North Ward Councilman David Lyons in his campaign headquarters on Monday night. 

IRVINGTON - Gene Etchison approaches a sprawling old house on the corner of Clinton Avenue and tells the resident when he steps outside, "I love your grass. It’s cut real nice. I love to lie down in the grass, that’s why I always notice it when I go by here."

The man shakes the candidate's hand. He knows it’s the day before Election Day.

He confesses he has a problem with the way Mayor Wayne Smith’s administration is running the town, and he tells Etchison he’d like to go to Town Hall and tell them they need to improve the sanitation department - and everything else for that matter, but he just doesn’t have the energy anymore.

Ward Two Councilman Steve Rovell 

BELLEVILLE - Less than a week before Election Day, both sides open up with everything they’ve got, and the resulting facial expressions and body language indicate that some of the shots have landed.

A glossy mail piece hits the tightknit blue collar neighborhoods off Franklin Avenue that run up against the Parkway on the other side. The man whose face appears in unflattering photos on those mailers storms to the microphone at a rally for him and his running mates.

"It’s pure and utter B.S.," cries Ward Two Councilman Steve Rovell, referring to challenger Mario Drozdz’s charges that Rovell was part of a team that increased taxes $10 million in thee years, indulged in political favoritism and hired nearly a million dollar’s worth of town employees who don’t live in Belleville.

Sen. Ron Rice (D-Essex)Sen. Ronald Rice (D-Essex) hopes his written request to Attorney General Anne Milgram for an investigative audit of Irvington, cc’d to voters, will give North Ward Councilman David Lyons a leg up in Tuesday’s municipal elections.

A vocal critic of Mayor Wayne Smith’s management of the Essex County town and often the lone dissenting vote on the council, 12-year incumbent Lyons is in a competitive race with Newark Det. Gene Etchison.

Lyons has questions about his town’s obligation to pay the state back $8 million over a 20-year period, a result of the Smith administration’s bonding without the permission of the state Department of Community Affairs.

Rice has the same questions.

Ward Three Council candidate Paul "P.J." Mac Donald, right, with his ally, Belleville Mayor Ray Kimble. 

BELLEVILLE - All over town, the headquarters of candidates are shuttered on a Monday afternoon, with the exception of Paul "P.J." Mac Donald’s campaign digs on Washington Avenue.

The mood is grimly combative in this roomful of politicians and former cops as Mac Donald recounts what led him to this point, eight days before the May 13 election.

"There was an empty seat and some friends asked me if I’d be interested in running," he says. "I went down to the mayor’s office and sought his support. I called every public official and every one of them gave me his blessing.

"Then I called Caputo."

Sen. Ray Lesniak signs his book for Sen. Ronald Rice and Caren Friyer at Kean on Tuesday evening.

UNION - A line of politicians and friends spilled out of Kean Hall tonight, patiently awaiting their time with Sen. Raymond Lesniak (D-Union), who at a table in the front of the room signed copies of his new book, "The Road to Abolition: How New Jersey Abolished the Death Penalty."

"I learned how to do book-signings from McGreevey," cracked the veteran legislator, whose slim, soft-cover volume recounts the Legislature’s 2007 demolition of the New Jersey law that once sent Bruno Hauptmann to the electric chair.

Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzoMidway through his second term, Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo is gearing up for whatever fight comes his way as he plans for a third term in office.

"Joe is looking ahead to running, and serving, to complete the execution of his vision for Essex County," said chief-of-staff Phil Alagia.

To that end, DiVincenzo today is holding a $300-a head celebration in West Orange.

An ally of North Ward Democratic leader Steve Adubato, Sr., who supports U.S. Rep. Rob Andrews (D-1) for U.S. Senate over incumbent U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg, DiVincenzo to date has remained neutral in the U.S. Senate primary.