Erie mini-golf lawsuit ends as judge sides with port authority
Editorial illustration — Press Pass USAA judge has ended the legal fight over a former miniature golf course on Erie's bayfront, ruling against the owners who said the Erie-Western Pennsylvania Port Authority forced the course to close and owed them for relocating it.
Erie County Judge Joseph M. Walsh III granted the port authority's request for summary judgment on October 14 and denied the owners' competing request, the Erie Times-News reported Monday. Barring an appeal, his 16-page written opinion and order ends the case.
The 18-hole Harbor View Miniature Golf course operated for about 19 years on authority-owned property on the west side of State Street, just north of the Bayfront Parkway. It closed in June 2021 after an access road was built on the site of the course, according to the report.
Owners Tom and Teresa Stankiewicz, who never reopened the course, sued the authority in the Erie County Court of Common Pleas in June 2024. They claimed the authority breached the Harbor View lease by failing to select other options for the access road, and failed to honor a promise to pay nearly $700,000 for relocating the course to the authority's Liberty Park, farther west on the bayfront. The authority denied the claims.
Walsh ruled that the owners presented no evidence the authority breached the lease agreement or promised to compensate them for the relocation. The ruling closes a dispute that had run for more than two years in court over a bayfront attraction that had already been closed for more than five.
Sources: Erie Times-News / GoErie (Oct 26, 2026).
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