City Freeze Plan Stirs Up Heat

“A bombshell” in one of L.A.’s most affluent markets is how several realtors view some proposed city restrictions on new housing construction and remodeling.

Councilmen Michael Woo and Zev Yaroslavsky introduced the proposals, which would, in effect, place a one-year moratorium on home building and expanding in most of Bel-Air, the Hollywood Hills and what is known as “the Beverly Hills post-office area.” The idea is that after a year, tough, new building restrictions will have been adopted.

President Reagan’s new home might even be affected! The restrictions would apply to homes on substandard streets, narrower than those being approved for new tracts.

Even Julie Jaskol, Woo’s press secretary, says, “Most of the streets in Bel-Air wouldn’t fit the minimum requirement. And this could affect up to 90% of development slated for those hills.” (Builders with permits in hand needn’t be concerned.)

Gary R. More of Merrill Lynch/Rodeo Realty in Beverly Hills notes, “This will affect homes (valued) from $150,000 to more than $10 million as well as vacant land and remodeling plans of more than 500 square feet.”

For every 1,000 square feet of a home, the city would require one covered parking space. So, as More points out, “for a typical 8,000- to 10,000-square-foot house, which is what they’re building in the hills now, you would have to have eight to 10 indoor parking spots.”

A September press conference and two public hearings (one last week) got scant attention, but the Planning Commission scheduled a second public hearing Dec. 1 at 9:30 a.m. in the wake of what Jaskol described as “concerns voiced by neighbors and developers.”

Film director Herb Ross (“Funny Girl,” “The Sunshine Boys” and--most recently--”Steel Magnolias” with Shirley MacLaine and Sally Field) has put his 15,500-square-foot home overlooking the Riviera Country Club in Santa Monica on the market for $5.6 million.

Ross and his bride of two months, Lee Radziwill, plan to live, instead, at their Santa Ynez ranch and New York home. (He was born in New York and choreographed as well as directed a number of Broadway hits.)

The five-bedroom, eight-bath house he just listed--with Juan Alvarez and Jane Nathanson of Alvarez, Hyland & Young--is about 7 years old, but Ross has had a home in the area for about 20 years. The home for sale was built as a dream house for him and his wife, Nora Kaye, a prima ballerina in the ‘40s and ‘50s, who died in February, 1987. An auction of their furnishings is planned Dec. 5-7 at the new auction house for Butterfield & Butterfield (7601 Sunset Blvd.)

Radziwill, sister of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, still owns one of those magnificent paintings of flying draperies by California artist David Ligare, by the way.

Talk about “hot” property: After our deadline last week, U.S. Attorney Robert C. Bonner announced that the mostly drug-related forfeitures taken by his L.A. office during fiscal ’88 totaled $60.6 million in value, compared to $30.7 million in ’87. Many of the forfeitures involved houses and other real estate.

Tab Hunter has moved from a Beverly Hills house he sold recently to a 10-acre property he purchased on the outskirts of one of the hottest places for trendy California transplants: Santa Fe, N.M.

The actor/producer probably will have more opportunity there to enjoy his hobby of breeding and raising horses as he has a barn in Santa Fe with horse stalls, but for the moment, he’s doing a lot of remodeling, says his good friend and former Beverly Hills neighbor, Dawn Heinsbergen, who just bought and refurbished a small adobe in Santa Fe herself. What price did the handsome Hunter pay? “He’d kill me if I told you,” she said.

“Pegfair”--the 70-year-old Pasadena landmark owned by Hugh Hefner’s former longtime girlfriend, actress/singer Barbi Benton, and her husband, George Gradow--is for sale at $4.5 million.

They’ve owned the 5.27-acre property since 1979 but want to sell because they recently bought a 40-acre site in Aspen, Colo., where they are building a 15,000-square-foot home. Pegfair only has 11,000 square feet!

Barbara Dolan and Yvon Jacques of the George Elkins Co., Beverly Hills, have the Pasadena listing, named--by the way--for former owner Margaret Dumm and as a take-off on “Pickfair,” the famous Mary Pickford/Douglas Fairbanks home.

The Real Estate Industry Division of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center was kicked off last week with a cocktail reception to announce its goal of raising $1 million for hospital care of the indigent and for the children’s cancer facility. Movers behind the division: Joyce Rey, Rodeo Realty; Jerry Asher and Joel Kurtz, Coldwell Banker; Mark Kaplan, Jon Douglas Commercial Brokerage, and Jeffrey Resnick, Hillside Village.