The Birth of the Fort Salonga Association
By the spring of 1946 individuals and communities had made good progress toward getting back to the problems and projects of peace-time. In Fort Salonga, for example, a small group of people — 15 neighbors — met at the home of Paul and Julie Whitney on May 31, 1946, to discuss the idea of organizing a civic association. The consensus favored such a step, for there was a widespread feeling that Long Island was on the verge of a tremendous population growth, with all the prospects, both favorable and troublesome, that such a development would bring. Local zoning laws and building codes were inadequate, it was felt; the community’s roads needed attention; that perennial problem, the Huntington dump, was sending clouds of fly-ash through “The Hollow” and wherever else the wind carried it; and the Long Island Rail Road trains were dirty and late. There was plenty to do.
A notice dated June 10, 1946 announced a “membership-organization meeting” to be held in the Kings Park school (there was only one) cafeteria on June 19. When that evening arrived approximately 140 were present to give their hearty approval to the association idea. Paul Whitney was elected chairman, to act until officers could be chosen, and he, in turn, appointed nominating and by-laws committees.
A bulletin dated July 1 stated that 125 residents had paid the dues of $2 per family. At that time such a large part of Fort Salonga’s population consisted of “summer people” that the fiscal year — the dues year and the term of officers — was set at September 1 to the following August 31. This permitted election of officers and dues collection before the exodus to the City immediately after Labor Day. On the 30th of July a membership meeting elected the first slate of officers and directors.
The Association’s first years were busy ones, of course, being concerned not only with organization matters but also with the initial steps toward solving some pressing problems — notably zoning, which is a 3-year story in itself, with a happy ending. It was decided that Smithtown zoning demanded attention before that in Huntington. The Township’s first zoning law, enacted in 1932, gave Fort Salonga one-half acre zoning from the Sound southward to a line roughly parallel to and about half a mile north of Pulaski Road. Below that the zoning was one-quarter acre. After three years of hearings — some of them very lively when developers were present — letters to editors, membership meetings, and petitions, the Smithtown Town Board raised Fort Salonga’s residential zoning to two acres, as the Association had requested. A few years later, however, when threatened with a suit by a few of the largest property owners, the Town Board compromised at the one-acre level, which is what Fort Salonga has now except in those small areas where half and quarter acre development had taken place before the zoning was up-graded in 1949.
The newspapers in Smithtown, Northport, and Huntington were very generous in their editorial treatment of the new organization. Many of their editorials supported Fort Salonga’s aims, and frequently space was given to residents’ “letters to the editor:" The first fair and pet show was followed three months later by the first dinner-dance. An extra dividend resulted from the latter event, for invitations were sent to town officials and their wives in both Huntington and Smithtown. The mutual better understanding and respect generated by this friendly contact were important in the Association’s civic efforts.
What these efforts were and what degree of success they had are shown in brief form in a publication the Association distributed in late 1976, “Thirty Years of Keeping Fort Salonga Green?’ Many of the problems we have had — and solved — can be expected to recur from time to time. There will always be promoters looking for loopholes in the zoning laws and others who hate trees and love asphalt. As it is with freedom, the price of keeping Fort Salonga green is “eternal vigilance.” And that’s where the Fort Salonga Association comes in.