4 More Groups Given OK to Seek Donations From County Workers : Fund raising: Supervisors permit Asian, Latino and women’s groups and environmental organization to solicit contributions.

Los Angeles County supervisors Tuesday expanded the list of charities authorized to solicit millions of dollars in contributions from county employees to include Asian, Latino and women’s groups, and most notably, an environmental organization.

Supervisors added the Asian Pacific Community Fund, the United Latino Fund and the Los Angeles Women’s Fund to voluntary employee payroll deduction program. They also unanimously voted to add the Environmental Federation of California, against the recommendation of the county chief administrative officer.

Until now, the United Way and the Brotherhood Crusade have been the only charities authorized to solicit funds from the 85,000-member county work force. They raised about $2.6 million last year from county employees, about a fourth of whom contributed. The money was then distributed among more than 400 community groups.

Shortly after she took office in March as the first Latino supervisor this century, Gloria Molina proposed that the program be expanded to reflect the county’s cultural diversity.

Chief Administrative Officer Richard B. Dixon supported adding the Asian, Latino and women’s groups. But he recommended against the Environmental Federation, saying it represents a “special purpose” agency that provides grants or funds to agencies “promoting a single issue cause, the environment.”

“Although this special purpose is a worthy cause,” Dixon told supervisors, “it does not address the county’s campaign objective, to support local community agencies serving the health and human care service needs of Los Angeles County communities.”

Jim Hardie, marketing director for the Environmental Federation of California, said his group merits support “in a county where on a weekly basis we hear weather forecasters warn us that the air is unhealthful.”

The federation distributes funds to about 40 groups, including Heal the Bay, Greenpeace, the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund, the Coalition for Clean Air and TreePeople. The federation, Hardie argued, provides human services, from giving fruit trees to low-income families to sponsoring trips to the mountains for inner-city youth.

Supervisor Ed Edelman, speaking in support of the environmental group, pointed out that it is authorized to solicit contributions from Los Angeles city employees and government workers in 12 other California counties.

“This issue is really about choice, expanding the options to employees which may also encourage more employees to give,” Edelman said. He compared efforts to clean up the environment to the work of health providers and other social service agencies.

“We all breathe the same air, drink the same water and swim in the same ocean,” he said. “This is everyone’s health issue.”

During the board meeting, Raul Nunez, president of the County Chicano Employees Assn., urged supervisors to make sure that county employees are not coerced into contributing to charities or attending fund-raising appeals on county time.

A Superior Court judge last year ordered top county officials to stop “coercing and intimidating” employees into contributing to charities. State legislation recently signed into law by Gov. Pete Wilson allowed counties to conduct fund raising on county time.

In a lawsuit filed last year, some county employees contended that they were forced to spend thousands of hours soliciting for charities instead of doing their jobs.