The U.S. General Services Administration has ruled out a second Baltimore County site as the next headquarters of the federal Health Care Financing Administration, as county officials and union leaders gear up for a campaign to keep HCFA and its 3,000 local jobs in Woodlawn.

Officials from the county and Baltimore have staged a fierce battle for the HCFA headquarters, with the city trumpeting the agency's ability to rejuvenate the west side of downtown and the county pointing to how HCFA workers support businesses in Woodlawn. The agency runs Medicare and Medicaid programs.

GSA has eliminated an 82-acre site at Windsor Corporate Park in Woodlawn proposed by Foulger-Pratt Development/Construction Inc. of Montgomery County and owned by local developer Leroy Merritt, said Anthony J. Haley, an aide to Kenneth C. Nohe, the county economic development director.

GSA had already eliminated the only Owings Mills site in the running, 40 acres near Owings Mills Mall.

That means the choices are down to three, two in the county and one in the city. The county is pushing a 95-acre site at Rolling Wind Center in Woodlawn or a 54-acre site at Rolling Heights Business Center in Woodlawn.

The city is pushing a site near the new baseball stadium.

County officials led by County Executive Roger B. Hayden and Rep. Helen D. Bentley, R-Md.-2nd, are expected to announce today a coalition between the union representing HCFA's workers and county businesses to pressure GSA to keep the agency in Woodlawn.