LEAD: Thirty-five employees - virtually the entire field force of the company that collects money from New York City's parking meters - were arrested yesterday and charged with stealing almost $1 million in quarters in three months.

35 Held in $1 Million Parking-Meter 'Rip-Off'

LEAD: Because of the Jewish holidays of Shemini Atzereth and Simhath Torah, which conclude the harvest festival of Succoth, alternate-side parking will be suspended in New York City today and tomorrow. Other rules remain in effect.

Holiday Parking

WEEKENDER GUIDE

LEAD: The Reagan Administration has adopted a new policy that will reduce welfare benefits for many elderly, blind and disabled people who receive free food, shelter, firewood or winter clothing from churches and charitable organizations.

New Reagan Policy to Cut Benefits For the Aged, Blind and Disabled

LEAD: There's a lot of fun stuff for a 17-year-old like Alex Fernandez to do at the Y. He enjoys shooting hoops and lifting weights, and he likes the Teen Fathers club. It's a bunch of regular guys, and you can talk to Manny Cardona, the leader, about your feelings.

Booties and Jobs: A Club to Help Young Fathers

LEAD: A private jet carrying former Transportation Secretary Elizabeth Hanford Dole was involved in a near-collision with another aircraft Wednesday at Lakefront Airport in New Orleans, aviation experts said today.

Elizabeth Dole's Jet Has Near-Collision With Another Plane

LEAD: The National Football League Players Association ended its 24-day strike today by sending its members back to work, only to have them find something less than a warm reception.

N.F.L. Players End Strike but Can't Play Sunday

LEAD: The Soviet Union announced today that it was paying all its outstanding debts to the financially troubled United Nations, including $197 million for peacekeeping operations it has long refused to support.

SOVIET, IN SWITCH, SAYS IT IS PAYING U.N. ALL IT OWES

LEAD: Against a backdrop of financial markets that have turned tempestuous over the trade deficit and interest rates, Treasury Secretary James A. Baker 3d raised the possibility today of pushing down the dollar's value in reaction to recent increases in West Germany's rates.

U.S. CAUTIONS BONN THAT IT MAY FORCE THE DOLLAR LOWER

LEAD: After a day of wild gyrations, short- and long-term interest rates moved higher yesterday as the financial markets remained fearful about the effects of a weaker dollar.

Rates Up In Wild Trading

LEAD: Hundreds of children are forced to live in New York City's foster-care system solely because their parents have been unable to find suitable housing, according to a survey of private agencies released yesterday.

Shortage of Housing Keeps Children in Foster Care

LEAD: Democratic tax writers in the Senate today proposed making all of an employee's wages subject to the Medicare portion of the Social Security payroll tax. At present, the 1.45 percent hospital insurance tax, paid by both employees and employers, is imposed only on the first $43,800 of an employee's annual wages.

Medicare Tax Cap Is Target

LEAD: The special prosecutor's investigation of Attorney General Edwin Meese 3d has recently been widened to include activities not only when Mr. Meese worked in the White House but also since he has been Attorney General, according to people familiar with the inquiry.

Prosecutor Studying Actions Of Meese While in the Cabinet

LEAD: Although the raw numbers show little improvement in the nation's trade deficit, Reagan Administration officials and other analysts paint a more more optimistic picture. They note, for instance, that the import totals have been swollen by price increases that conceal an underlyingshift favorable to the United States.

A Complex Trade Gap

LEAD: The city's Board of Adjustment has approved a variance to permit construction of the first new supermarket here in more than 20 years.

Supermarket For Newark: Plan Gains

INSIDE

LEAD: In flat tones that contrasted sharply with the graphic scene he described, a young black man testified yesterday that 10 white youths wielding a baseball bat and other weapons confronted him and two other blacks in what the authorities say was the start of the Howard Beach racial assault.

Man Struck in Howard Beach Recalls Start of Confrontation

LEAD: Lawyers have briefed faculty members of the Harvard Business School about libel law as part of a counterattack on a new book that paints an unflattering portrait of the school and its faculty, people at the school said yesterday.

Harvard Criticizes Book On Its Business School

LEAD: A strange sound rumbles past William Massi's home on the Berlin Turnpike these days, traffic.

Highway Strip Recaptures Its Glory Days

LEAD: THE first thing to be said about ''Frank Stella: 1970-1987'' at the Museum of Modern Art is that it is a masterpiece of presentation. Not even the dungeonlike rooms to which the museum consigns its temporary exhibitions can spoil it, and what is waiting for us at the bottom of the escalator is an hour of euphoric buffeting that left this visitor amused, fortified and exhilarated.

RISKY WORKS FROM STELLA AT THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART

LEAD: Roslyn B. Payne, the highest-paid person on the Federal payroll, has been ousted from her job as chief executive of the Federal Asset Disposition Association, the embattled unit that administers loans and real estate obtained from failed savings and loan institutions.

U.S. Demotes Top-Paid Official

LEAD: CHELSEA has perfected one of the great tricks of cultural geography: how to hide a 75-square-block neighborhood on the edge of midtown Manhattan and Greenwich Village. For years, the area has been touted as ''up and coming,'' yet, to the relief of many longtime residents, it has remained in the shadows of its more glittery neighbors.

CHELSEA: WHERE THE AVANT-GARDE RUBS SHOULDERS WITH OLD NEW YORK

LEAD: An Iranian missile struck an American-owned tanker in Kuwaiti waters today, causing a huge explosion and setting the tanker ablaze, the Pentagon said. But the Reagan Administration ruled out a response because the ship was not flying the American flag and was not in international waters.

Iran Missile Hits A Gulf Tanker Owned in U.S.

LEAD: THE ECONOMY  The possibility of U.S. moves to push the dollar down was raised by Treasury Secretary Baker in reaction to recent interest rate increases by West Germany. He said Bonn's action, which was the fourth increase since July, was inconsistent with ''the spirit of our recent consultations.

BUSINESS DIGEST: FRIDAY, OCTOBER 16, 1987

LEAD: Federal prosecutors filed a lawsuit yesterday seeking to seize control of the Fulton Fish Market in lower Manhattan, declaring that it is dominated by the Mafia.

October 16, 1987

Headlines from October 16, 1987

35 Held in $1 Million Parking-Meter 'Rip-Off'

Holiday Parking

WEEKENDER GUIDE

New Reagan Policy to Cut Benefits For the Aged, Blind and Disabled

Booties and Jobs: A Club to Help Young Fathers

Billboard 200

Bad

Whitesnake

Whitney

Hysteria

A Momentary Lapse Of Reason

Historical Context for October 16, 1987