SEVERAL POINTS are worth making regarding neighborhood concern about Harvard’s plans for Allston-Brighton. The area isn’t exactly South Boston when it comes to political clout with the mayor. So don’t expect a generous linkage deal for Allston-Brighton along the lines of what the mayor negotiated with waterfront developers for South Boston. In that case, South Boston leaders signed a deal with Menino guaranteeing the neighborhood 51 percent of the linkage payments — money that developers pay to the city for affordable housing and job development — which was more than 40 percent of what neighborhoods usually get. When exactly how much South Boston was slated to receive came to light and the rest of the city expressed outrage, Menino backed away from the deal. South Boston was back to square one. Not surprisingly, the episode has left its mark on Allston-Brighton activists. "I don’t think that given what happened in South Boston, people are looking for a South Boston–style agreement," says one community activist.

But they still want something: "We’d like to see some community benefits come our way," says Berkeley, sketching out a vision wherein Harvard builds housing available to students and residents, constructs graceful buildings along the lines of the business school’s new Spangler Center, and helps improve the flow of traffic in the area.

Menino, nonetheless, can use the fact that Summers wants to move so much of Harvard to Allston as leverage to win the neighborhood the kind of "direct benefits" it’s looking for. He could also use it to get Summers’s cooperation and participation in the Crosstown project (not to mention money for services in other parts of the city, and, possibly, higher payments in lieu of taxes). In short, Menino’s message will be: if you want to move ahead with your plans, you’ve got to do something for me.

Says one city insider: "Menino definitely has the upper hand in this relationship. Harvard needs him a lot more than he needs them."

Another point worth noting, however, is that Harvard’s presence in Allston-Brighton isn’t anything new. Harvard constructed its neoclassical football stadium in Allston in 1903. In 1927, Harvard built its business school on the Boston side of the Charles. Plus, while Harvard did recently complete the Spangler Center, which local activists laud as a model of development, it left Allston relatively untouched for some time. That said, the university got into hot water when it disclosed in 1997 that it had been quietly purchasing land in Allston throughout the 1990s. Damage control, in part, prompted Harvard to donate the land for what is now the spanking new Allston Public Library.

But the residential community has been in Allston longer than Harvard. The swath of land between the Mass Turnpike and the Charles River — the area in which Harvard wants to build — contains some 10,000 residents, many of them homeowners whose families have lived there for generations. Much of the community, organized around St. Anthony’s Parish, is a hard-working, unified group. The church has consistently produced an annual show each March to raise funds for its religious school. It’s not a neighborhood Menino can in good conscience abandon.

State Representative Kevin Honan of Brighton maps out Menino’s moral — if not political — obligation to the neighborhood. "We don’t want to be trampled by a huge institution," he says. "We want to make sure the neighborhood is treated with respect and decency."

It remains to be seen what this odd power couple can work out. But one thing is clear: behind the politics of Menino’s maneuvering lies a bit of good sense. Over the last few years, the amount of time and energy the mayor expended on private developers and the Red Sox seemed out of whack with the amount of attention he devoted to the key institutions that form the city’s backbone — such as the hospitals and universities. In his dealings with Summers, Menino gets to build on Boston’s relationship with a premier educational institution and a major developer. At a time when Boston needs to return to its economic roots — health care and higher education — a good Menino-Summers relationship is sound politics.

Seth Gitell can be reached at sgitell[a]phx.com