Police DARE Enjoys Big Fund Night

“Hillcrest and L.A. Country Club. We have them all here,” Los Angeles Deputy Police Chief Glenn Levant quipped Monday night, at the first-ever major fund-raiser for DARE, the department’s anti-drug program.

And they paid to be there, too, netting more than $760,000 for the 3-year-old Drug Abuse Resistance Education.

Geary’s Bruce Meyer, the dinner chair, took well-deserved thanks right and left--and kidded about how he was finally going back to his business after the six months he’s spent putting the night together.

Time well worth it, since the crowd at the Beverly Hilton merged downtown and Beverly Hills, entertainment and enterprise, a unique and obviously lucrative combination not usually seen in these parts. And it was a great time, too--no black-tie, an energy that made the ballroom bounce, as the people whose names were on the invitations showed up and brought dozens of their important and ready-to-spend friends with them.

Banker Bram and Elaine Goldsmith and developer Nathan Shapell and Beverly Hills developer Don and Arletta Tronstein chatted with Bob and Midge Clark, Chief Deputy City Atty. John Emerson, attorney David Watts and his wife, Janet (“I am bidding on the blimp ride” she insisted), attorney Lynne Wasserman sitting with Barbara Eden (“I’m thrilled to see men so involved in something that helps children”), Paul and Joan Selwyn and actor Jamie Farr.

Taking bows were representatives from the two underwriters (which made all money raised strictly profit), Tom Spiegel from Columbia Savings Charitable Foundation and Michael Milken from Drexel Burnham Lambert.

Just how good was the crowd? “When you get Dick Riordan and (Los Angeles Police Chief) Daryl Gates in the same room, that’s power,” quipped Pam Mullin (whose husband, developer Peter Mullin, is no slouch in the heavy-hitter department).

Developer-philanthropist Riordan was kiddingly complaining about the bidding war at the silent auction he’d gotten into with his wife, Jill, both competing for a luncheon with “Hunter” star Fred Dryer. Turns out she’d won, he was telling the Mullins--”but I’ll be darned if she’s going alone.”

The prizes were plentiful--the Suzuki Sidekick going for more than $10,000 and an “Inside the Indy 500” package going for $5,200. The lucky winner of the race-track VIP trip was Bill Tooley, whose wife, Reva, has just been reappointed to the Los Angeles Police Commission--and that keeps everything in the family.

DON’T FORGET--Arco Chairman and CEO Lod Cook, who keeps chairing wonderful fund-raising events for both charity and political types, gets a little spotlight himself Thursday night, when the American Jewish Committee presents him with its annual Human Relations Award. This time, Pacific Telesis’ H. Trevor Jones is the chair, and the dinner is at the Beverly Wilshire hotel. Henry Kissinger does the speaking honors. . . .

Tiffany and the Satellites for the Starlight Foundation kick off the foundation’s March 11 gala at a reception that also features the debut of the Diamonds of Tiffany Exhibit. Expect stars and also very large jewels Thursday night at the Beverly Hills store.

For those who still remember it, 1969 was a very good year. And the film, “1969,” debuts Thursday night with a post-premiere party that will no doubt feature the young crowd at the Park Plaza Hotel. And, for those who remember 1969 well, how young Robert Downey Jr. and Kiefer Sutherland seem. . . .