CANCELED: Harbor Carnival Is No More-Fire Department said no to a fund-raiser

It was a sad week in Sag Harbor - a week without cotton candy, without stuffed animals. No sweethearts kissed at the top of a Ferris wheel.

The annual Sag Harbor Carnival - which the Sag Harbor Fire Department Web site had announced would take place between Aug. 17 and 21 - never came to town.

"What happened to it?" asked callers to The Star this week. "It was such a nice carnival," one person said sadly. "What else can I do with my kids this weekend?"

Chris Kohnken, the Fire Department chief, said this week that the village's volunteer firefighters decided against continuing the carnival in October 2004. It was "voted down" because of "an accumulation of things," he said.

The department had hosted five days of fun and games each summer for six years. The carnival was begun in 1999 as a way to raise money as the department prepared to celebrate its 200th anniversary in 2003. "The 200th anniversary is over with," Mr. Kohnken said, citing one reason for the carnival's discontinuance.

But the firemen were also reacting to "problems that happened" last year at the carnival site, Havens Beach, the chief said.

On Aug. 21, 2004, a Jeep was stolen from a nearby driveway by a carnival worker who had just been fired. After Trevor T. Wilson of Brooklyn took Robert Allardice's 2004 Jeep he was spotted on Sunrise Highway by Southampton Town police and charged with driving while intoxicated. Sag Harbor Village Police then charged Mr. Wilson with grand larceny, a felony.

Although Mr. Kohnken admitted that the theft was "one isolated incident," he said that "the guys didn't want to deal with problems like that," after having worked hard to organize and run the event.

Sag Harbor's was the only full-fledged carnival east of Wainscott. Similar events are held annually in Bridgehampton, North Sea, and Southampton.

Mr. Kohnken said that the carnival raised a good deal of money for the department, although he could not cite an exact figure. The firefighters are "looking into different types of fund-raisers," he said. The department will continue to hold its annual cocktail party; next year's installment is tentatively scheduled for March.

Mr. Kohnken said he had heard that the Stella Maris School might organize a carnival in coming summers. No one at the school, which is closed for the summer, could be reached for comment.