Saturday looms as a day of reckoning for lord mayor Nuatali Nelmes and the Labor agitators who have been trying to bring her down.
Just over 300 Labor members will cast preselection votes at Trades Hall in the morning to decide who will represent the party at the September local government elections.
All six Labor ward councillors and Cr Nelmes face challenges from rival tickets.
Newcastle Labor's first across-the-board challenge in almost 30 years follows a period of heightened infighting.
Opponents of Cr Nelmes and deputy lord mayor Declan Clausen say they are unpopular with many branch members because of their leadership and communication style and the way they have managed a host of council issues, from the "privatisation" of pools to the appointment and continued support of controversial chief executive Jeremy Bath.
Wallsend MP Sonia Hornery has been embroiled in the argy-bargy by publicly lambasting the council over the pools issue and calling on the floor of state Parliament for Mr Bath to be sacked over the Scott Neylon letter-writing investigation.
Newcastle East medical specialist Ross Kerridge has thrown his hat in the ring to challenge Cr Nelmes for lord mayoral preselection.
To varying degrees, the challengers have expressed disappointment with the council's direction.
Cr Nelmes and Cr Clausen maintain they have broad rank-and-file support and say much of the criticism is factional.
The incumbent councillors sent a letter to members this week outlining their platform for re-election and including supportive quotes from local MPs Yasmin Catley, Pat Conroy and Jodie Harrison.
"Together we have united our community to support a shared Labor vision for Newcastle," the letter says.
"Our collaborative approach has transformed our city and our work is not yet done!"
The letter says the Labor incumbents have a "proven record of delivery" in areas such as major events, cycleways, waste management, roads, parks, financial stability and support for community and business groups.
After years of accusation and counter-accusation, Saturday's vote will finally present a picture of how well loved the city's leaders are within their branches.
Cr Nelmes or her critics will be vindicated.
The lord mayor and all the other female candidates on the preselection ballot will receive a 20 per cent loading on top of their vote totals under Labor's affirmative action policy.
Labor insiders expect the votes in wards two and four to be close while the incumbents are favoured in one and three.
The under-pressure councillors are Carol Duncan in ward two and Deahnna Richardson and Elizabeth Adamczyk in ward four.
Declan Clausen is the Labor councillor in ward one, while Peta Winney-Baartz and Margaret Wood represent the party in ward three.
Adamstown branch member Paige Johnson will head up a ticket challenging Cr Duncan in ward two; Beresfield branch secretary Tahlia Kelso has nominated in ward four with Mary Harrington and Julie Davies; and Newcastle Labor local government committee member Sandra Feltham has nominated in ward one.
Dr Kerridge is second on a ward-three ticket headed by Linda Barter.
In an ideal world, the numbers don't lie, but that may not be the case on Saturday.
The internal "credentialling" process to decide who is eligible to vote has produced 293 names, but 15 of these are being challenged.
Another 25 people ruled ineligible are subject to challenges to have them included.
Bizarrely, under NSW Labor processes, all 318 members will be allowed to vote on Saturday and the party's Internal Appeals Tribunal will not meet until afterwards to decide whose votes out of the disputed 40 will count.
In ward four, part of which is in Ms Hornery's Wallsend patch, there are 14 challenges, six to remove and eight to include, meaning the number of eligible voters will be somewhere between 34 and 48.
Again, no one will know the final number until some time after everyone has cast their ballots.
Cr Nelmes has been arguably the leading figure in Newcastle politics for much of the past decade and undoubtedly the most talked about.
She has won the popular city-wide vote for lord mayor three times in a row, but now a few hundred Labor members hold her political fate in their hands.
