Mayor Mufi Hannemann are headed for a runoff election with City Councilwoman Ann H. Kobayashi after falling just short of the votes needed to end the race for Honolulu mayor last night.

Although early returns put Hannemann's vote total above the needed 50 percent mark, later numbers showed his opponents gaining while Hannemann fell slightly below the threshold needed to avoid a run-off.

By 11 p.m. it was looking like Hannemann and Kobayashi would face off in the Nov. 4 general election.

"I love to play one-on-one," Hannemann said. "Tonight, it's fine, we wanted to end it, but the voters want us to go a little bit more. What I am most proud about is we ran a classy campaign."

He said he will now have time to "focus a little bit more on the record of my opponent and combat some of the things that were said in this primary. ... She distorted her record, taking credit for saving Waimea Valley when she was never around for the final vote.

"It's going to be a great campaign and I look forward to the debates we're going to have."

Kobayashi's supporters erupted in cheers when news of the runoff reached her headquarters.

"We had so little time and so little money but it's your energy that got us here," Kobayashi said to supporters. "We love all of you. Thank you very much."

University of Hawai'i engineering professor Panos D. Prevedouros finished third.

Yesterday's election was seen largely as a referendum on Hannemann's handling of the city for the past four years and his proposed $3.7 billion rail project.

At his election night party at Dole Cannery, Hannemann addressed supporters after the first results came in.

"There are many more quarters to be played tonight so it's still early," he said. "Obviously, we are very grateful for what we have seen so far."

He then bowed his head and said a prayer that lasted more than two minutes and was accompanied by a musician on an acoustic guitar.

He showed up at his campaign headquarters shortly after 10:15 p.m. following dinner with his family at Zippy's on Nimitz Highway. While greeting supporters, he said he was confident that he would avoid a runoff.

"I feel right now, that we're going to go over," he said at 10:30 p.m. "I'm feeling confident."

Kobayashi said she went to her campaign headquarters at University Square early to be with her supporters as results came in.

"It's never over until it's over. We're always very positive," said Kobayashi after the first returns came in. "We have to wait until the next printout to see how the trend goes. Everyone is waiting around to see what happens."

Prevedouros said he remained upbeat despite being in a distant third place early in the evening. He, too, was with supporters at his Queen Street headquarters when the early returns came in.

DIVERSE CAMPAIGNS

Despite the bitter public battle over the city's proposed $3.7 billion commuter rail project, a stagnating economy and lingering infrastructure issues, Hannemann was hoping to convince a majority of voters that he deserved to be rehired.

Throughout the campaign, Hannemann played the role of the hard-campaigning front-runner and did not engage in negative campaigning despite several personal attacks from Kobayashi and Prevedouros.

He cast Prevedouros as a one-issue candidate and refused to engage Kobayashi's negative attacks that began 11 days before the primary during a live debate at the Hawaii Theatre.

Kobayashi, a former friend and Hannemann ally who campaigned for him in 2004, said she felt the city was headed in the wrong direction and that spending practices did not match the tough economic times.

She campaigned as the candidate who would control government spending and bring transparency and accountability back to City Hall. She supported mass transit, but preferred the rubber-tire-on-concrete alternative to the steel-on-steel technology the City Council eventually chose.

Kobayashi decided to enter the race the night before the filing deadline following a late-night meeting with Democratic party leaders, including former Gov. Ben Cayetano and state Senate President Colleen Hanabusa.

Last night, she said she did not regret entering the race earlier.

"It was such a hard decision. I'm not sure we could have started earlier. We tried to reach as many people as we could," Kobayashi said. "We worked as hard and as fast as we could. I think we did the best we could with the amount of time that we had and the amount of money that we had."

Prevedouros rode the momentum created by the anti-rail movement and used his opposition to the project as a platform to paint Kobayashi and Hannemann as career politicians who lacked the technical expertise to efficiently manage core city services such as road and sewer repairs.

He said it was unconscionable to consider a project like rail transit when people are having a hard time making ends meet.

Speaking outside his campaign headquarters, Prevedouros said he felt that he was able to get real information to the voters and believed that he helped clear up a lot of misconceptions about the project.

Surrounded by friends, supporters and tables of food, Prevedouros said he will return tomorrow to his work as a professor at the University of Hawai'i.

"I was campaigning hard from mid-July. The fact I started late and only had two months was irrelevant," Prevedouros said. "People are really worried about the rail and their pocketbooks. We shouldn't be doing mega-projects because people can't afford to pay for them."

The Hannemann campaign raised more than $3 million during his re-election campaign and spent $861,805.32 from Jan. 1 to Sept. 5.

Kobayashi and Prevedouros combined did not raise a tenth of what Hannemann did.

VOTERS SPEAK OUT

Voter reaction to the mayor's race was strong.

At the Mililani High School gym polling precinct, Jennifer Grant of Mililani said she turned out to vote specifically for Hannemann.

"Mufi — I feel he's doing a wonderful job," Grant said. "Also, I'm concerned about traffic congestion and the proposed rail system. I'm sold on rail. And I know he's going to try to make it happen."

At the Kamokila Park Recreation Center polling site, Bruce Mount of Ko Olina had mixed feelings about the mayoral contest.

"I would like to see the mayoral race ended in the first polling," Mount said. "I'd like to just go ahead and put all the nonsense to rest.

"Mufi Hannemann might not be the best guy for the job, but he's the guy who's there, and

he's doing OK. And I do support rail."

Back at the polling place in Mililani, Evelyn Rogers seemed to agree.

"I voted for Mufi Hannemann," Rogers said. "I think we should let people finish their jobs."

But folks such as Stephen Escher, a longtime Makiki resident, had come to a firm conclusion.

"I voted for Panos Prevedouros," he said after casting his ballot at Makiki District Park.

Escher said he favored the UH professor of transportation engineering because he's a bus rider, and also because he questioned the wisdom of building such an expensive project in Hawai'i's current economic downturn — especially in light of last week's financial meltdown on Wall Street.

Staff writers Mary Vorsino, Will Hoover, Loren Moreno and Gordon Y.K. Pang contributed to this report.