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To hear the candidates for Manhattan borough president tell it, unless quick action is taken, Manhattan will become a fantasy island just for the super-rich, its neighborhoods erased by luxury high rises, its small businesses and mom-and-pop stores turned into high-priced malls and multiplexes, even its $150,000-a-year lawyers forced to flee.

Most of the 14 candidates in the race cite the rising cost of Manhattan as the key issue facing borough residents and say that, if elected, they will work hard to preserve neighborhoods, enable middle income families to live in Manhattan and provide affordable housing.

Critics might scoff: Isn't it too late? Haven't small businesses already been forced out by rising commercial rents; doesn't the cost of an apartment right now average more than $1 million? And even if Manhattan can still be saved, could a borough president, with few powers, be the savior?

Some of Manhattan's leading politicians say yes to that last question. The 14 candidates for the post now held by C. Virginia Fields, who has to leave office because of term limits, include three current members of the City Council and one former member, as well as three State Assembly members, a former community school board president and a Democratic district leader. The candidates represent neighborhoods from the Lower East Side to Washington Heights. There are two openly gay candidates, two African Americans and three Hispanics. Ten will compete in the Democratic primary in September. Four people from other parties - Republican Barry Popik, Libertarian Joseph Dobrian, Jessie Fields of the Independence Party and Kenneth Schaeffer of the Working Families Party - have filed petitions to challenge the Democratic winner in November.

Looking at the Democratic field, Assemblymember Keith Wright said, "It's one of the best groups of candidates I've ever seen -- and I'm including myself." (He is one of the 10). "All of the candidates are pretty much in agreement on the issues and most of us have been in public service for a while."

WHAT MAKES SCOTT AND EVA AND BILL AND ... RUN

Most observers agree with Keith Wright's assessment. So why do these people want this office? One answer is that it is available, and other positions are not. It's an open seat, explained one candidate, Carlos Manzano, and "these kinds of opportunities don't happen all the time."

Term limits bar two of the candidates -- Margarita Lopez and Bill Perkins -- from seeking re-election to the City Council this year, and Eva Moskowitz would have come up against term limits in 2009. A fourth candidate -- Stanley Michels -- had to leave the City Council after 24 years in 2001 when term limits went into effect.

For candidates not faced with the loss of their other jobs, the borough presidency could provide greater visibility than their current positions. Even an unsuccessful try for the office could raise the profile of a member of the State Assembly, laying the groundwork for a run for citywide office or a State Senate seat.

After all, the current borough president, C. Virginia Fields, is running for mayor, as did her three predecessors. One, David Dinkins, won. Robert Wagner, who served as borough president form 1950 to 1953, also went on to Gracie Mansion.

Most of the candidates say the borough presidency -- not some loftier post -- is what appeals to them and they dismiss suggestions the post offers little beyond its trappings.

Bill Perkins likens it to a toolbox. "The box is not the box that it was," he said but "there are tools -- significant tools -- that can be very impactful if wisely and effectively and bravely used.

And Eva Moskowitz sees the position partly as a way to deliver services, to make government work. "You can never be in local government and not do garbage collection, or not worry about noise and fix potholes. That's your job," she said.

But one candidate, Libertarian Joseph Dobrian, remains skeptical. "The office doesn't do much and especially from a libertarian viewpoint it doesn't do much since it depends on a vision of a large, service oriented government," he said. Dobrian said he is running to help Libertarian Audrey Silk implement her programs if she is elected mayor.

WINNING THE ELECTION

Powerless or not, the office has attracted so many aspirants this year that no one can predict with any degree of certainty who will win.

Unlike the mayoral race, the borough president contest does not include a runoff, so if everyone gets on the ballot, a candidate could win with less than 20 percent of the vote; Wright thinks it could work out so that the winning candidate would be the choice of a mere 30,000 voters, in a borough of about 1.5 million residents.

If money matters, Eva Moskowitz, with $916,000 according to July filings with the Campaign Finance Board, and Scott Stringer, with about $884,000, have the edge. Brian Ellner, whose campaign has attracted support from many young people normally not involved in local politics, says he has energy, enthusiasm and former Howard Dean campaign manager Joe Trippi on his side. And everyone is vying for endorsements.

Candidates who have held elective office say that the New Yorkers who voted for them for council or assembly will help send them to borough hall. But some candidates are vying for the same people - Stanley Michels and Adriano Espaillat in Washington Heights, for example, and Keith Wright and Bill Perkins in Harlem.

Other constituencies overlap as well. Will voters eager to elect the first openly gay person to boroughwide office look to Margarita Lopez or Brian Ellner? Lopez, Adriano Espaillat and Carlos Manzano are all Hispanic -- will the Hispanic vote divide, with Dominicans voting for Espaillat and Puerto Ricans for Lopez or will all the borough's Hispanic voters overwhelmingly prefer one of them?

"It all comes down to classic politics," said Doug Muzzio, a professor at Baruch College. "Getting your base energized and motivated."

The candidates all argue their experience will help them do this. Noting her years as district leader and member of the City Council, as well as as a community activist, Margarita Lopez said, "I have been in a PhD program to become the Manhattan borough president and I'm graduating from that."

Eva Moskowitz said that the style of government she honed on the council would serve her well in the borough president's seat. "After six years on the City Council, I've learned that the single most important characteristic for an elected official to have is doggedness and follow through," she said.

And Keith Wright said it makes sense for him to move back to city politics after 13 years in Albany. "A lot of the things we do in Albany take a long time to filter down," he said. "I want to see a quicker effect."

But Brian Ellner, whose only elected office was as chair of a community school board, takes a dim view of his opponents' experience. "I am running against eight career politicians who have collectively been running the city for 100 years" during which time many things have "gotten worse," he said. Now that the city has ended social promotion for third graders, he added, it's time to end it for politicians.

The candidates point to their lives as well. Margarita Lopez, Adriano Espaillat and Carlos Manzano all talk about coming to the U.S. as newcomers, not speaking English and working their way up. "I know what it's like to try to make it and succeed," said Carlos Manzano, who is from Colombia. "I know how hard it is and the generation behind me is going to have a harder time" because of rising cost of living, higher rents, and cutbacks in financial aid.

Adriano Espaillat recalled going to a police precinct after his father had been attacked. "As a young Dominican, I'm treated as a drug dealer rather than someone whose father has just been victimized," he said, adding that the incident prompted him to become involved in the local police precinct council and other community groups. "The adversity we faced in northern Manhattan no other community in New York has gone through," Espaillat said. Bill Perkins mentioned growing up on public assistance in Harlem where he could have been headed to Rikers Island but instead went on to private school, Brown University -- and City Hall.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING

Most of the candidates agree that the absence of affordable housing in the borough is the number one issue this year. They describe the struggle in almost apocalyptic terms.

"The development pressure is such that the very people who made Manhattan a wonderful place to live are now the most vulnerable," Scott Stringer said.

"If Manhattan is left to the most powerful, we could have a line of Trump towers," said Eva Moskowitz, whose council district includes one of the tallest apartment buildings in the world, the Trump World Tower near the United Nations. "If there's no check, the buildings will be as tall and the density will be as great as the market will bear."

Among Manhattanites, said Bill Perkins, whose council district includes Harlem and Morningside Heights, there is "a sense of change, substantial change, taking place right before our eyes and feeling impotent, powerless" to do anything about it. And says Adriano Espaillat, "we're up against the wall...We don't want Manhattan to be an island of the rich and powerful."

As a first step, most of the candidates say they would try to preserve what affordable housing Manhattan does have. Most enthusiastically support rent control and would try to wrest the power over it from Albany. "There's no reason for a hostile Albany to be dictating how people down here should be living," Bill Perkins said.

But Barry Popik, the one Republican, at the very least has doubts about rent control, although he did not come flat out and oppose it. A free market, Popik said, should lead to more and better buildings and then housing would become more affordable. After all, "how many rich are there?" he asked.

Espaillat said he would offer legal assistance to tenants facing displacement or eviction.

But just keeping what we have will not solve the problem. Most of the candidates called for including affordable housing in all new development projects, though they differ over the amount. Noting that the city now usually requires that 20 percent of the new apartments in any large project be affordable, Keith Wright said he would increase that to 30 percent. Perkins would go further, perhaps reversing the formula. "We have to begin to tweak the formulation so that... the formulation is weighted more toward affordable," Bill Perkins said, dismissing arguments that this could stymie new development altogether.

Scott Stringer, Brian Ellner and Carlos Manzano all advocate some kind of dedicated housing -- apartments for artists, say, such as the Westbeth project in the West Village, or for teachers or other government employees. Stringer and Margarita Lopez say they would work for the use of pension fund money to build affordable housing, as was done in the past in New York.

But Margarita Lopez sees the shortage of affordable housing as part of a larger problem: the lack of planning for preservation and development. "Right now the only official who's really putting forward plans for this island is the mayor," she said. "There has to be a balance of power."

NEW DEVELOPMENT

The borough president, said Keith Wright, "has more influence than one might think over what gets built and what does not get built." The candidates say the powers the borough president does have -- to appoint a member of the planning commission and members of community planning boards -- lend themselves to a focus on development issues.

Several of the candidate talk about strengthening the community boards, 12 of them in Manhattan, which have advisory powers only.

Scott Stringer, for example, has put forth a plan to make the boards more professional -- by hiring urban planners, for example -- and would also make them comply with lobbying disclosure rules and other measures designed to make their workings more open to the public. Bill Perkins said he would encourage more community based planning and help community boards implement those plans. Barry Popik said he would use his appointment power to name more Republicans.

Several of the candidates called for using the office's influence to affect development in Lower Manhattan and north of the Columbia campus in upper Manhattan.

Many expressed concern about the halting progress at Ground Zero. "I think it's pretty shameful that the state took over this process and it seems to be at a standstill," Eva Moskowitz said.

Criticizing Governor George Pataki for leaving the mayor and the borough president out of the planning process downtown, Margarita Lopez said, "I will get in no matter what....I will get in by my charm or my demand – one way or the other."

On the uptown project, several expressed doubt about Columbia's plans for a new campus in Manhattanville, While not opposing it outright, they criticized the university for not paying greater attention to the community. "Columbia has been an isolated ivory tower for many years," Keith Wright said. To remedy that, Wright said the university should open its doors to more students from the community and Adriano Espaillat called for the university's Teachers College to become more involved in neighborhood public schools.

CONGESTION AND THE ENVIRONMENT

The boom in Manhattan has created more people, more buildings, more traffic, and more pollution. Most of the candidates cited congestion as a major issue. Calling the West Side Highway a "highway for turtles," Lopez said, "you cannot get in or get out of this island." As a result, she said, "we're polluting this island like there's no tomorrow."

To address this, she would enforce rules barring trucks, and would work to restrict traffic on Canal Street by banning turns from the crowded east-west street.

Brian Ellner proposes a congestion pricing policy, similar to that in effect in London, where drivers pay to enter parts of the center city at certain times. He would use the proceeds from the fees for mass transit. "I don't want to do congestion pricing to go to the coffers in Albany or to do some other issue," he said. He would also limit the bus depots in northern Manhattan and encourage use of hybrid vehicles.

Beyond transportation, Bill Perkins would work to encourage environmentally sound development. And he cites his work on other environmental issues, including one he called "the unsexiest of them all" -- the fight against rats.

Stanley Michels focused on environmental issues, including garbage and safe drinking water -- during his years in the council, and would seek to continue that work, among other things figuring out how to encourage recycling and reduce the amount of garbage.

AIDS, SECURTIY, EDUCATION

Brian Ellner cited health as a major concern. The lawyer, who marched with the Reverend Al Sharpton in this year's Gay Pride Parade to call attention to high rates of HIV and AIDS among African-Americans, said the borough president has to focus on that issue even though "it's uncomfortable to talk about. It involves sex. It involves homophobia. It involves race." He also advocates making condoms more widely available and buying prescription drugs in bulk to sell to low-income seniors.

Carlos Manzano has made security one of his number one issues, issuing a report and calling for more money for security from Washington, creating security and preparedness committees for every community board, and instituting drills similar to the air raid drills of the Cold War era.

Borough presidents used to appoint members to the central Board of Education. But they lost that power three years ago and, possibly because of that, education appears to be less of an issue this year than in the past. In Carlos Manzano's view, this is not because the system has improved. "We had the best public education system in the United States. In 30 years, it became the worst," he said.

Scott Stringer called for a new teacher's contract, while Brian Ellner said teachers "are the heroes of the system" and need more pay. Margarita Lopez said she would spend some of the borough president's money to reduce class size.

(Democrat Diane Wiser who has filed petitions to appear on the ballot, emerged as a candidate at the last minute and could not be contacted.)

(Kenneth Schaeffer's name has been filed by the Working Families Party as their candidate, but it is their practice to submit the name of somebody by the filing deadline so that they can keep the party's ballot line. His is not necessarily the name that will appear on the ballot in November.)