RACINE - As Racine prepares for Democratic Sen. Barack Obama's campaign to roll into town today, some leaders in the black community feel the campaign has ignored them.

"I'm quite irritated about it. I feel that it is not the spirit of inclusion that the Obama campaign in a national way has expressed," said Ken Lumpkin, publisher of the Insider News. "I think that the players in Racine do not understand the message that Obama is putting out there, which is a positive message - inclusion, working together, a color-blind

society."

State Rep. Bob Turner, D-Racine, said although he has not gotten directly involved with the Obama campaign, he has heard concerns that the campaign was not reaching out to the black community.

"I know how these things can happen, but there's no excuse for it," Turner said.

Dan Leistikow, spokesman for the Obama campaign, said the campaign is striving to include everyone who is interested.

"The campaign is working to bring as many people into the process as possible, reaching out and working with community leaders of all backgrounds - often with a very short turnaround time," Leistikow said. "We're reaching out to folks who have expressed concerns and want them to be a part of this event. Sen. Obama is looking forward to the opportunity to hear from the people of Racine and share his vision for change in America."

Racine city Alderman Michael Shields, chairman of the Democratic Party of Racine, which

supports both Democratic presidential hopefuls, said he has been out of the loop from both the Obama and Clinton campaigns. He received one call from an Obama representative and met with a Clinton campaign staffer once, he said.

"You would think the Democratic Party chair needs to know what's going on," Shields said. "I kind of feel this wouldn't happen if the chair was a different color."

Although the people putting the local campaign efforts together probably didn't mean any harm, Shields said, all the news he gets is secondhand.

"We're a strong part of this community, people of color," he said. "I think they should be

included."

Beverly Hicks, director of the Racine branch of the NAACP, said she was surprised when she saw news of the Obama event on TV Tuesday morning. During the time she has been director, for the two previous elections, the organization always received calls from the headquarters of campaigns inviting members to events. This time, she was not notified. She called the rally organizer, who offered her two tickets. Normally, Hicks said, the organization gets at least 20 to 25 tickets.

"I was somewhat upset with how that whole thing went down," she said. "It was like a slap in the face."

But former Alderman Keith Fair said the campaign itself has been communicating locally. Fair met with an Obama field coordinator Tuesday to discuss strategies for reaching out to all of Racine.

"I believe that they're reaching out to a diverse segment of the community, and they're bringing people together," Fair said.

Fair said local Obama supporters Mayor Gary Becker and state Rep. Cory Mason, D-Racine, have not been reaching out to the minority community.

"Some of the frustration was that there was a lack of communication as far as the local leaders were concerned," Fair said. "They didn't pull together a coalition of people that cross racial lines."

However, Becker said that contacting local black leaders about the rally was not his job.

"The campaign, they contacted Cory and I because we've both been very vocal for months on supporting the senator," Becker said. "It was not our job to go around telling people what was going on, so if people want to be upset, that's fine."

The real issue, Becker said, is meeting the goal of electing Obama as president. He added that the time frame between publicizing and holding the rally was short.

"These things move at hyper speed, and that's just the way it is," Becker said.

Lumpkin said he was planning on putting together a Racine group of blacks who support Obama. He said the community needs to mirror some of the progressive movement that is happening nationally on issues such as health care and the economy.

"We have the same concerns here in Racine that they have from a national perspective," Lumpkin said. "We understand that Wisconsin is key, and we understand that we should not be ignored."