Update: PGCB’s ‘Application Status Report’ Incorrect Re: State College Casino Filing

Posted on: April 22, 2025, 10:57h. 

Last updated on: April 23, 2025, 09:28h.

Devin O'Connor @CasinoorgDevinO Read More
Expertise: Asia Pacific Gaming, Commercial Gaming, Legislation, Politics.

Update: The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board tells Casino.org that the Bally’s executive’s application with the PGCB is for an interactive gaming license — not a principal license with SC Gaming OpCo, LLC. The Board’s “Application Status Report” as of April 20, 2025, listed the Bally’s exec as applying for a principal license with the State College casino project. The PGCB’s official document was incorrect. 

Last fall, Bally’s Corp. exited the development group behind a planned casino at the Nittany Mall in Pennsylvania’s State College near the Penn State University Main Campus. This week, the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board published an incorrect document claiming an executive at Bally’s had applied to be designated as a “principal” of the SC Gaming OpCo, LLC, team.

State College casino Pennsylvania Bally's
A billboard against a State College casino in Pennsylvania. Filings recently made with the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board suggest a Bally’s executive will be involved in the forthcoming casino’s operation. (Image: Submitted)

SC Gaming OpCo is the LLC led by real estate developer Ira Lubert, a Penn State alumnus and former chair of the university’s Board of Trustees.

Lubert presented the PGCB with the high bid of $10 million during its September 2020 Category 4 license auction. Legal challenges alleging that Lubert didn’t bid solely, but instead with other investors who weren’t eligible to participate in the bidding because they didn’t possess an ownership position in an active Pennsylvania slot license eventually went Lubert’s way in a long, drawn-out challenge that reached the state’s Supreme Court.

Soon after Lubert’s SC Gaming OpCo was cleared to possess the Cat. 4 mini-casino license, the project’s operational partner — Bally’s — abruptly left the group. Bally’s said last September that departing the State College casino scheme would allow the company to “allocate resources towards other priorities.”

Bally’s License Application for iGaming

Bally’s hasn’t been involved in the State College casino investment since September when it formally withdrew from the project.

Lubert found a new management firm in Saratoga Casino Holdings, a family-owned racing and gaming company that runs the Saratoga Casino Hotel in upstate New York’s Saratoga Springs, Saratoga Casino Black Hawk in Colorado, and Magnolia Bluffs Casino Hotel along the Mississippi River in Natchez. Saratoga is also part of a bid for a downstate New York gaming license on Coney Island.

According to the incorrect filings made public April 20 by the PGCB, Elia Trowbridge, the chief compliance officer and senior vice president at Bally’s, had applied for a principal license with SC Gaming OpCo on April 16, 2025. The PGCB now says the application was wrongly listed and that Trowbridge applied for an interactive gaming license with Bally’s. 

Casino Construction Underway

Fences are up around the former Macy’s department store at the Nittany Mall as construction is underway on the $120 million project. Lubert and SC Gaming OpCo’s latest blueprint includes a casino floor with up to 750 slot machines and 30 live dealer table games, a sports-themed restaurant, a bar, and a grab-and-go food outlet.

Poole Anderson Construction is the casino’s contractor. Poole Anderson is co-owned by Robert E. Poole, Jr., who was approved as a principal in SC Gaming OpCo by the PGCB on Jan. 25, 2023.

Additional pending principal licenses with SC Gaming OpCo before the PGCB include Sam, Daniel, and Robert Gerrity. The Gerrity family controls Saratoga Casino Holdings.