All candidates want to get voters to the polls. But suppose the polls are hard to find?

That may not seem like a big deal in this era of vote-by-mail, but it is in Hudson County, where just about everything political is a big deal.

This dispute, which ended up in court Tuesday, has its genesis in the ongoing fight between Brian Stack and Nick Sacco. The mayors of Union City and North Bergen, respectively, are each backing their own slate for the state Assembly in the June 10 primary.

And as a proverbial punch in the face to Sacco, Stack recruited Larry Wainstein as one of his Assembly candidates to run with incumbent Gabe Rodriguez.

Wainstein unsuccessfully ran against Sacco for mayor three times, accusing him of corruption, but never came close to winning. Now he may get to the Assembly. And represent Sacco's town no less.

Sacco's Assembly team is Tony Hector and Frank Alonso.

This is LD-33 covering Guttenberg, North Bergen, Secaucus, Union City, Weehawken and West New York. And it is the geography that prompted the legal battle.

To understand that, we must consider River Road, which runs north and south along the Hudson River and through Weehwken, West New York, North Bergen and Guttenberg.

A few generations ago, this was an industrial center and then an abandoned industrial wasteland. Now it's been revitalized with townhouses, condos and the like.

The team of Hector and Alonso filed suit saying there are not enough polling places on and near River Road to accommodate a growing population there.

They say those voters (8,000 are registered) must get to the polls by travelling up the cliffs of the Palisades. While one makes that trek by vehicle, not by horseback, it can still take a while. There is always congestion in these parts. The plaintiffs want "at least" three new polling places along the River Road corridor.

They also point to Union City, which they say is different. The suit notes that Union City has 10 polling places.

Union City is not along River Road, so all the polling places are atop the cliffs. That can be a function of geography, but Hector and Alonso see something more sinister afoot.

"This clearly creates an advantage for Union City voters to obtain access to vote as opposed to other residents of the district, specifically those residents of the waterfront," they said in the suit.

This is important. Stack is legendary in New Jersey for turning out the vote in his hometown. And he plans to do it for Wainstein and Rodriguez.

The Hudson County Board of Elections rejected any call for more polling places. In its court filing it spoke of time problems and said Union City has more polling places because the city pays for them.

Or, as it noted more officially:

Union City "chooses to pay for additional mobile trailers out of its own budget, including delivery, rental costs, portable restrooms and generators, for use during early voting. "

And on Tuesday, Judge David B. Katz, in state Superior Court, Jersey City, agreed with the county and denied the request for more polling sites "on the waterfront."

That means that, presumably, Hector and Alonso will have to fight the Wainstein-Rodriguez team on the field that now exists. So they remain contenders.