Sometime before month’s end, a new ad campaign featuring legendary comedian Richard Pryor is expected to go up on billboards in African-American neighborhoods throughout the city. The promotion, sponsored by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), targets KFC, formerly Kentucky Fried Chicken, by alleging that the popular fast food giant condones unusually cruel treatment of its pre-slaughtered chickens.

While details about which billboards will be rented and exactly when the Philadelphia campaign will begin are still being hammered out, PETA officials say they plan to erect anti-KFC billboards in the 10 U.S. cities that have both the highest populations and highest per capita incomes of African Americans. The organization says it is targeting African Americans because it believes members of that community are particularly empathetic to oppression. Along with Pryor, other high-profile notables who have signed on include hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons, scholar Cornel West and NAACP President Kweisi Mfume.

"By and large, black people are going to best resonate with a message against oppression," says Bruce Friedrich, PETA director of vegan campaigns, who points out that this is PETA's first foray into the black community. "There is universal outrage among black people -- even wealthy blacks and blacks in business -- that is not shared by the white community, unfortunately."

Dan Shannon, PETA campaign coordinator, adds that KFC's plans to saturate African-American neighborhoods with a glut of new advertising has also spurred PETA's latest crusade.

Jennifer Lee Pryor, Pryor’s publicist and wife (the two divorced 20 years ago, but remarried in 2001), says her husband, who has never been afraid to address uncomfortable issues, believes in this campaign.

"It's really smart of PETA to ask Richard to be involved," she says. "As an African American, he believes it's incumbent upon him to address this situation because, as he says, "There's a lot of black people who eat chicken. Let's educate them.'"

An international nonprofit charitable organization founded in 1980, PETA opposes all activities wherein animals are eaten, worn, experimented on and used for entertainment. The organization is credited with exposing horrific cruelty in animal laboratories, as well as for the closure of the largest horse-slaughter operation in North America.

Its activists are probably best known for highly publicized assaults on citizens who they say have abused animals. They've staged stunts such as tossing blood-colored paint onto women wearing furs and, last week, The Associated Press reported that PETA asked the Oklahoma city of Slaughterville, named in the early 1900s after a grocery owned by James Slaughter, to change its name to Veggieville.

KFC would not comment on the PETA campaign, nor would officials elaborate on advertising strategies.

"We buy our quality chicken from the same trusted brands that consumers buy in their supermarket -- like Perdue, Tyson and Pilgrim's Pride," reads a statement provided by its public relations department.

Shannon also says that the city's largest black newspaper, The Philadelphia Tribune, is expected to run the ad in its pages. Based on the Tribune’s high circulation in the targeted areas, Shannon says that no other African-American newspapers in Philadelphia have been approached.

"We’re looking at a quarter-page, black-and-white ad, which will hopefully run in the next three weeks, costing about three and a half thousand dollars," Shannon says. "They sent that proposal to us. We haven’t signed anything yet, but it looks good."

However, Robert Bogle, president and CEO of The Philadelphia Tribune, says he’s unaware of such plans.

"If they're in negotiations with The Philadelphia Tribune to place an ad in our paper, The Philadelphia Tribune is not aware of it," Bogle says. "I’m here with the advertising director and he doesn’t know anything about it."

Shannon says that the confusion might stem from PETA not approaching the newspaper directly, instead using the services of American Minorities Media, an independent media buyer. But representatives from the Tribune’s advertising department say that while they are very familiar with that ad buyer, they have no recollection of any phone calls or orders placed on behalf of PETA.

"It could be because we haven’t signed anything official yet," Shannon says. "Our person who handled this isn’t in this week -- which adds to the confusion."