More Funds Needed For Lighthouse Restoration

Long Islander News photo/Jano Tantongco
Pam Setchell, right, president of the Huntington Lighthouse Preservation Society, appeals to donors to spread the word about the Crowdrise initiative to help fund additional repairs needed for the lighthouse’s foundation.

By Jano Tantongco
jtantongco@longislandergroup.com

The effort to restore the Huntington Lighthouse is going to require more work and funding, officials behind the project said at a fundraiser last Thursday.

Progress has been made in the repair of the historic lighthouse, but the Huntington Lighthouse Preservation Society and its contractors discovered the foundation on the south side of the structure was in further disrepair than previously anticipated.

At the donor fundraiser, Pam Setchell, president of the preservation society, said that the project will cost an additional $160,000 to make further repairs on the fourth side.

Setchell added that years of deterioration and a lack of adequate riprap have led to the fourth side being “compromised tremendously.”

“It would be a shame to stop. We would keep the funding that we have in the capital campaign, waiting for them to come back,” Setchell said. “The longer it goes undone, the bigger the project gets because it doesn’t repair itself, it just gets worse.”

Nick DeSantis, owner of Newport Engineering, was grateful that the project has come this far, adding that 85 percent of the 20-foot steel sheets surrounding the base of the lighthouse has been secured.

DeSantis added that by the time it’s completed, the system will protect from scour, add extra protection for the lighthouse’s exterior and additionally reinforce the foundation with an extra foot of concrete. He added that completion of the fourth side was “paramount and instrumental” to the project.

The next phase, he said, will be the placement of riprap once the steel sheets are set.

“We’re very fortunate the lighthouse was in good enough shape to do it,” DeSantis said. “We want to protect what we have.”

Frank Scobbo, owner of Scobbo Contractors, said his crew had just discovered the original davit, a small crane system that the original lighthouse keeper used to hoist up his boat.

They’ve also found a large boulder with what appear to be an emblem that has yet to be fully seen.

Setchell said they are in the process of trying to lift it up out of the water to determine what’s actually inscribed onto the rock.

A Crowdrise page (Crowdrise.com/huntington-lighthouse-preservation-society1) has been established to help fund the remainder of the construction. Since it launched Wednesday, the campaign has received $6,760 so far.

“You know what upkeep is like on a regular home,” Setchell said. “Take that home and stick it out in the middle of the water, and it’s a whole new dynamic.”