County Panel Hears Pleas of Immigrants : Human relations: Representatives from Southland ethnic groups call for financial aid and understanding at hearing.

Representatives from a handful of the county’s small but fast-growing local ethnic communities--immigrants from countries as diverse as Iran, Guatemala, Samoa and Ethiopia--told the Los Angeles County Commission on Human Relations stories of suffering and neglect Thursday at a hearing in Glendale.

Commissioners listened to pleas for financial help and an end to discrimination. They were educated on the ills of negative stereotypes and the need for multilingual service providers.

Then they promised to pass the word.

With speakers also representing Cambodia, El Salvador, Armenia and Soviet Jews, Friday’s hearing at the Glendale City Council chambers resembled a miniature United Nations.

Representatives from Glendale city offices and the Los Angeles Police Department were in the audience, but no elected officials attended the hearing.

Most speakers made eloquent, carefully worded presentations describing the size of their communities, how they happened to arrive in Los Angeles County and the myriad problems they faced during their assimilation.

“Soviet Armenians did not take many of the laws of their country seriously,” Zabelle Alahydoian of the Armenian Evangelical Social Service Center told the commission, suggesting that law enforcement agencies and schools be educated about Soviet Armenian traditions.

Tara Pir, director of Iranian Social Services Project, said many Iranian refugees are under great stress. “Iranian refugees have experienced unusually harsh experiences due to war, religious persecution, loss of loved ones, loss of important possessions and loss of home,” she said.

June Pouesi, director of the Office of Samoan Affairs, noted that a disproportionate number of the small Samoan community are school dropouts or live below the poverty level. “The severe rates of poverty and unemployment, as well as the lack of white-collar positions for Samoans, are critical problems.”

Like most of the other speakers, she said her community was in dire need of health services, counseling and training.

The commission holds about three hearings a year, generally on issues affecting larger, well-established minority groups such as blacks, Latinos and Asians.

The commission reports to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, executive director Eugene S. Mornell said.

In the next three to six months, commissioners will prepare a report of what was said at the hearing, distribute it to 200 to 300 private relief, government and law enforcement agencies, and hope that these groups will in turn help the communities, Mornell said.

“We can’t make any promises,” Mornell said.

After the hearing, several speakers said that, while they appreciated the opportunity to make their case before a regional government body, they feared that their speeches were made in vain.

Saba Maskel from the Ethiopian Community Center complained that the Human Relations Commission “has been in place for 44 years, and it seems like they’ve just found out we exist.”