Attorney General Christine Gregoire said Friday she would try once more, perhaps in person, to persuade the Washington state Investment Board to just say no to tobacco.

Briefing the King County Health Board on the $368 billion proposed settlement she helped negotiate between state attorneys general and tobacco companies, Gregoire said she was disappointed that a move to sell the state’s tobacco stocks failed on a 4-4 tie vote a day earlier.

For health as well as fiscal reasons, public funds should not be invested in an industry facing “40 lawsuits by state attorneys general and innumerable lawsuits by private individuals,” she said. “The exposure of this industry in the attorney general lawsuits alone, they have publicly acknowledged, would bankrupt the industry… “I would ask the state Investment Board to reconsider their decision.”

The Health Board unanimously adopted a resolution endorsing the settlement and approved a deal that chairman Greg Nickels said would practically end tobacco advertising on billboards in the county by the end of the year.

Under the billboard deal, AK Media-NW agreed to halt all such tobacco advertising in the state’s most populous county after existing contracts expire Jan. 1. In exchange, the board agreed to postpone a ban on tobacco billboards within 2,000 feet of schools, churches and playgrounds from Aug. 15 until Jan. 1.

AK Media controls all but a handful of billboards in the county. Alonzo Plough, the board’s administrative officer, and other officials said they knew of no other billboard owners now running tobacco ads.

George Masten, a former state employee union president who now represents retirees on the Investment Board, said his move to dump tobacco stocks would have succeeded if the ninth board member, Patrick McElligott, had been able to attend.