Tuesday’s election in Miami has been a tale of two very different races — one low-key, the other marked by nasty fliers, heated debates and stinging personal attacks.

In both contests, voters will decide whether the incumbent commissioners — Wifredo “Willy” Gort and Marc Sarnoff — deserve new terms in office.

Sarnoff, who is up for his second full term, faces a crowded field of four challengers: Williams Armbrister, Kate Callahan, Donna Milo and Michelle Niemeyer.

With his deep campaign pockets, Sarnoff says he expects to win. But if he falls short of receiving a majority of the vote, he will face a runoff two weeks later — when three of his four opponents have signaled they may join forces to defeat him, even after attacking each other during the current campaign.

“Kate and I talked in February, and Donna and I have spoken the past few months. It’s a mutual agreement,” said Niemeyer, a lawyer who heads the Coconut Grove Village Council and has the backing of the city’s police union.

“I think it’s fair to say all of us are running because our community hasn’t been very well represented the past few years. And all of us agree it would be better than the status quo.”

“I talk to a lot of people, and people are just upset at the way things are going at City Hall,” said Milo, a builder who has served on Miami’s planning and zoning board and is endorsed by the fire union. She ran unsuccessfully for Congress last year. “I don’t have anything against helping any other candidates.”

The campaign manager for Callahan, a healthcare consultant and former nurse who served on the Grove Council and on Miami-Dade County’s Public Health Trust, confirmed that the three women may work together to unseat Sarnoff.

“Everyone agrees — if nothing else — Marc is not the right person for the job,” Vanessa Brito said.

Armbrister, a retired Florida Power & Light employee and third-generation Grove resident with no previous political experience, was not so quick to say the challengers should help each other down the line.

“If I do put my name to support them and they turn out to be worse than Marc Sarnoff, what would that do to my name?” said Armbrister, who trails the others in fundraising. If he makes a potential runoff, he added that he would not seek the other candidates’ support “because then I might be expected to be beholden to them.”

For the three others to work together against Sarnoff, however, one of the challengers has to get past Tuesday’s first-round election.

That will be no easy task. Unseating an experienced incumbent is unusual in Miami. Five years ago, Sarnoff won a surprise victory over then-Commissioner Linda Haskins, who had been appointed to the seat.

This time, Sarnoff’s fundraising has outpaced that of his rivals, who have had to spend their time and money boosting their name recognition. Any challenger would have only two weeks to bring in more cash.

There is no chance of a runoff in the other race on the ballot, between Gort and political newcomer Shawn Selleck. Selleck is a former community development consultant who has campaigned full-time, saying the city’s Flagami and Allapattah neighborhoods need a more hands-on commissioner.