we are seeking to do is to make sure, when we walk to the courthouse, that we are there with good evidence that will sustain a judgment in our favor."

'Good Medical Sense'

Earlier in the day, Mr. Koch and the city's Corporation Counsel, Frederick A. O. Schwarz Jr., focused on the need to buttress the state policy with regulations that would hold up to a legal challenge.

"The regulations are in a broad sense sensible," Mr. Schwartz said. "They make good medical sense. Having said that, one has to proceed to implementation of a broad regulation. That isn't as simple as some people are pronouncing in the newspapers."

Mr. Schwarz raised enforcement problems that he believed New York City - where an estimated 10 of the state's 12 bathhouses are situated, according to homosexual activists - was confronting.

For instance, he asked, if inspectors have evidence of one incident of anal intercourse in an establishment frequented by 400 men in one day, does the city seek to close that place or does it have to establish a pattern?

If high-risk sex is suspected to be going on behind the closed door of a cubicle, Mr. Schwarz asked, "Do you have somebody peer over the top? Do you issue an order that states you have to take the doors off?"

'The Nitty-Gritty'

Mr. Koch, addressing the same subject yesterday at his first news conference, said, "You know, you're getting into the nitty-gritty here."

Mr. Schwarz said at the Mayor's last news conference that the city had not yet resolved the many legal issues that it faced. The only difference between what was said in the morning and in the evening was one of emphasis, he suggested. The city still believed the policy could not be implemented overnight, but had begun the process.

"We have arrived upon a plan to obtain the facts," Mr. Schwarz said. "What you do with the facts is something that reasonable people decide what to do with, once they have seen the facts."

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