On Saturday, Dunaway wrote to members of the boards of both museums that he opposes the idea, though he began his e-mail with the phrase "At the risk of losing friendships and relationships."
"Even though I have just a few weeks to go as Mayor, I am opposed to the merger for many reasons, but the main one is financial. Marietta simply does not have the financial resources for it," Dunaway wrote in the e-mail, which was also sent to city council members.
"As wonderful a prospect as this merger might seem on the surface, this is too large for just the city and the (MMH) to do," Dunaway wrote.
Micky Blackwell, who is vice chairman of the board of the aviation museum (AMDC) and a longtime ally of Dunaway's, responded via email this week that he is disappointed the mayor "would take a public stand that opposes combining" the museums "before knowing the facts. You have jumped to the conclusion that the combining of the two museums will add a financial burden to the city. What if this is not the case?"
"The AMDC is essentially debt free," Blackwell wrote, and the ongoing cost of combining the two entities "is virtually nothing. However, there is a huge potential revenue upside for the city and county from the projected 50,000 visitors/year that would attend the first aviation building when it is built (with private funds)."
"I hope that you will be open to at least hearing the facts. ... I am very confident that we can change your position once you know the facts," wrote Blackwell, a retired president of Lockheed.
On Tuesday, Dunaway acknowledged to the Journal that Blackwell was right and that he should keep an open mind.
The Marietta Museum of History is financed in large part by the city. The museum director's salary and benefits ($60,272) come from the city's general fund. The museum also gets $179,751 from the city's tourism funds, which are generated by the hotel/motel tax. City Manager Bill Bruton said the museum also uses space in the city's old water system building on Sessions Street for storage, without charge.
The museum leases the top two floors of Kennesaw House from the Downtown Marietta Development Authority, paying $40,600 per year for rent, or about $3,383 a month, Bruton said.
In his e-mail, Dunaway talks a lot about dollars.
"The next fiscal budget will be extremely difficult to maintain the current funding of all the city functions, including the (MMH). I don't think this will be possible and I don't see a rebound any time soon," he wrote.
Also, "The completion of the (AMDC) in any form would require many hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of dollars, and of equal importance, many hundreds of thousands of volunteer hours...(which has to be knowledgeable and skilled man hours). The city is not prepared for this prospect," Dunaway said.
Dunaway said "displayed" airplanes must be in controlled humidity and temperature environments to be preserved. "How many millions of dollars would this take?" he asked.
The mayor suggested the only alternative would be for the Cobb County government or a foundation to support the merger. "The Aviation Museum must be supported by a larger financial and public base than just as a city museum. I do not see any prospect of state and federal funding for this, considering the budget restraints they have. Even now, the city does not have adequate funds to purchase the Kennesaw House from the DMDA. The city would have to work hard to find the $30,000 plus a year to rent the first floor from the DMDA for a (MMH) expansion."
Alice Summerour, an attorney who is on the board of the history museum, also emailed a lengthy list of concerns to Brent Brown, the chairman of that board.
The city clerk's office reports that on Nov. 10 the MMH board voted, 17-0, to appoint a committee to look into the possibility of a merger or acquisition.
"Most of the MMH Board seemed totally blinded by the '$8m in assets' carrot being dangled in front of them without thinking about all the logistics and funding requirements that go along with this 'opportunity,'" she wrote to Brown, expressing frustration that no one seemed to have many answers.
Summerour also asked where MMH would get the $65,000 needed to meet the AMDC's obligations through the end of the year, as well as $20,000 per month in 2010 for AMDC operations.
MMH board member Steve Imler also wrote to Brown, saying the 17-0 vote could send the wrong signal since "it may lead people associated with the Aviation Museum and the public in general to think the MMH is unanimously positive and optimistic if not yet committed. Anyone who was at the meeting on Tuesday knows that is not the case."
Imler went on to write that "After thinking more about it, I will be candid to say I am very skeptical that I will ever get to a point I could endorse this decision. There are many specific questions and unknowns to deal with about leases, expenses, employees and so on, not the least of which is the apparent need to do this within a few weeks if it all."
Brown, for his part, replied to Summerour that "these were not carrots other than real facts," and that he was "frustrated at your lack of even supporting looking into it."
He also blamed "bad numbers from the MDJ" for many of her questions, though the figures all came from a Nov. 9 email sent to the AMDC board by Lori Cowie, AMDC executive director, board chairman Chuck Clay, and Blackwell.
"If I had answers to all these questions I would have been accused of going behind the board's back. So allow us to do our work in front of everyone," Brown wrote to Summerour about the MMH task force.
The AMDC board is scheduled to meet at 8:30 this morning at the community room of Vinings Bank. A joint meeting with members of both boards, as well as members of city council, has been tentatively scheduled for Dec. 8.
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And Dunnaway's claim that the city would have to be prepared to provide volunteer hours is a joke. I'd love to hear from him how many volunteer hours he thinks the city contributes to the thousands of hours put in by the History Museum volunteers!