Nittany Mall Owners Must Pay College Township $126K for Sinkhole Repairs, Judge Rules

A Centre County judge has ordered the owners of the Nittany Mall to pay $126,119 to College Township for completing repairs to a sinkhole on the mall property in 2024.

Nittany Centre Realty, Nittany Nassim and Namdar Realty Group breached an easement and violated the township’s stormwater ordinance when they stopped work on the repairs to the sinkhole at the southeastern end of the mall property near Rural King, Judge Julia Rater wrote in an opinion and order filed on July 22.

The township notified the mall of the sinkhole in late 2023, and the owners hired an engineering firm and landscape contractor to carry out the work in April 2024. A day after repairs began, however, a second sinkhole opened, and both the landscaping company and engineer testified at a March trial that the mall authorized no further work after that.

College Township issued enforcement notices in May and June 2024, the latter including a warning that the municipality would do the work at prevailing-wage cost if the owners did not take action. Though the owners asked for more time because they were negotiating a new contract, one did not materialize and the township bid the project in late July.

HRI Inc. completed the repairs in October 2024.

The mall owners contended they did not bear responsibility for repayment because a sinkhole is naturally occurring, not the result of improper maintenance, and that the township acted too soon.

Rater, however, concurred with the township’s claim that both a 2021 easement and ordinance require stormwater facilities to be maintained “in good order, condition and repair,” regardless of the cause of any defects.

“An open sinkhole left unrepaired for months, after the owner’s contractor has quit and no replacement contract exists, is a facility that is not being properly maintained,” Rater wrote.

The township’s engineer testified “based on the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection’s Best Management Practices manual, that a sinkhole in a stormwater basin is a maintenance matter and that responsibility for the repair rested with Defendants,” according to the order.

Rater wrote that she “found the Township’s witnesses credible and their account uncontradicted.” Principals from the defendant companies, meanwhile, were subpoenaed but did not appear, and they produced no evidence of a contract for repairs after April 2024.

She added that the township was “measured,” allowing requests for more time and not awarding the contract until mid-August 2024, three months after the first enforcement.

Rater awarded the township $115,947.23 for remediation, concrete restoration, engineering fees and legal fees, as well as $10,172.26 in interest from October 2024 through July 2026.