Geisinger Community Medical Center will oppose a neighbor’s lawsuit aimed at overturning a recent rezoning of property flanking the hospital to accommodate its expansion.
A lawsuit by Tom Hoppel of 215 Arthur Ave. filed Jan. 7 in Lackawanna County Court challenges the city’s adoption in December of an ordinance rezoning Geisinger properties in the 200 and 400 blocks of Colfax Avenue flanking the current hospital facilities’ footprints.
As the hospital would be affected if the lawsuit were to end up reversing the rezoning, GCMC on Feb. 6 filed a petition in court to enter the case as an intervenor/appellee.
Hoppel and the city did not object to GCMC joining the litigation as an intervenor. On Feb. 9, Lackawanna County Judge Andrew Jarbola signed an order allowing GCMC to become a party in the case.
Hoppel’s lawsuit stemmed from Scranton City Council on Dec. 9 voting 3-2 to pass Mayor Paige Gebhardt Cognetti’s rezoning plan to accommodate Geisinger’s construction of a five-story building and parking garage in the 400 block of Colfax Avenue, across from the hospital. At that time, the rezoning arose a month earlier. Geisinger issued a news release Nov. 10, outlining how major investments in the Hill Section hospital undertaken during the past two years have maxed out space there, and noted Cognetti would pursue a rezoning to accommodate GCMC expansion across Mulberry Street.
The issue revisited a zoning debate from 2023 that resulted in council at that time limiting the height of new buildings on GCMC’s Colfax properties to 45 feet, which stymied the hospital’s former expansion plans. Raised anew in November and December, the issue again spurred concerns and questions from Hill Section and other city residents, and council members, as well as arguments in favor of the rezoning and expansion by GCMC, the mayor and others.
At a Dec. 2 council meeting, Geisinger told council of plans to construct a five-story, 75-foot-tall clinical building and parking garage in the 400 block of Colfax Avenue. A bridge over Mulberry Street would connect the “inpatient addition” on the site of the former John J. Audubon School to the existing hospital; a five-story garage with 400 parking spaces would go next to the addition, closer to Vine Street. The rezoning changed Geisinger-owned property on the odd side of the 200 block of Colfax Avenue and the even side of the 400 block of Colfax Avenue from institutional to civic zones. The institutional zone had the 45-foot height limit imposed by council in 2023, while a civic zone has a 100-foot limit. Geisinger officials said the health care system had no plans for the lot in the 200 block of Colfax.
Residential concerns generally centered on giving neighbors more time to participate in an expansion they fear could harm the neighborhood already stressed by the hospital’s presence and traffic, and giving them more input and safeguards to ensure Geisinger sticks to its concept and it does not sprawl even larger.
Council held a public hearing Dec. 9 on the rezoning that featured numerous speakers generally restating arguments and concerns on both sides of the rezoning and GCMC expansion issue. At that time, Hoppel spoke of the rezoning as getting rushed through before a new council with a different composition of members would take over in January, according to an Electric City Television simulcast and video of the hearing posted online. Hoppel said the neighborhood did not have enough notice of the impending rezoning and a “shoehorned” expansion without any impact studies would negatively impact neighbors.
Some of the claims that Hoppel raises in his appeal lawsuit include: the city violated due process via inadequate posting of a public notice, which amounts to a fatal flaw of the rezoning ordinance; the rezoning was arbitrary and unreasonable; and the rezoning constitutes “spot zoning” by creating a GCMC “zoned island” that is totally incompatible with a well-established residential neighborhood of 18 square blocks of housing. Hoppel is represented in the appeal by attorney Edmund Scacchitti, a resident of the 400 block of Arthur Avenue. Scacchitti previously raised similar concerns to council and in an injunction lawsuit that unsuccessfully sought to push off the rezoning into 2026 to give residents and a new council more time for review.
On Feb. 3, the city filed preliminary objections to Hoppel’s appeal, contending it is “defective” and should be dismissed. The city claims Hoppel failed to first challenge the rezoning with the city Zoning Board, after the mayor and council enacted the rezoning; and thus the county court does not have jurisdiction in the matter, according to the preliminary objections filed by attorneys Jenna Kraycer Tuzze and John Price of the Oliver, Price & Rhodes law firm of Clarks Summit representing the city.
Geisinger, which is represented by attorneys Daniel Brier, Patrick Brier, Neal Thatcher and Brian Levy of the Myers, Brier & Kelly law firm of Scranton, has not yet filed its response to Hoppel’s appeal.
A statement issued Tuesday to The Times-Tribune from GCMC spokesman Matt Mattei regarding the appeal said: “Although Geisinger is not a defendant, we are intervening in this case because Scranton and Lackawanna County residents deserve a medical center that is best positioned to meet their health care needs now and for years to come. Expanding Geisinger Community Medical Center is critical to give our community more access to acute hospital services — in a setting where patients can heal and recover in the best possible environment — as soon as we can.”
Vehicles are parked in a lot across from Geisinger Community Medical Center in Scranton Thursday, January 8, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
Rendering of a 75-foot-tall, five-story expansion building proposed by Geisinger Community Medical Center in Scranton, for the 400 block of Colfax Avenue, connected to the existing hospital by a bridge over Mulberry Street, and with a five-story parking garage on the Vine Street side of the Colfax block. IMAGE PROVIDED / COURTESY OF GEISINGER
Geisinger Community Medical Center on Mulberry St. in Scranton Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
A map showing existing zoning in the area of Geisinger Community Medical Center in Scranton, and proposed changes to Geisinger-owned properties in the 200 and 400 blocks of Colfax Avenue. (IMAGE POSTED IN SCRANTON CITY COUNCIL AGENDA)
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Vehicles are parked in a lot across from Geisinger Community Medical Center in Scranton Thursday, January 8, 2026. (SEAN MCKEAG / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)