First off, Welcome to FocusFanatics
Secondly, I'm glad to hear you did some research and you are correct that a drop-in filter is one of the best upgrades for the intake.
With that said, since you live in the Northeast and you're probably not racing your SVT, you shouldn't worry too much about heatsoak.
I say since you have it installed already, it would be just fine to just leave it on.