"I think we can win more elections by speaking to values that are being ignored," Brett Bursey, director of the South Carolina Progressive Network, told about 40 people gathered Saturday at the Communications Workers of America Union Hall in West Columbia.

Bursey, a longtime political activist, helped run the two-hour meeting to strategize how to build the Progressive Caucus within the Democratic Party. The largest constituent group in the state's Democratic Party is black women, Bursey said. More black women need to get involved, he said.

"This state is crying out for leadership -- true leadership," said state Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter, D-Orangeburg, who encouraged members to run for office.

If people don't step up, she added, "South Carolina will continue to be last in things that are good and first in things that are bad."

The Progressive Caucus has been organizing within the party for the past two years and will meet at the state party's convention on May 1.

Members say they are fed up with Democrats trying to "out-Republican" Republicans -- a jab at former party leaders, whom some criticized for relying too heavily on television advertising and not speaking and visiting with voters personally. Speakers said they are more pleased with new state party Chairman Joe Erwin.

But they said there still is a need to reach out to South Carolinians who don't vote regularly, including women and minorities. Instead of allowing money to dominate elections, they want to run issues-driven, grass-roots campaigns.

Rep. Seth Whipper, D-Charleston, encouraged members to talk in their barbershops and to their neighbors and say, "A woman does have a right to choose. And maybe there is something wrong with the war in Iraq," he said. "Somebody needs to be upset about that. We need to talk about those issues hand to hand, across the fence."

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