The race for mayor in final sprint

Vote for “my friend,’’ the former president rasped, “He has done a terrific job.’’

Vote for me, Flaherty implored: “What is it going to take for folks to realize that we can do better?’’

The candidates spent the day racing across the city, seizing the final hours of a warm, leaf-strewn Halloween to hammer home their messages at the close of the battle between Menino, Boston’s longest-serving mayor who is seeking an unprecedented fifth term, and Flaherty, a veteran city councilor who has said Boston needs fresh leadership after 16 years under one man.

The candidates are racing to preside over a diverse and changing city of nearly 600,000, an influential capital of finance, education, and culture that has nevertheless struggled with underperforming schools, lingering violence, and rising unemployment in the midst of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

Flaherty, a 40-year-old former prosecutor from South Boston, has cast himself as a bridge between the parochial politics of Boston’s past and the city’s younger, highly educated professionals. He kept up a dizzying pace yesterday as he sought to close a gap in the polls without the money that has enabled Menino to saturate the airwaves with radio and television ads.

Flaherty started the day with the conference call and then recorded two short videos, which his campaign said would be e-mailed to 20,000 voters tomorrow and Tuesday, urging them to get to the polls and to remind their friends and relatives to vote.

He then greeted voters in Charlestown, Mattapan, and Roxbury, stopped by a Halloween party in the South End, and ended his day at a meet-and-greet in Dorchester. Councilor at Large Sam Yoon, whom Flaherty plans to appoint as deputy mayor, attended several events with Flaherty and also went to a rally for public housing tenants in Hyde Park.

“Boston is a great city,’’ Flaherty told voters patched into the phone call. “We are the intellectual capital of the world and there are so many missed opportunities in education, in business, and in public safety that we want to make that necessary change.’’

Menino, a 66-year-old former insurance salesman who prides himself on paying close attention to neighborhood needs, continued to project an air of calm and confidence during a day that was busy but considerably less harried than Flaherty’s.

He began his day by announcing a parenting program in Dorchester, then greeted female supporters at a rally and unveiled a plaque in West Roxbury, stopped for a leisurely lunch at a Greek restaurant, dropped by a Halloween party in Dorchester, and handed out candy at his home in Hyde Park.

“Let me tell you, my organization is revved up and they’re out there knocking on doors today,’’ Menino told reporters at the Halloween party.

The candidates were capping a campaign that has forced Menino to work harder on the hustings than he has since his first election in 1993. Flaherty, a city councilor first elected in 1999, has attacked him almost every day, even lambasting him yesterday as “one of the most powerful and vindictive individuals this city has ever seen.’’

But a Globe poll earlier this month indicated that Menino has enjoyed durable favorability ratings. One possible reason: An astonishing 60 percent of Boston residents said in the poll that they had personally met the mayor during his 16 years in office.

“Mayor Menino is not just any incumbent,’’ said Avi Green, executive director of MassVote, a nonprofit voting rights group that sponsored the final mayoral debate at Faneuil Hall. “The length of years in office, plus the tremendous power of the mayor, make him an institution. He’s been in office more than a good number of the residents of Boston have been voters.’’

Flaherty has cast Menino’s longevity in office as the mayor’s main drawback. During his phone conference yesterday, which resembled a call-in radio show, Flaherty repeated his central argument that the mayor has failed to clean Boston’s “filthy’’ streets, improve its “failing’’ schools, or diversify city leadership that now “resembles 1909 more than 2009.’’

“He had 16 years at the helm to make these changes,’’ Flaherty said. “It’s time for the next generation of political leadership.’’

Flaherty also fielded several questions on the phone call about his endorsement by Boston Firefighters Local 718, a union that has provided him with much-needed campaign muscle but also ensnared him in questions about the firefighters’ resistance to mandatory drug and alcohol testing.

Flaherty reiterated that he would require such testing for firefighters, police, and emergency medical workers. “If anyone on the line has concerns I won’t be tough against [union head] Ed Kelly and the Fire Department, you are sadly mistaken,’’ Flaherty said, adding that if he can stand up to Menino, Local 718 “pales in comparison.’’

The mayor, for his part, called on perhaps his most prominent supporter, Clinton, to record a phone call that was sent to thousands of voters this weekend. In his message, the former president said Menino has “worked hard to break down barriers . . . Now, he needs your help to keep moving Boston forward.’’

Yesterday, the mayor traveled across the city casually, one hand in his pocket. Stopping by the Women for Menino rally in West Roxbury, he greeted each supporter. “Thank you, thanks a lot,’’ he said, shaking hands. Time and again, he batted away comments from supporters who joked that they didn’t need to campaign for him because victory was assured.

“We’ve got to keep working until Tuesday at 8 o’clock,’’ Menino said.

Stephanie Ebbert of the Globe staff contributed to this report.