What's up with Swing City?!
(inquiring minds want to know)

Well, it's a long story.

Short version: The Greek Church for the moment is not working out, so we're moving to SpringStep in Medford Square for the balance of the summer. If you've never been to SpringStep, it's Boston's premier dance venue, designed from the ground up in 2003 for classy dance events. It features two ballrooms and a classroom, all with pristine sprung wood floors, great acoustics, lighting and sound, modern HVAC, and many other features. SpringStep is also professionally managed, and while pricier, it has nicely cleaned floors, and rates highly on all the other amenities.

It's also right off the highway: exit 32 on I-93, in Medford. directions page»

YES, BE SURE TO GET YOUR EXPLICIT EASY-TO-FOLLOW DIRECTIONS HERE!! »

The Long Version (abridged):

Normally it wouldn't be wise to talk about this stuff, especially since the plethora of Boston's heated Friday Swing-dance competitors are accutely tuned in, but enough information has leaked already so it doesn't much matter I suppose.

Bottom line: we had a three month trial agreement with the Greek Church, starting in April. The Church is run by a volunteer council of 21 people, and they pretty much do everything by committee of 21. If you know Greeks, they are kind but very passionate and opinionated people. Me? I'm one of those pragmatic Germans: wir like to get tings done und schnell, yah?

So it took a little mutual getting used to, but eventually things picked up, patrons tried out the other venues for a bit and ultimately "voted with their feet," to borrow a phrase from Benson Wong. The hall was nice, people came back, attendance progressively improved, and finally Swing City was "back".

However, a few things happened behind the scenes in the interim:

1) The volunteer management of the hall started to cave to the burden and commitment to run the hall so regularly. That started causing problems with floor stickiness, HVAC, etc. All of that eventually would be solved by them hiring someone.

But... then a bigger fish swam into the pond...

2) The City of Somerville, specifically the fire department, took notice. In 2007, Chapter 304 of the Mass. General Laws went into effect, which regulates fire sprinkler requirements in dance halls, particularly in the context of the Rhode Island nightclub tragedy of ~2000. What this law requires is fire sprinklers for any sort of dance venue that holds 100 people or more, if its primary use is not as a church hall, educational facility, town hall, and a few other exempted uses. Such exempted properties however, may still host dances on a _temporary_ basis. Finally, the local fire chief is assigned to regulated this law according to his discression. End of Law, very simple really.

However, a thing called the State Automatic Sprinkler Appeals Board (ASAB), tasked by same the law to handle appeals from businesses aggrieved by the typically high costs of sprinklers, decided that the law was too loose and issued a 14 page document about what the law actually meant. Among many things, it declared that the word "temporary" meant any event that wasn't regular. In other words, if an event is held "regularly", said usage is a venue is not exempted and the hall has to get sprinklers. Go figure. So our "Big Fat Greek Wedding" is okay, but a bunch of swing dance hobbyists who spend an average of $3 each on mostly water at the bar isn't... According to the State. Right.

So... the local chief, who I was told is a guy that very much "goes by the book", pretty much told me that he and the town strictly adopted the ASAB's guidelines (as opposed to using legislated discretionary authority), and thus an edict was sent to the church advising that it had to get sprinklers installed in order to host our "regular" event, or cease and desist. This has arguably little to do with public safety when it comes to common sense, but rather it eliminates liability for both the City and the chief personally should anything every happen in our as yet unsprinklered hall. One really can't blame them because in Rhode Island, 100 people died and other people ended up in prison. The problem though: sprinklers cost $150,000+.

The irony however is that the ASAB also calls for "fairness and common sense" in applying said laws, and in Somerville all manners of halls (veterans' posts, other church halls, for profit function halls, etc) don't have sprinklers either. Yet, upon inquiring I was told that those had basically been approved by earlier officials. Fair? You tell me. Then, to further bewilder the situation, one of the fire details we had to have on scene prior to being shut down told me one evening, "Ten gallons of gasoline and a match wouldn't set this place on fire." Common sense...?

The thing to understand I suppose is that public safety is not necessarily what it's about in local politics: liability and control are often much bigger concerns. Public officials don't want to get sued, go to jail, they want to keep their jobs, and get re-elected. Understandably, in my book, unjust and unconducive to say swing dancing as its manifestations are. Welcome to the system.

There is a rapidly closing window to appeal the city's decision, or more likely to come up with an extended grace period and plan, after which the sprinklers would need to be installed. Said plan is affordable if one looks at the numbers over say 5-10 years, but to the church's volunteer board this $150,000 bill is akin to going to say Crane's beach and jumping in the water, only to discover that it's 35 degrees. Just getting the concept lined up internally takes a lot of doing, committee meetings, and late night discussions. i.e. wier are not going to get dies done very schnell, nein. Unfortunately I can't appeal it myself since I am not the owner of the venue. Nevertheless, there is some support internally by members of the church board, so the discussions continue. i.e. there is what I like to call a "non-zero probability" that it will all get worked out.

But.... for now, on to Plan B.

After looking at every hall this side of Waltham and then some, fortunately SpringStep (which is host to Liz Miller's monthly Saturday Night Blues Cafe, on hiatus for the summer), was available every Friday through the end of August. We quickly signed a deal and thus we've found a VERY NICE albeit temporary new home.

Unfortunately, after that things are cloudy again but there are some options that may pan out sooner or later. These include the Greek Church, another as yet undiscovered very nice hall near the Sullivan Square (off I-93 in Somerville), and eventually we might have dibs on the future brand new Huron Ave VFW/West Cambridge Youth Center building that would take Swing City full circle. In the meantime, hopefully all the Swing City patrons new and old will continue to be loyal to our efforts in bringing Boston "Top" Swing dancing.

Thanks and hope to see you in Medford!

-Olaf
Your faithful Swing City impressario

P.S. if someone has the power to pull some strings in Somerville, please let me know...!