For a while, Cliff Stanton had candidacy for the 11th Council District, which includes Norwood, Bedford Park and Riverdale, all to himself. Now, however, Riverdale’s political establishment, including current 11th District rep Oliver Koppell, is throwing all of its weight behind another candidate, Community Board 8 member Andrew Cohen.

Stanton may have an 11-month head start, but he now has to deal with a candidate backed by Riverdale power players like Koppell, Assemblyman Jeff Dinowitz, State Senator Jeff Klein and Congressman Eliot Engel. That means he will also have the support (and extensive campaigning machine) of the Benjamin Franklin Reform Democratic Club.

Stanton, an entrepreneur who owns the Nuts 4 Nuts street vendor franchise, has been active in local schools for the past several years and led a boycott against the Riverdale Review, which he accused of slanted coverage on politics and schools (and, specifically, for interviewing elementary school students for a story without their parents’ permission).

Engel, Dinowitz, Klein and Koppell are all scheduled to be on hand for a press conference announcing Cohen’s candidacy tomorrow at noon on the steps of City Hall.

Here’s the background bio on Cohen from a press release:

A lifelong New Yorker and twelve year resident of the Riverdale area, Andrew Cohen is a practicing attorney who currently serves as the Chairman of Community Board 8’s Aging Committee. Prior to starting his own law practice, Mr. Cohen served as a Court Attorney to a Justice in Bronx Supreme Court for eight years and worked for Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz as Legal Counsel. Since 2010, Mr. Cohen has been an adjunct professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and is a member of the New York State United Teachers Union. In addition to his voluntary work on the Community Board, Mr. Cohen also serves on the Board of the Friends of Van Cortlandt Park, is a member of the Bronx Bar Association, a Vice Chair of the Bronx Democratic County Committee and a member of the Benjamin Franklin Reform Democratic Club. After first settling into Riverdale at Skyview, Mr. Cohen currently resides in Spuyten Duyvil with his wife, Dr. Heather Erhard, M.D., and their four year old daughter, Sarah.

The 11th Council District is one of several Bronx seats opening due to term limits in 2013.