By Alan Burke
Can this relationship ever get off the ground?
They come from different worlds: One lives in a kind of sheltered harbor, and the other faces the fury of the open ocean. One seems well fixed financially; the other is desperate for cash. One is known for art associations and historic preservation; the other has a big reputation in the gritty world of football.
And they fight. They fight all the time. But especially around Thanksgiving.
On the face of it, Marblehead seems all wrong for Swampscott. But who knows? Sometimes opposites attract.
Maybe that's what Swampscott Town Administrator Andrew Maylor had in mind recently when he suggested that a merger with his larger, richer neighbor might be a solution to his town's fiscal woes. In a report to the selectmen, he included the words "Marblescott" or "Swamphead" as a potential alternative to the town's grim financial future.
"The point is to generate dialogue," Maylor said. "I didn't mean it literally. It was a quasi-spoof. There's certainly not an expectation we'll be merging politically."
Good thing. Marbleheaders were quick to discourage their would-be suitor. Selectman Bill Woodfin spoke of an independence that goes back nearly 400 years.
"Marblehead has a proud history of doing things as well as it can," he said. "I wouldn't like to depart from that."
Others have cited the centuries-long rivalry between the two towns making any merger sound as likely as a marriage between the Red Sox and the Yankees. In fact, the competition has become institutionalized in the annual Thanksgiving football game, a match that ended in a small brawl as recently as 2006.
By coincidence, the two towns will play their 100th game on Thursday.
If they merge, town historian Don Doliber said with a laugh, "They'll have to play against themselves." He notes that there have been discussions in the past of uniting the school districts. "But nothing came of it."
Marblehead's relative economic health compared to Swampscott's might be a bigger roadblock.
"No community is problem-free," Doliber said. "But Marblehead has managed to maintain fairly good control of its finances."
Marblehead Town Administrator Tony Sasso got a heads-up on Maylor's speech prior to its delivery on Nov. 10. Sasso is willing to entertain discussions on whatever cost savings might be realized by combining services like 911 dispatch or health inspectors.
He said, "If it's not already obvious, (Mr. Maylor's) comment was made in jest." No merger is contemplated, he stressed.
Swampscott Selectman Jill Sullivan also sees the humor in Maylor's proposal, which, she said, was made "in a formal, tongue-in-cheek way. ... Everyone in the room got a chuckle out of it."
Her town's finances are not good, Sullivan agrees, and the outlook for 2010 promises no relief.
Nonetheless, she notes that few towns have anything to boast about on that score. Marblehead's relative success can be traced to the fact that it has more people, more expensive real estate and more taxable land.
That doesn't necessarily make it better.
"I lived (in Marblehead) for four years," Sullivan happily points out, "and then I moved here."
