Battle Mayoral in New Orleans Goes to Voters : Election: Polls show Marc Morial, son of city’s first black mayor, and Donald Mintz, lawyer who lost 1990 runoff, in a dead heat.

A nasty mayoral campaign dominated by scurrilous campaign flyers culminated Saturday with voters choosing between the son of the city’s first black mayor and a lawyer who lost a 1990 runoff.

Polls showed state Sen. Marc Morial, the son of former mayor Ernest (Dutch) Morial, and Donald Mintz in a dead heat or Morial with a slight lead. But the polls indicated that at least a fifth of the voters were undecided going into the last week of campaigning.

The winner will succeed Sidney Barthelemy, who was ineligible to run after two terms. Both candidates are Democrats.

The new mayor will inherit recurring budget woes; the prospect of dealing with the world’s largest gambling casino, expected to open in the next year or two; and a record murder rate.

Morial, 37, was one of two former mayor’s sons in the race. State Rep. Mitch Landrieu, son of the city’s last white mayor, Moon Landrieu, ran third in the primary behind Morial and the 51-year-old Mintz.

As the race began late last year with 10 candidates, polls showed crime and dissatisfaction with a patronage-laden City Hall to be the key issues.

Then flyers aimed at almost all of the candidates began appearing on doorsteps.

One flyer alleged back-room deals between Morial and Landrieu and questioned Morial’s sexual orientation. Others were peppered with swastikas and racist and anti-Semitic remarks later described by an investigative committee as “ghastly.”

On Feb. 4, a day before the primary in which all candidates compete regardless of party affiliation, a grand jury indicted an unpaid Mintz adviser, Napoleon Moses, on a misdemeanor charge of distributing anonymous--and therefore illegal--campaign flyers.

Mintz said he knew nothing about the flyers but dismissed Moses. Morial blamed Mintz’s camp. In turn, Mintz’s campaign accused Morial of planting spies and using publicity from the investigation into the flyers as a dirty campaign tactic.