A divided Scranton City Council introduced legislation for the city to buy for $1.88 million the Fidelity Bank building next to City Hall for a municipal annex.
Council voted 3-2 Tuesday — with council President Gerald Smurl, Bill King and Jessica Rothchild voting yes, and Mark McAndrew and Tom Schuster voting no — to introduce a resolution from Mayor Paige Gebhardt Cognetti to approve the purchase of the bank branch at 334-336 N. Washington Ave. Council voted the same way on introducing a companion resolution regarding amending the 2025 capital budget toward funding the purchase.
The resolutions likely will come back before council for second votes on adoptions during council’s next meeting this coming Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. at City Hall.
In recent years, as Fidelity Bank has embarked on making the Scranton Electric Building at 507 Linden St. its headquarters, the Cognetti administration has eyed the three-story bank branch next to City Hall at 340 N. Washington Ave. as a municipal annex. Fidelity expects to complete the renovation of the Scranton Electric Building in April, and then vacate the branch next to City Hall. Fidelity’s website gives the branch address as 338 N. Washington Ave. The branch will remain open until Fidelity completes its headquarters at the eight-story landmark topped with the iconic “Scranton, The Electric City” sign.
The city intends to make the bank branch into a public service facility for functions that require frequent transactions with the public, such as permits and code enforcement; as well as for a Police Department real-time crime center facility, the mayor and city Police Chief Thomas Carroll told council during a caucus on Nov. 25. With a street-level first floor, the bank branch is more readily disabled-accessible than City Hall.
The bank branch also comes with 35 parking spaces for use by city employees, the mayor had said. Carroll described a real-time crime center as a “decentralized component” of Police Department facilities. Decentralization would involve moving administrative offices from police headquarters at 100 S. Washington Ave. to the annex, using the current police headquarters as an operations and investigations center, and using the Serrenti Center in the Hill Section for training.
At council’s meeting Tuesday, McAndrew and Schuster raised several concerns about a city purchase of the bank branch building, including whether the city needs it, according to an Electric City Television simulcast and video of the meeting posted on YouTube.
“There’s ‘need to have’ (and) ‘nice to have,’ especially when I’m spending taxpayer money,” McAndrew said. “Do we need to have that building next door? No. Would it be nice to have for the chief? Sure. But they’ll still do a fantastic job with the building they have (police headquarters) and fighting crime.”
They also asked about the costs of outfitting the building for city functions, as well as the costs of maintenance, utility and insurance.
In an email reply Thursday to The Times-Tribune posing similar questions, city Business Administrator Eileen Cipriani said: “The current proposed projects for the building are focused on the development and installation of the SPD Real Time Crime Center. This project would be funded with a $500,000 LSA grant to outfit the Center and within that application security measures would be installed to mirror the current SPD headquarters and ensure CJIS compliance of the space. The building has been inspected by the City Engineer as well as reviewed by the third party building and safety inspectors. As part of this transaction the City would also be taking position of the building fully furnished so this would be another cost savings to the City. The Fidelity Bank building is an updated facility which has reduced operating costs, by comparison the historic city hall currently has a utility expense of $165,000 annually, while the bank building utility costs at $50,000.”
Schuster and McAndrew also wondered if the city had an appraisal of the bank branch done. Cipriani said both the city and Fidelity Bank had certified appraisals performed, and the city’s appraisal was $1.75 million and the seller’s appraisal was $2,010,000.
“My fear here is that we’re entering into something like the county entered into when they bought the Globe store,” Schuster said. “I’m happy with the footprint that we are operating in. I don’t think it’s time to expand out.”
Schuster also wanted the administration to provide the assessed value of the annex building and how much in taxes would be lost by the city, school district and county with the commercial building coming off tax rolls under city ownership.
Citing the current assessment of the bank branch at $1,920,360, Cipriani said, “The city has done analysis on the revenue that is being generated by the building and equally important the amount of revenue that will be generated by the employees that will be located in the new Fidelity Headquarters. In 2025 Fidelity Bank paid $25,511.99 in property taxes. Fidelity Bank has plans to locate 130 employees, who would be now paying EIT (earned income tax, also called a wage tax) to the City as well as joining the Downtown Scranton workforce which in itself delivers economic impact to of the businesses in the Downtown.”
McAndrew said he wanted to know who made the offer, regarding a sale/purchase of the building.
Cipriani said: “Over several meetings around the Fidelity Downtown Expansion different thoughts on the building’s uses were discussed informally, some of which touched on a potential for how the space could solve ongoing accessibility short falls of City Hall. Not until a subsequent meeting did Fidelity directly ask if the City was interested in purchasing the building. At that time the City began formulating a potential offer and working through appraisals and inspections. This is an opportunity that likely would not come again for the city to acquire a property that is turnkey ready and allow for ADA access. It would be cost prohibitive to make city hall ADA compliant.”
“]
The Fideilty Bank building at 338 N. Washington Ave. in Scranton on Friday, Nov. 28, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
The Fideilty Bank building at 338 N. Washington Ave. in Scranton on Friday, Nov. 28, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)
Show Caption
1 of 2
The Fideilty Bank building at 338 N. Washington Ave. in Scranton on Friday, Nov. 28, 2025. (REBECCA PARTICKA/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER)