"One has to assume that the bulk of the voters who have registered since two years ago in October...are likely to be younger voters than older, more highly educated than less, and are likely to have moved here because of job opportunities," she says.
That's making affordable housing one of the central issues of the campaign, as Ackermann points out. "It's a less mixed society [now]," she says.
Because small numbers of voters can so influence the elections, the results of this year's City Council election are, as ever, hard to predict.
Mobilized groups of voters can elect one candidate all by themselves, or one person can squeak by and get elected through the intricacies of the transfer system.
"Any 10 percent can elect one person if they are together about it," Ackermann says.
"Certainly because of PR voters don't write anybody off," Koocher says. "It's like trying to pick which of your friends you like the best."