Chamber Executive Accused of Race Bias : Lawsuit: A black employee of the business group is seeking the establishment of a clear-cut affirmative action policy as well as punitive damages.

Charging that the Chamber of Commerce has “stonewalled and stonewalled and stonewalled” on charges of racial discrimination and sexual harassment, attorneys for an aggrieved black contract employee of the chamber have filed a discrimination suit.

Allison Bedell, who has complained to the chamber’s board of directors that she was the victim of discrimination, is demanding in papers filed Tuesday in Los Angeles Superior Court that chamber chief executive officer Bruce Ackerman be removed from his job.

She is also asking that the court order the chamber to appoint her to a managerial position, to establish a clear-cut affirmative action policy and to pay punitive damages.

Two weeks ago, Carolyn Carlberg, counsel to the chamber, completed a six-week investigation of Bedell’s charges and presented her findings to the 12-person chamber executive committee, but the full board of directors has so far not responded.

Chamber Chairman Steven Ralph said Wednesday that he had not seen the lawsuit and therefore could not comment on it.

Ralph said the executive committee had met at least three times on the investigation and that the matter will soon be taken to the full board of directors.

“We don’t want this to drag on,” Ralph said.

The difficulty has been getting the full board together, he said. “There’s a group of 25 or 30 folks involved, and we’ve got to educate them and get them all up to speed,” he said. “We’re clearly not dragging our feet.”

The issue first surfaced in September, when Bedell complained that she had been passed over for a less qualified white women for a management job. She also said Ackerman had displayed favoritism toward a close circle of female friends.

At a news conference at the office of attorneys Theresa M. Traber and Bert Voorhees, Bedell held up a framed document of emancipation of one of her forefathers, who was freed from slavery in 1836.

“It’s a shame that more than 150 years later, I’m still fighting to be a human being,” she said.

Ackerman could not be reached for comment. In recent weeks, his Colorado Boulevard office has been the target of demonstrations by Bedell’s supporters, who have chanted, “Bruce must go!”

Other past and present chamber employees have said Ackerman, 46, had behaved “inappropriately” toward his female employees, sometimes caressing them in work situations and asking them to share hotel rooms with him on business trips.

Ackerman has broadly denied the charges but he has declined to discuss them in detail on the advice of his lawyer.