College Square Pizza Closed

A handwritten sign posted in the window of College Square Pizza says the shop will be reopening soon, but with the owner's whereabouts unknown that seems unlikely, according to many familiar with the situation.

The pizza and sub sandwich shop at 552 Washington St. abruptly closed its doors just before Memorial Day after 13 years, and the owner Theo Tsitos hasn't been seen or heard from since.

"I really have nothing concrete to tell you except they are no longer in business," said Holly Detroy, the town's health agent responsible for inspecting the restaurant. "We have been unable to contact the owner."

Tsitos, who had been a fixture at College Square since it opened, hadn't been working in the restaurant for some time before it closed, according to other tenants in the building who said relatives had been running the place when the doors closed.

According to Detroy, her office received a complaint of an odor coming from the restaurant shortly after it closed.

She contacted the building owners, Sullivan and Company, and said she was assured that they had cleaned out all the food and perishables left in the restaurant.

"I have also been assured that it is still getting routine pest control monitoring visits," she said, something that is particularly important because of the tenants living on the second floor of the building and because of other restaurants on the same block.

Detroy said she wishes Tsitos well and that he had always been cooperative with her office.

Records in the town's assessors' office show Tsitos is essentially up to date on his personal property taxes, owing approximately $200 from November.

A woman refusing to identify herself who answered the phone at Sullivan and Company said she had no information on the closing of College Square and refused to answer whether the company had started proceedings to officially break the restaurant's lease.