Benner Township, Pennsylvania

After years of speculation, property transaction records have revealed the end user of a planned fulfillment center warehouse in Benner Township .

Amazon recently completed the purchase of about 100 acres at the end of Penntech Drive in the Benner Commerce Park, where the facility is to be located, for $6.309 million. The transaction was recorded with the Centre County Recorder of Deeds on Jan. 28.

The company received approval on Feb. 6 to begin site work for the 122,000-square-foot facility, according to Christopher Schnure, senior subdivision and land development planner for Centre County.

Though the identity of the warehouse's operator has long been assumed to be Amazon, it had not been disclosed since developer SunCap Property Group introduced initial plans for the facility in April 2022 . SunCap representatives said then and in the intervening years that they were bound by non-disclosure agreements, and in 2022 then-Centre County Commissioner Michael Pipe said the county had only been informed that it would be "a warehouse for e-commerce.”

An initial plan called for a 1 million-square-foot warehouse that would have nearly 700 full-time employees. That plan was withdrawn just weeks after it was made public. A nearly identical plan was submitted in August 2022 and withdrawn in February 2024 .

SunCap then submitted a plan for a downsized warehouse in March 2024 , and it did not disclose a reason for the smaller facility or how many people it would employ.

A final land development plan received conditional approval from the Centre County Planning Commission last June.

Board of Commissioners Chair Mark Higgins on Tuesday said he was happy to add jobs but speculated they would be just a fraction of those that would have come with the larger warehouse plan. He was also less sanguine about the impact given the possible loss of 658 jobs from the county with the potential closure of nearby Rockview state prison.

"Obviously more jobs is a good thing," Higgins said. "The difficulty is that the jobs at Rockview and Quehanna [Boot Camp in Clearfield County, which has also been recommended for closure] paid good family sustaining wages, also provided a good benefits package and a retirement package. From what little I know, the jobs at a last-mile Amazon warehouse don’t necessarily meet those definitions."

The warehouse would be the sixth development in Benner Commerce Park since it opened in 2010. It is currently home to the Rockview state police barracks, Cleveland Brothers, SilcoTek, Happy Valley Blended Products and Homeland Manufacturing.

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