DETROIT -- Even death could not put this city's contentious mayoral race on hold.
The incumbent, Kwame M. Kilpatrick, stood before mourners at civil rights activist Rosa Parks' funeral here last week and spoke of the need to empower the people.
Outside the Greater Grace Temple, as hundreds huddled around Parks' white hearse, challenger Freman Hendrix campaigned - shaking hands, signing autographs and talking about his plans to deal with Detroit's unemployment rate, the second-highest in the nation.
Kilpatrick's mother, Democratic Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick of Michigan, tried to woo the electorate from the pulpit.
"Take your souls to the polls and vote," she said. "That's the tribute we owe Mother Parks."
For a city in decay, Tuesday's mayoral election has taken on a sense of urgency.
Economists recently dubbed Detroit the country's poorest urban center, with about one in every three residents living below the federal poverty line.
The city's population has been falling steadily for decades, and researchers estimate that 25 percent of all structures within the city limits are abandoned.
Detroit's economic outlook also is grim: It has a $300-million deficit. There is a chance city workers might not get paid next month. And the city auditor recently warned that unless drastic measures are taken, federal receivership will be unavoidable.
"How the city is handled in the next year or two will determine whether it will have a federal overseer rather than a mayor," said Lyke Thompson, a professor of political science at Wayne State University. "The stakes are very real."
The candidates - both Democrats - have been wary of discussing painful topics, such as cutting municipal services, so close to the election. Yet both have acknowledged there probably will be significant layoffs; hundreds of police officers and firefighters already have lost their jobs.
A poll conducted over the last few days for Detroit's WXYZ-TV showed Hendrix - who came in first in the primary - leading Kilpatrick 49 percent to 39 percent. Officials in both camps say the election will hang on the 12 percent of the electorate that is still undecided.
Over a recent lunch hour, Hendrix arrived at M&W Inc., a car-parts manufacturing plant, to talk to workers about his ideas. Wearing dark brown slacks and a crisp tan shirt, the candidate quickly enumerated Detroit's problems:
