Meanwhile, she said, there is the chapter phone number (599-5500), which links callers to an answering service staffer who will summon an officer to help.

"It's almost like a hotline," Kennedy said. "If there are any complaints they'll be handled in a speedy way; we've opened the lines of communication."

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, owing to its long history as a civil rights organization, is familiar to many people who may be unaware of other agencies locally that can help them, said chapter president Alphonso Braggs. So the Honolulu group can serve as a referral agency to hook up callers with an agency or other resources, he said.

Many of the calls Braggs has fielded have dealt with perceptions of workplace discrimination.

"Most of these cases are able to be handled just by informing people that there are processes and resources that can be used — maybe the equal opportunity specialist in their workplace, or the Hawai'i Civil Rights Commission," he said.

Kennedy said chapter members also hear from parents of students who feel victimized by racial bias on campus. The organization leadership has met with public school officials, who have boosted diversity training for faculty and staff in recent years in response to these complaints, she added.

The gala is sponsored in association with the Hawai'i Friends of Civil Rights. And some chapter members also are active in the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Coalition-Hawai'i, one of the groups that helped put the program together. Coalition member Ed Young is the cousin of William Kennard, the former chairman of the Federal Communications Commission; Young helped to land Kennard as the keynote speaker tomorrow.

Chapter members will speak briefly about the work of other multicultural groups to which they also belong, Kennedy said: It's that kind of partnership in a community alliance that is the NAACP's strength.

"We all wear different hats, and yet we all come together for the NAACP, which makes us stronger," she said.