New York Today: Final Showdown

Ruth Fremson/The New York Times debate caption TK

When the Democratic candidates face off tonight for their last mayoral debate, the rules for the primary will play an outsize role.

If no candidate gets more than 40 percent in next Tuesday’s balloting, then there is a runoff between the top two.

Michael Barbaro, a political reporter for The New York Times, told us that Christine C. Quinn and William C. Thompson Jr., who polls show are vying for second place, are trying to eliminate each other.

But there’s a catch: they both need voters supporting the front-runner, Bill de Blasio.

“Quinn needs the white liberal voters that de Blasio is performing very well with,” Mr. Barbaro said. “Thompson needs the black voters that de Blasio has captivated. So both of them will punch up rather than punch each other.”

For Mr. de Blasio’s part, Mr. Barbaro said, “It’s going to be a really rough night for him. He has to figure out how to stay classy, stick to his message, seem unruffled.”

The debate, at 7:30 p.m., will be on WNBC-TV and WOR-AM (710) radio, and streamed live at the Web sites of WNBC-TV and The Wall Street Journal.

Here’s what else you need to know as you head back to work on Tuesday.

WEATHER

A mixed, muggy bag â€" morning fog, then partly sunny, but with scattered showers and thunderstorms in the afternoon and a high of 83.

After this cold front moves through it should be dryer and cooler tonight, but bring the umbrella today, and maybe a towel.

TRANSIT & TRAFFIC

- Mass Transit Click for latest M.T.A. status.

- Roads Click for traffic map or radio report on the 1s.

Alternate-side parking is in effect.

COMING UP TODAY

- New York City’s public schoolteachers (but not students) go back to school.

- Anthony D. Weiner visits senior centers in Brooklyn. Mr. Thompson calls for an end to prosecuting teenagers as adults, then tours the Rockaways. John C. Liu attends a Sierra Club rally in his honor outside City Hall.

- While the Democrats debate, Joseph J. Lhota, a Republican, attends a meeting of opponents of a proposed Upper East Side trash transfer station.

- In the comptroller’s race, Scott M. Stringer knocks on doors in Ridgewood, Queens and greets shoppers at a kosher supermarket in Borough Park, Brooklyn.

- A rally against American military action in Syria outside the State Office Building on 125th Street in Harlem at 4:30 p.m.

- Another rally, outside the Russian consulate on the Upper East Side at 6:30 p.m., against Russia’s anti-gay law.

- Livery-cab drivers will protest the policies of the Taxi and Limousine Commission outside its headquarters.

- Opening of a new public library building in Glen Oaks, Queens.

- The New York Cosmos offers soccer clinics in Queens for school children. [Free]

- The Urban Park Rangers present the “Alley Pond Park Adventure Course” in Queens. 10 a.m. [Free]

- Two reporters, Matt Apuzzo and Adam Goldman, talk about their new book “Enemies Within: Inside the N.Y.P.D.’s Secret Spying Unit” at BookCourt on Court Street in Brooklyn. 7 p.m. [Free]

- The Brooklyn Botanic Garden has free admission on Tuesdays. [Free]

IN THE NEWS

- The contract dispute that blacked out CBS on Time Warner Cable has ended. [New York Times]

- A federal jury in Manhattan awarded $250,000 to a black employment-agency worker whose black boss addressed her with a common racial slur. The boss had argued that use of the word by blacks is acceptable. [Associated Press]

- The mayoral candidates’ criticism of the real estate industry has not stopped them from accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars of donations from it. [New York Times]

- After three weeks without gas service, public-housing tenants in East Harlem have begun a rent strike. [Daily News]

- The search for suspects in the fatal shooting of a 1-year-old Brooklyn toddler is not being helped by the boy’s tight-lipped father, the police say. [New York Times]

- The number of people caught sneaking into city pools after hours this summer jumped 488 percent over last year. [Daily News]

AND FINALLY…

Male baseball fans over the age of 40 can get a little something extra at tonight’s Yankees-White Sox game at the stadium: a free prostate cancer screening.

Before and during the game, which begins at 7:05 p.m. doctors and nurses on the concourse behind home plate will offer blood tests and physical exams.

At last year’s screening, 305 men took the exam and 17 of them were found to have elevated levels of the antigen linked to prostate cancer.

Nicole Higgins DeSmet contributed reporting.

New York Today is a morning roundup that stays live from 6 a.m. till about noon.

What would you like to see here to start your day? Post a comment, e-mail us at nytoday@nytimes.com or reach us via Twitter using #NYToday.

And bookmark us at www.nytimes.com/nytoday