A few minutes.
Let us know when you're ready, Lakeisha.
Thank you.
looks good right keith yes i was just about to say chair we have 36 37 attendees we're ready to
start when you are very good thank you and uh everyone's on board good morning everyone my name
is Frank DiCicco. I'm the chair of the Zoning Board of Adjustment. I'll be participating in
today's hearing, along with our board secretary, Confessor Plaza, and board members, Mr. Thomas
Holloman and Mr. James Snell. Board Administrator, Ms. Lakeisha Dandy, and our board attorney, Ms.
Sharon Saleta, are also in attendance, as is our zoning board administrator, Ms. Tanya Sunkett.
For those of you who haven't yet participated in one of our virtual hearings, I'll go through some
the basics of what you can expect. First, we will be administering oaths to individual participants
prior to their testimony. Second, we'd like to advise everyone that this proceeding is being
recorded and that by participating you acknowledge your agreement to be recorded and that the
recording will be made available to the public on the web or otherwise. Third, for anyone participating
by phone, if you wish to testify, you must raise your hand by hitting star nine and then star six
to unmute yourself. I'll repeat. For anyone participating by phone, if you wish to testify,
you must raise your hand by hitting star nine and then star six to unmute yourself.
Finally, to enter an appearance statement, call Google 267 -270 -5548 and leave your email address
and the address of the property at issue.
I'll repeat, to enter an appearance statement,
call Google 267 -270 -5548
and leave your email address
and the address of the property at issue.
And I would also like to remind everyone,
please do not attempt to testify in the chat.
If you have any concerns or comments
that you wish to relay,
please relay them to our board administrator,
Ms. Lakeisha Dandy. With that, I will read off a list of requested continuances and withdrawals
for the 930 list. Number four on our list, MI 2021 -002421, 1720 North 59th Street.
applicant is requesting a continuance number five on our list mi 2021 -000739 1714 north
22nd street is withdrawn number six on our list mi 2020 -001856 1715 north 59th street is
continued. And number 13 on our list, MI 2021 -000738. 638 North Peach Street is being withdrawn.
If anyone disagrees with the cases that I've read into the record to be continued or withdrawn,
please raise your hand at this time. Only if you disagree with those cases I just read in to be
continued or withdrawn. Please raise your hand.
Chair, we have Steve Masters. Mr. Masters, you want to mute yourself?
Good morning, Mr. Masters. Please spell your full name and I'll swear you in.
Good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board. Steve Masters, M -A -S -T -E -R -S. I'm with the law
firm of JustLaws. You swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
you swear for him to tell the truth the whole truth nothing about the truth i do thank you
Thank you, sir.
sir please proceed um yes mr chair i heard you read one of the four um appeals that i'm going to
be um objecting to today 1714 north 22nd street mi2021000739 you stated that that one was withdrawn
but there are three associated appeals with that are those also withdrawn are those not withdrawn
today uh are you talking about 1720 1744 and 1750. oh here's where we are 1720 north 59th no
my mistake hold on um chair i can tell him that those are going forward it's only the one of the
forward but it's withdrawn yeah thank you okay thank you i have no further questions anyone else
anyone uh disagrees with any cases that are being continued or withdrawn please raise your hand
no more hands chair at this time i will ask if anyone would like to request
a continuance or withdrawal please raise your hand at this time only if you're requesting a
continuance or withdrawal? Please raise your hand. No hands, Chair. Okay, thank you. Sharon,
did we find out from Leonard if he wants to go on first or later? Yes, if you could call those
three cases first, Chair. Okay, so for those of you waiting, we're going to go a little bit out
of order. We have someone from the law department who'll be joining us, and that'll be case
Cases 3, 7, and 8.
Correct, Sharon?
That's correct, yes.
Okay, so these cases will be heard all together.
MI 2021 -000242, 1720 North 22nd Street.
MI 2021 -000784 -1744 North 22nd Street, and MI 2021 -000242 -1750 North 22nd Street.
Mr. Masters, I believe, is the attorney of record.
Excuse me, Chair.
No, Rachel Pritzker is the attorney for the applicant.
Mr. Masters is representing the protestants.
Yes, and Mr. Reuter is representing the city.
He is here only should there be questions about the accuracy of the refusal.
Thank you.
So we'll get Ms. Pritzker on to identify yourself.
I'll swear you in.
Mr. Masters has already been sworn in, and then we'll go to Mr. Reuter and swear him in as well.
So, Rachel, if you're out there, please identify yourself, spell your name, and I'll swear you in.
good morning rachel pritzker r -a -c -h -a -e -l pritzker p -r -i -t -z -k -e -r 1635 market street
street 1600 philadelphia pa 19103 you swear for him to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but
the truth yes rachel before you begin let's get leonard sworn in and then we can start we can
proceed okay mr reuter uh thank you may please the board leonard f reuter for the city of
philadelphia your last name please i'm sorry r -e -u -t -e -r these swear from the tell the truth
the whole truth nothing but the truth i do thank you uh steve you've already been sworn in so
rachel please proceed um just one thing mr chair um i had requested a copy of the exhibit binder
be shared um with me as the opposing counsel and i have not received it excuse me mr masters i
don't think you let anyone know that until yesterday afternoon is that correct i don't
have any emails from steve i didn't even know he was opposing it or who he was representing
i received exhibits from you after five yesterday i will gladly send you
ms pritzker's um exhibits now i don't believe you copied you her on yours but i will send you hers
now i was told that jeffrey young was the attorney for the applicant so that's who i was um corresponding
with well my name is the applications so we ready to proceed with these cases yeah i i'd like to
receive a copy of that too just in case um sharon when if you get a chance i will send um or steve
you can just send them directly i'll send them to you later okay thanks
all right okay yeah so i'm just gonna share my screen um just to go through the refusals and
i'm just gonna share my screen um just to go through the refusals and then we have our
And then we have our art.
architect on the line who can go through the plans um this is just about for parking um
everything all these properties are zoned rm1 so all we're trying to do is put accessory off
street parking um on these properties um as you can see this this property uh 1720 is rm1 so is
1744 50 um and 50 uh north 22nd street um these buildings are already built so um and they're
multi -family by right so essentially all we're here is for parking um i know that jeff uh young
who's on the call as well um was there for the community meeting and that most of the people in
opposition don't live on the 1700 block of north 22nd street um and we're are more so opposed to
the units in general. But again, these are by right, and we're just trying to accommodate
parking. We hear nonstop that parking is an issue in the city. And when we go to provide it,
somehow now parking is not an issue. So the only way to provide parking on these lots is parking
access by a front street. We can't do anything, no other sort of accommodation for the parking.
One of the reasons the other property was withdrawn is because we figured out a way to do a buy -write option there.
It's not available to the other properties.
So again, we're just here for parking on these sites.
I'm going to have our architect, Logan Dry, present the plans.
I'm happy to take any questions.
and jeff young is also on the call um if if there's any questions as he was the one who did
the community meeting and sort of attest to the fact that most of the concerns were
not related to why don't we just get jeffrey sworn in now just in case all right so jeffrey
if you're out there he's raising me he said he's having trying to get zoom working
hey rachel this is logan if you want to swear you know have me sworn in you can do that while
we're waiting logan please spell your full name sure logan dry l -o -g -a -n -d -r -y uh kca design
associates 65 25 tulip street philadelphia pa 19135 you swear a firm to tell the truth the
whole truth nothing but the truth i do thank you rachel we're having uh jeffrey's having
technical difficulties yes okay let's proceed yeah you catch up with this we'll swear them in thank
yeah rachel uh logan uh would you present your screen and just go through the plans for uh
parking for 17 20 44 and 50 i i actually i actually don't have screen share at this point
So if you have it, I can walk through it,
but I don't have the ability to share at this point.
I'm on a mobile.
Okay, give me one second, please.
Sorry about that.
Yeah, it's okay.
I just didn't have it up ready to share.
Can you see my screen?
So, you know, basically what we have here, as Rachel mentioned before, you've got a three -story multifamily building.
You know, when we initially designed this, everything was as a right in terms of coverage, setbacks, building height, unit count, et cetera.
What we did when we did this initial design, we initially had designed a front recess of the building.
um we were we were going to try to do something with uh perhaps some some covered outdoor space
um so you know we designed all of this with that existing void in the front of the building
initially it was going to be a covered terrace um you know so so you know once we got through
and did some of the construction um you know looking at what the dimensions were of the
building and looking at some of the other sites around the area we thought it would be a good idea
to provide some accessory off -street parking.
Again, as Rachel had mentioned,
these streets don't run street to street.
So unfortunately, if it was a rear -loaded street,
we could get that parking as of right.
But because the nature of this only having one street,
the front -loaded parking from the main street
was the only way to get access to that parking.
And so as a result, we got refusals for front -loaded parking on site.
We got refusals for front -loaded parking on site.
And every one of the ones, 17, 20, 40, 40, 40, 50,
are all trying to accommodate three accessory off -street parking spaces.
It's also worth noting, just as I have this chart,
I'll show the letters of support we have from the property owners
and developers that are actually on this block.
but uh most of this block is vacant that's why we mentioned that there's very few people who
actually live on the block because most of the block is vacant um this church is owned by our
client and then most of these vacant lots are owned by um the city so uh there aren't really
any directly adjacent neighbors as you can see the block is mostly vacant and while parking is not an
issue at this second um this is some of the units that we know to be in process at the moment um
some of them are also owned by our client and some are not owned by our client but you have
about 138 units coming on either under construction or with zoning submissions all of which would not
be providing parking because you'd have to get a variance for them as they don't have an ability
to have parking access by a shared driveway or a rear alleyway. So we're just trying to accommodate
three parking spaces per building in order to help alleviate the constant concern of parking
in our city, specifically in North Philadelphia. And also the fact there's about to be 130 units
coming on this block, either under construction or rezoning submissions, and none of which would
have off -street parking. Other than that, I'm going to show the support letters that
we have. I'm just going to find them. I'm happy to hear, take any questions from there.
Bring it up, the support letters? Yeah, I'm just trying to find them. I'm just trying
to not give everyone a migraine while I look for them.
So this is from the owner of 1724 North 22nd Street, actually on the block.
1704 -12 north 22nd street and 1711 north crosby street
1726 north 2nd street
and 1738 and 40 north 22nd street
pretty much the extent of the properties that are occupied um yeah correct
thank you like i said there's no other properties on the block yeah i mean your visuals show that
i just was curious if that there's any others on that block but it doesn't appear to be
okay um anybody have any questions for miss pritzker or uh mr dry at this time the board
the board have any questions yes mr chairman mr hollivan yes let me ask you this prisoner
could you uh develop these buildings by right without accessory parking yeah they're already
built no that wasn't my question i said could you build them without accessory parking because
they're already built with accessory parking no they're currently built without accessory
parking right now what we're looking to do is add parking to them so the answer is yes uh
mr halliman we could build them without accessory parking and they are already built with
out accessory parking they were set back in a way to allow for the accommodation of parking in the
event that um it it was it was important which it now is um but yes let me try it another way
the buildings are already built with accessory parking that's done correct no they do not have
parking right now well you don't have these spaces for parking we have the room for it but they're
not built because we need to get a variance to do that that's why we're here no no not the room to
build them it's a space one site designated for state for parking no well currently it's just
land it's currently just no no no it's more than just land it's a space is there a
it's currently just no no no it's more than just land it's a space is there a roof over it no
and two walls that's not true i'm sorry i'm confused what you're asking me is it a carport
logan i don't believe there's a carport there so so to clarify so we initially designed the
building with a recess on the ground floor that was going to be used as an outdoor terrace area
for the building and then after the the owner took a look at some of the other developments coming to
the block we decided that we could use that space for parking so currently on site like there's no
curb cuts there's no there's no anything related to parking only because we're converting what was
going to be a terrace to accessory parking so we don't have like everything paved we don't have
curb cuts we don't have anything else like that because we wanted to go through and get the legal
spaces first before is the parking space paved current currently no it was going to be it was
going to be a terrace no no that's not that's not what i asked is it paved is the parking space paid
let me let me try it the area where you're looking to put the parking
is that already been paved no there's no concrete there no we didn't we didn't do any kind of we
didn't do any any sort of site work to facilitate parking until that's that's not that's that's not
my question site work is the material there no okay let me do it another way is the sidewalk
slopes for parking to get access to it no not yet no
again we didn't we didn't get any of the building we didn't we didn't get any of the building
approval showing curb cuts showing driveways showing that is parking because we knew your
drawings show that your drawings your site plan shows parking and slope and curb cuts your drawings
show that which is right we we submitted this drawing to get the variance we submitted another
version that got approved by the city that didn't have any parking as part of it so in order to get
just the accessory parking because the building as it was built and designed previously didn't
include parking didn't include curb cuts that doesn't show on the previously approved drawing
so in order to start the variance process and get the legalized parking we took our site plan that
already had we showed the parking on it we showed the curb cut we got the approval from the streets
department we developed this site plan that you see in front of you here this is just this is just
to get three parking spaces added to the previously approved application well let me ask you let me
ask you could you build the building by right without accessory parking yes so why didn't you
we we did so we got it approved without accessory parking we got the building permits they're
already in construction we figured before construction wraps up oh so so the picture
i'm getting is that the owner built it and now you didn't try to get a variance for it
because the builder built it already well it's under construction correct it's it's under
construction with that front area initially intended for an outdoor terrace but what we're
saying is because of all the development coming to the block a better use of that terrace would
be for accessory parking so we didn't just pave it and do the curb cuts and stuff like that and say
legalize the condition we built we're trying to go through and do it correctly by getting the
parking legalized then submitting the amended building permits to actually have the curb cuts
that the streets department will approve and then have the paving in the front to facilitate that as
actual parking spaces versus an outdoor terrace space so why do you want all street parking
accessory parking there why do you want it there you can get the building by right so you want it
there you built it and now you're trying to get it approved legalized no they don't that correct
let me let me step in if i could i think tom they have not they didn't make the curb cuts
the original plan is what they're building without off -street parking they're now coming
back and asking us to amend the original application to allow for three i think it's
three parking spaces three per building yes three per building nothing's been done as
as it relates to curb cuts correct me if i'm wrong you have an amended application
to the original plan that was submitted and approved, correct?
Correct.
so what is the hardship to put accessory park in there where's the hardship that you have
So what is the hardship to put a Sesame Park in there?
Where is the hardship?
have to have accessory parking there so as i'm sure you've heard from a lot of the hearings
parking is a huge issue in the city and rm1 for whatever reason doesn't contemplate parking
access by a front street it makes it so that you can have accessory off -street parking but it has
to be accessed by a shared driveway or rear street or really your alleyway but there's a lot of
properties in philadelphia that are not accessed by anything other than a front street so there's
no way to accommodate parking and when you're about to put up um you know a significant amount
of units and you you don't have any off -street parking it becomes a planning issue down the road
so um it's if we could do it another way if we could do it by a rear street or a private or a
driveway or an alleyway we certainly would um there's no other way to accommodate accessory
off -street parking on this lot besides access by a front street and that's just a convention of the
way the code is written well you don't mention that in your application for appeal no you don't
if you look at your application for appeal it says uh emmanuel institutional baptist church
which is no longer a church it's an apartment building and it doesn't require off -street
parking because it is an existing building you mentioned new salem after church they have a
parking lot that's from krosky street you mentioned martin luther king recreation center they don't
have a parking lot but that's a neighborhood local recreation center there's not a lot of cars coming
that recreation center the people are using it locally and one more thing the sensor tracks
for that area says that the transportation mode for most of the people in that area is over 50
public transit so you're not accommodating for the people in the neighborhood or the
facilities in the neighborhood so why do you need so more so much additional parking
off -site parking that is so it would only be three parking spaces for buildings um it's not
50 parking spaces or 20 parking spaces it's three parking spaces i think the reference to
some of those additional amenities in the neighborhood is that while this block is
currently mostly vacant now as these neighborhoods continue to develop if we don't provide any
parking it will become an issue as we've seen in i don't know hundreds of areas all over the city
so some of it is in consideration for long -term planning and it's only three spaces per building
it's not an additional parking so you don't think that the that area that community will increase
in public transportation and not on -site parking it's already over 50 public transportation
i don't know enough to speak to the trends of public transportation or infrastructure but what
i have seen from doing this for the last eight years is that the need for accessory off -street
parking is something that's continually asked about thought about and complained about in our
city um so while i appreciate that people also take public trans transportation there are still
people who need cars and we're looking to just add three parking spaces per building uh but but
transportation but when you add three parking spaces you've taken each cut of the building
it's taking two cars off off the street but you just said that 50 of people are
are now taking public transportation so if they're so so i i guess then if the net gain of that is
still one one additional car off the street and then if the comment is that you know parking is
not that big of an issue and they're taking public transportation and i'm missing the link there as
well it's either that we want public transportation and that on -tree parking is not a problem or that
on -tree parking is a problem we need accessory off -street parking the community needs more
public transportation better public transportation and not additional well that's a septa issue i
I mean, that's not anything that any developer in this city can solve is public transportation issues.
That's a state -wide issue.
I don't know how we resolve that and how three parking spaces is detrimental to that separate goal.
With and how three parking spaces is detrimental to that separate goal
Keep pull up the site plan
okay thank you you have three parking spaces and 10 units or eight units
so therefore some other tenants is not going to have a parking space is that correct yep
where are they going to park so as you mentioned they'll either park on the street or they'll take
public transportation or they may park or they may double park i'm not going to speculate about
someone double parking i don't know sure theoretically someone could double park but i
don't if the space is there they'll use it i'm sorry this is tanya sunk it uh mr holliman
your volume is extremely loud can you just turn it down a little bit please
I will do. Thank you, Kylie. That's better.
One more turn down. Okay, I will. Thank you very kindly.
Our 22nd Street is a heavily traffic street. It has four lanes. One is a bus,
two is parking and one is driving. And in your application, you say it won't
create a traffic congestion well how are they going to get into debarking space
when they gotta go about let's say five miles per hour and the street is doing 20 miles per hour
that's not going to cause a traffic jam um i'm not a traffic planner so i'm not going to
weigh in on the i don't want to say anything inaccurate so i don't want to make any speculation
about how traffic is going to go without a traffic study but it's free parking spaces it's not
an underground garage or a structured parking garage there's plenty of places in the city of
philadelphia where there's accessory off -street parking in this same manner and there's uh they
seem to be able to navigate it um this isn't like a brand new idea um but i i hear what you're saying
well the thought behind it was just to provide off street parking given the amount of development
on this block going up and the fact that from a regular basis we hear constantly about the need
for parking parking parking parking so maybe this block uh has some ties to public transportation
different than other blocks i do still think there's a need for both off -street parking and
public transportation and like i said the block is mostly vacant now so maybe it's not an issue
at the minute but it won't stay vacant and we do have support from those who actually own
um property on this block most of the opposition that we faced was not related to anybody who
actually lived on this block which is uh so that's the evidence that we we have and and
i do appreciate you know the comments that you've made um just trying to not uh state
anything inaccurately based on my experience
as far as i can tell there's only one house occupied on that block correct so where did
1724 and the other addresses of people occupying comes from it's the owners it's developers and
owners on that block that are have properties under construction or in the permitting phase
so they actually have ownership on the block but they don't live on the block
you just said nobody lives on the block i said there's one house that's occupied on that on the
block right and i don't know if that person is in attendance i know that we have uh the owner and um
another owner on the block that if you wanted to you wanted to get them sworn in they could
certainly tweak to the conditions and the ownership on the block better than i could
but the owners of those properties don't live there but they're developing properties on the
but they're developing properties on the block so they can certainly speak to the units coming up
block so they can certainly speak to the amount of unit to come
they're speaking for their own units building correct i mean that's all they would be able
to speak to is they're they actually own property on that block whether they live in it i don't know
it's just relevant they also own it they're going to be maintaining it and responsible
for leasing them etc or selling them if they're condos let me ask you some other questions
uh do you have approved building permit um i would defer to logan on that i'm not involved
with that side of it yeah so we have we have building permits on all three buildings like
i mentioned before the building permits that we have approved just have that space in the front
as being a terrace for the residents to use again if we were to get the variants for the
accessory parking spaces we would submit amended building permits that show you know the proper
driveways curb cuts along with all the streets department approvals as well but currently at
this point we just have building permits for each building with again that front area being used as
terrace okay so i now i now understand you use two separate sets of plans one to get
billing approval but not the real one you want to put there you come back for a zoning
variance to put the all street parking which is the one you wanted from the beginning that
seemed to be the scenario that you're doing here because you had two sets of plans
well well again we we developed the second set of plans we developed the second set of plans once
once the owner realized the the influx of development in the area and we decided that
we were going to use that terror space instead a better use would be for the accessory parking
so we didn't have two set we didn't have two sets of plans from the beginning we had you know all
intents and purposes to use that front space as a terrace for the building but then once once the
owners saw a lot of the development coming to the area you know we we reworked the plans in such a
way that we could get the accessory parking spaces in the front and with all the respect it's not
uncommon for a developer to submit a set of plans and go through moving it forward given how long
some of these processes take and then make changes to it go through the variance process or add on
to a project it's common or or illegal sometimes you get through a project and you make changes to
it uh you try to go for uh something that allows you to move forward for for financing and for a
whole bunch of other reasons and then can add on to it and our process luckily allows
not wholly uncommon either uh it's probably not an uncommon practice but usually you get
community support for doing it yeah we don't have any control over how the community feels
with any given project i've done projects that i thought were very simple and very straightforward
and people are in opposition to them i've done projects that i thought were going to be more
contentious and there's a ton of support for them you don't know that going into it but when you
hear about the concerns with parking you try to provide parking from the outset there's no way
until you move through the process to understand how anybody's gonna feel i was surprised at the
level of pushback for parking i'm sorry i'm sorry we're getting some background noise someone is
shuffling papers or something like that and mr holliman i need you to turn your volume down a
little bit more I don't know why but it's it's extremely loud on my hand okay
is that better a little bit more if you could I think so yes it works for me
Thank you, Chair.
Tom, do you have any more questions?
No, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
All right, thank you.
We can come back to you.
Rachel?
Yeah, I wanted to...
Please.
I would like to get the owner on,
and then we also have uh one of the property owners joe canones uh as well who would like to
testify and also mr young is available now if you would like
great would you like first yes let's get let's get mr young on
mr young please spell your full name i swear you in
jeffrey young j -e -f -f -e -r -y y -o -u -n -g address is 39
J -E -F -F -E -R -Y, Y -O -U -N -G. Address is 3900 Ford Road, Suite B, Philadelphia, PA, 19131.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Thank you. Rachel?
Yeah, Jeff, if you could just share with the chairman and members of the board, I know you did the RCO meeting for this project, so if you could just kind of discuss that a bit.
And I had mentioned that most of the concerns did not really relate to the parking.
If you could affirm that and share anything else that you have, that would be great.
So I represented the developer before the St. Elizabeth's RCO.
We did have that meeting.
The meeting was well attended for a community meeting in this neighborhood.
And the issues, the main issues that were brought up were with neighboring properties, adjoining properties.
um, regarding, um, uh, ownership of space. Um, there was, uh, some concerns about, um,
the traffic because of the curb cuts where the, uh, where the bus may be. Um, but, you know,
as, as mentioned previously, um, you know, buses tend to, uh, ride, uh, slower in this area,
down 22nd Street because the stops are so frequent.
So just knowing the neighborhood being a resident of this neighborhood,
I do know that the traffic congestion is not much of an issue
on this stretch of 22nd Street between Cecil B. Moore and Montgomery.
So, yeah, I just wanted to add, you know, that there was a community meeting.
Most of the concerns were because of the ongoing property boundary dispute, but there were a couple of concerns about traffic and parking.
Just for some clarity, Mr. Holliman, when there are large events at the Martin Luther King Rec Center, because this is a rec center that's frequently used by the city of Philadelphia, the 76ers, and other organizations, there is a lot of cars that utilize the Orange Street parking for those such events at the MLK Rec Center.
So parking can be an issue on that side of the street.
I guess it would be the east side of 22nd Street when they're having large events, when there are football games there, when there are baseball games there, et cetera, at the rec center.
Mr. Chair, I'm looking for a clarification on Mr. Young's testimony because it appears that he's actually a fact witness testifying to his personal knowledge and not as one of the attorneys.
for the developer so i just wanted to get a clarification um is he a fact witness who is
also paid by the developer to represent him in this in this proceeding or is he an attorney for
the developer who is now testifying to facts that can't be admitted um according to the provisions
of the zoning code so i i can clarify i am an attorney who represented the developer before the
RCO. But I was clarifying Mr. Holloman asked questions regarding to parking at that site that
Rachel could not answer. So I'm answering questions that Mr. Holloman asked. Well, yes, I understand
that, Mr. Chairman, but the zoning code says that lawyers are not allowed to provide testimony
in a zoning proceeding. They have to be, any testimony that a lawyer gives has to be adopted
and approved by an actual fact witness, including the owner.
The owner doesn't have this.
Mr. Masters, this is Sharon Sletta.
I think you were misinterpreting that zoning code provision.
It is that an attorney representing a party cannot testify as to what the party would say.
It is not that no attorney can testify as a fact witness.
he's testifying i believe here on his own behalf not as
it is not testimony if he does not have first -hand knowledge of the information that does not seem
to be the case here yes that's why i asked for the clarification mr chair because yes he clearly
does have first -hand knowledge of what he's talking about and i and i respect and and and
am very fond of Mr. Young. But in this case, he's also paid by the developer. He represents the
developer in this proceeding. So I just want to clarify, is he actually a fact witness who's paid
is he actually a fact witness who's paid by the developer or is he a member of the community who's
by the developer or is he a member?
testifying in support of the project oh i am at this point miss pritzker is representing the
developer is that correct yeah and mr young represented the developer at the rco meeting
that's what i was testifying to i represented the our developer at the rco hearing and and that's it
i i i'm going to object to mr young's testimony to the extent that it's a fact that he's trying
to provide provide facts because he's clearly a biased witness because he's on the payroll of the
developer okay i'm gonna overrule overrule i don't know how to answer that so um at this point
as mentioned by jeff i wasn't at the rco meeting so the purpose of having him on was to have direct
testimony related to the RCO meeting, just in the event that the board had any questions
or there was any conversation about the RCO meeting as I was not in attendance at it. So
that was why Jeff is here. And I appreciate him taking the time to provide that information.
If we could, Chairman, get on the owner, Logan Kramer, and also Joe Canonez, who is a property
owner on the block, for their testimony, that would be greatly appreciated.
let's move forward with that request uh gentlemen please when you get on spell your spell your full
name and i swear you in and while we're waiting for them rachel do we have an rco letter my notes
say awaiting uh rco letters yeah we do we just i um i unfortunately didn't get it until i think
late yesterday um but i don't know all right mr chair we have many letters from the rcos and from
council president clark that's going to be in our rebuttal exhibit binder i was going to ask about
that as well okay so chair we do have available at this time mr logan kramer if you would um
mr kramer unmute yourself and wait to be sworn in sure hi this is logan kramer
l -o -g -a -n -k -r -a -m -e -r you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the
truth absolutely thank you miss pritzk um so logan um you've heard what what we've said today
um i just first want to make sure that you heard everything that was said
you've heard my testimony you deem it to be true and accurate and that you would adopt it as your
own? That's correct. And feel free if there's anything additional you want to add, please do so.
Definitely. So I just wanted to clarify what our thought was in between the original plan here
and then what we adopted our plan to for the variance version. So there was four buildings
that were new construction buildings that I'm building on this block, one of which 1714 North
22nd street um there's a adverse possession dispute in between me and one of the owners on
krosky street um there's been a lot of emotion and things brought from the table from that project
we purposefully withdrew that as we're amending our plans around the rear yard area that's about
10 of that parcel size and a lot of the emotions and whatnot from that were brought into the rco
meeting as well as just throughout this whole case and what we're here to really discuss is
parking not a separate litigation matter which we purposefully withdrew from this case um the
second thing i just wanted to mention is that um none of the opposing neighbors or anyone who showed
up to the rco meeting actually lives on north 22nd street they all live on krosky street and we have
full support from everyone um on uh 22nd street to uh go forward with our plans um that being said
um the only partial party that we could not get in contact with was 1704 which is an out -of -state
landlord that owns that existing structure um the only other existing structure on that block
is the church which we're currently um converting to 18 apartment units um in total we are building
56 units on this block um but across this entire block there's going to be 138 units between
myself and other developers what i'm looking to proactively prevent is a massive parking issue
i would encourage my other developer friends to add parking but unfortunately you know they don't
want to go through variances which i i can understand um but um we're trying to actually
make this better for both the future and existing residents as 22nd street is a street you can park
on both sides of the capacity for that street for parking is 52 parking spaces um with just my 56
um with just my 56 units alone if there was no parking um you know there all those parking
units alone if there was
spaces would be filled up with the additional development of um the additional uh it's about
80 to 90 other units there's going to be a massive parking issue and the cars from 22nd street uh
residents are going to be spilling onto krosky street which is already a very um uh very busy
block in terms of like it's very hard to find a parking spot on lacroski cecil b moore is also a
very busy block as well as the north side block of montgomery it's hard to find parking on so what
i'm trying to do is um provide relief and actually be a good developer here where a lot of developers
take the rm1 zoning code and say oh i don't have to provide parking no problem let's put the parking
problems you know on the community and i'm actually you know in good faith trying to add parking
here um i did not go into this project initially with the intention to put parking into it i went
into this uh and i said hey i want to create green space and i want to create an area to
store trash we're moving our trash storage into the rear yard so we do still have designated trash
storage we originally were going to be putting the trash as well as make like a green space for
uh you know people my residence dogs or whatnot else underneath the um covered area in the front
of the three buildings. Once I saw, which was about six months after I bought up the parcels
from the Emanuel Baptist Church, a bunch of other developers bought other parcels. And with that
addition of the 80 to 90 plus units, that's what influenced my decision to change my plans to go
from covered patios to parking. And that's what I'm here to ask the board of their support for.
thanks logan let me let me ask a question uh when when at the appropriate time i have some
questions for the witness also um you mentioned i think 52 parking spaces on the 100 block the
1700 block of there's yeah that's correct there's space for 52 street parking spaces
so hypothetically if you and the other developers were to get approval for the off street
parking i'm assuming it'd be three for each maybe that's the wrong assumption would there be a net
gain for parking on that block correct how many spots would we actually pick up even though you're
removing on street by adding the you're picking up one parking space for every three is that about
is that correct uh that's correct but what's the math on that roughly probably gain
about, I'm doing quick math here, but you'd probably gain net gain about 10 to 15 parking
spaces.
All right.
Thank you.
Mr. Masters.
Mr. Kramer, you don't own these properties personally.
You own it in a limited partnership.
Is that correct?
That is correct.
And you have a partner in that limited partnership?
that is correct they're limited partners I'm the managing member and general partner I'm the only
active decision making partner in an SEC filing that I looked at recently there's another
individual who's named as a as a principal to relevance what's the relevance of this I'm trying
to find out whether Mr. Kramer actually has the controlling interest in yes he does so I'm going
Mr. Kramer do you have a controlling interest in this project yes I am the managing member and I'm
autonomous decision -maker in this partnership. And what percentage do you own of the partnership?
I'm going to object. What's the purpose of these questions, Mr. Master? I don't mean to be rude,
but. I just want to make sure that it's an opaque
structure. And I just wanted to make sure that there's another gentleman who is listed and who
and who's filed statements at the SEC. And I just want to know whether why he's not here and whether
mr kramer can speak really for the partnership council i guess so he's already said he can speak
for the partnership so i don't think that we need to go into any okay mr kramer um you were saying
that one of your critiques of other developers um in the neighborhood is that they they typically
um when they develop rm1 properties they don't provide for parking is that correct i'm gonna
object to that the comment is that rm1 doesn't require the objection what's the objection
i'm going to finish the way that you're characterizing what he has stated and what
was stated is that rm1 as a function of the zoning code doesn't allow for accessory off -street parking
accessed by a front street it only allows for it if there's a rear alleyway shared driveway or rear
street so in a situation like this where there's no other way to access it but a front street a lot
So in a situation like this, where there's no other way to access it, but a front street,
a lot of developers, rightfully so, or wrongfully so, don't want to go through the variance
of developers.
process.
And so they choose to just put up the units, which is permitted by the code.
I was asking for Mr. Kramer's testimony and not yours.
Well, I'm representing him, so I'm going to answer the question.
On cross -examination, I can ask him about what he stated in direct examination.
And Mr. Kramer, did you not state that many developers, when they develop RM1 properties, don't provide for parking?
It is correct. I will say that most developers do not provide parking for RM1 because RM1 does not have any parking requirements except for a few areas like Temple University and whatnot that there's some neighborhood associations that required it.
But a majority of the city, RM1, does not require parking, which creates a massive hardship for blocks like this that are completely undeveloped, go from being completely undeveloped to massively developed.
There's an onslaught of units, and then there's nowhere for everyone to park.
What I'm trying to do is I've been in 50 -plus variances, 50 -plus neighborhood meetings.
I have a massive amount of experience with this.
And the thing that I'm always getting concerns from neighbors is you're not giving enough parking.
You're not giving enough parking.
You're not giving enough parking.
So other than the neighbors waking up on the wrong side of the bed, I don't understand the logic.
So, Mr. Kramer, when you applied for the zoning permits for these buildings, did you include parking in your plans initially?
That's been established.
Right.
They did not.
um so you're trying to tell the board today that you're a considerate developer who wants to provide
parking but in fact when you actually applied for these buildings and built them i'm going to
design them without parking characterization of and the thought behind the submissions as we've
already gone over this at length sustained okay i have enough further questions thank you steve
rachel do you have anyone else um just joe quinones who is an actual owner on the 1700
block of north 22nd street i believe he had had his hand raised so if he could raise his hand
that would be great
mr quinones please spell your full name and i'll swear you in
my name is joe quinones j -o -e last name q -u -i -n -o -n -e -s you swear if i'm to tell the
truth the whole truth nothing but the truth i do thank you miss pritzker uh joe could you just
share with uh the chairman and members of the board what properties you own on this block and
um i assume uh you're here to provide testimony in support of the variances so i'm happy to hear
your testimony? Sure. I own the vacant lots 1704 through 12, and also 1711 North Krosky Street,
which is in the rear of the aforementioned properties whose addresses are on 22nd Street.
And before you share additional testimony, do you have plans to develop those properties
in the near future as well?
And would those buildings have parking?
Unfortunately not.
And is that a function of the RM1 designation
and the need for a variance, I would assume?
That factored into it.
It would also factored into it
was limited financial resources
as an emerging African -American developer
who doesn't have the same access to capital as, you know, better funded majority developers.
A lot of factors played into the calculus and the present building permit we have.
Understood. Thank you. And so if you could just state, you know, if you're in support
of this matter and why, that would be greatly appreciated.
Sure. I'm in support of, I have a instinctive support to any development that adds parking spaces rather than takes them away for obvious reasons.
Even as a resident in North Philadelphia, I actually also live in North Philadelphia, I don't just do development there, when there are developers coming into my block that I live in, and I tend to be more supportive and favorable of their development, which I vote on as a resident, when I know that their presence is a net plus to parking as opposed to a net.
their presence is a net plus to parking
as opposed to a net negative.
Thank you, Joe, I appreciate that.
Chairman, if the board has any questions for Joe, happy to.
I have some questions too.
Question from the board?
Not at this time, Mr. Chairman,
but I reserve some time when we get through the questioning.
Mr. Ministers.
Sure, Mr. Quinones, we know each other, is that correct?
Yes, we do.
Actually, it was a pleasure to see both you and Tom on the call.
A surprise, but absolutely a pleasure.
Just a clarification.
When you say you support adding parking spaces,
you recognize that with these curb cuts,
there will be two parking spaces that will be removed from the street
for every curb cut that's that's um that would be awarded by the zoning board is that correct
i was not aware of the exact math involved but it seems like these still a net parking plus
please help me out if i'm wrong you're correct
it would be taking an additional car but the question well rachel i appreciate that you're
not actually being the one asked the questions at this point. So I would appreciate if just
Mr. Quinonez would testify. So just to reiterate though, there are parking spaces being
eliminated on the street for all the parking spaces that are being created off street.
i think mr mr time please thank you thank you mr masters i think that your question i could be
wrong was answered when i asked the question of mr kramer about the 52 parking spaces on 22nd
street there actually would be a net gain of he according to his testimony somewhere between 10
and 15 well his testimony was one one spot but you're picking up three well mr holliman explained
that that two spots will be removed for every curb cut not one um because because the way the curb
cuts work um you have to have enough space on each side of them if it's even if it's two you're
removing two but you're adding you're putting three off street which is a net gain of one
if you're removing two off street and providing three if you're removing two on street and
providing three on off street that's a net gain of one correct every two that you take off the
street correct yes but those people there's only there's only three people well there's only there's
a limited people who can park off street who who belong there as opposed to the on street parking
is available in a more equitable way to everyone in the neighborhood so yes yes and no i think it
it could play works both ways all right and we also heard that from mr hall i have no further
questions but rachel i don't think you need to testify at this point because i have no further
questions i'm sorry i'm sorry please cheer this is tanya i will thank you very kindly
i'm just going to add in um as the applicant representing the owner so i'm permitted to speak
Mr. Masters, that additionally, Mr. Holloman shared with us that there's about 50 % of people
use public transportation. So while I appreciate your argument or your speculation around parking,
there was testimony also given that public transportation is heavily utilized. So in
addition to the net gain that's going to be provided also those people will still be able
to utilize public transportation which is not affected by this application that was the
additional point i'd like to make thank you thank you and anyone else um rachel do you have any
other witnesses no chairman okay any other questions from the board at this time we're
that now go to the public uh yes mr yes mr chairman now i do feel ganged up one with joe uh present
i do understand the changes of uh drawings but accessory parking on 22nd street
it's not a good urban design, nor is it safe.
But for the benefit of architecture and city planning, for the 1700 block of North 22nd
Street. I would like to suggest, should I do it now, Mr. Chairman, provisos?
Should I do it now, Mr. Chairman, provisos, or should I?
You can do that because that may later rest some of the concerns of the public who may want to speak now.
Okay. I'd like to request four provisos. The first one, the new concrete sidewalk is removed on all three properties, and a new concrete sidewalk is poured with a five -and -a -half -inch curve.
second four trees approved by the city planning commission are planted near the sidewalk curve
between each property line on all properties third five bike racks installed at the already
built on -site parking spaces on all three properties and number four complete landscaping
recommended by the Philadelphia Planning Commission on the on -site parking spaces for all three
properties. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Tom. Excuse me, this is sharing. I was going to ask
are any of those provisos not enforceable? Chair, I would ask that if at the end of this that you
hold the vote for discussion in executive session okay very good thank you okay all right now we'll
ask is there anyone who would like to testify in this case if so please raise your hand mr chair
i have five witnesses that i've identified and submitted to to the board in advance and we have
an exhibit binder we'd like to go through you have their names i do well why don't we call them up
based on your list and if you could just clarify and have the witnesses state their address
because like previous mentioned i'm pretty sure that none of them actually okay we'll do that
and we'll ask mr masters if you can advise your witnesses to give us something new and different
rather than repeat over and over maybe well i also for sure mr chairman but i also want to do
an opening as well um so my first witness is going to be kayla frank jenkins who's my client
she's the owner of 1741 north crossby a member of rco saint elizabeth and a committee person in the
32nd ward we will next call priscilla bennett who's the leader of rco saint elizabeth uh then
let's call them up one at a time rather than just call number one let's get um yeah so kayla um
franks jenkins can you raise your hand to be recognized
you can unmute yourself okay good morning good morning ms jenkins please spell your full name
a -a -l -a last name is hyphenated it's f -r -a -n -k -s dash j -e -n -k -i -n -s and your address
1741 North Croskey Street do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the
truth yes and I will also like to state that Ms. Mary cannot be here right now she has class
you have to testify on your behalf ma 'am okay Mr. Masters sure um let me just um just to give
you a little brief opening Mr. Chair and members of the board um the applicant here cannot legally
established hardship and and this is why as the record indicates they applied as of right for
building these four multi -family dwellings without any front -loading parking spaces and they were
awarded both a zoning permit and a building permit to build those and they have in fact
constructed those buildings this is now they are now not able to come to you and say that they have
any kind of legally recognized hardship. I'm going to object.
There's no objection to an opening. I'm sorry. I don't believe, Mr. Minister, I don't believe
they're claiming a hardship. They have to claim a hardship. They're asking for variances.
Well, let's go. This goes back to something that this board and I guess previous boards have always
been accused of. There aren't too many cases in this city of Philadelphia
that anyone can really establish a hardship. Do you agree on that?
Well, Mr. Chair. Let me ask you this way, and I don't want to get into a debate with you,
I'll end with this. An applicant comes before this board and they want to create a daycare
center in their home. The board may grant it based on community input and the district
council person's recommendation. Is there any hardship? Is there a hardship for that
person who wants to apply to create a daycare center within their home?
well you're asking me a hypothetical that has nothing to do with this case no no it's a reality
because i'm going to be in front of you soon on a daycare center um myself so um mister i understand
that yeah and i it's a legitimate question is there a hardship there can be depending on how the
is there a hardship there can be depending on how the configuration of the property is if
if the property was built out to be a daycare center sorry i need one at a time thank you
i'm sorry it's a single family home that someone wants to establish a daycare facility within
is there a hardship the answer is no you don't have to answer but it is
and i'm only saying that because i want to put that on the record i'm a little bit excited right
now and i apologize that this board gets accused of approving variances because and we're approving
variances where the applicant does not demonstrate a hardship there aren't too many there are a
handful of cases in the city of philadelphia that this board handles here's that would probably
qualify for a hardship so let's let's move well tomorrow tomorrow i'm going to be in front of you
mr chair with a hardship um yeah i'm sure it is a heart you'll figure a way of saying it's no no
it's it's a waterized place in a little shed and it can't be used for a house so it's definitely
a hardship well maybe i said there a handful let's go forward okay please continue mr masters you
cannot mute yourself and i'm sorry anyone who isn't speaking for the accuracy of the record
could you please mute yourself thank you yes um so so members of the board we we view this
as a bait and switch as as Mr. Holloman has called out previously in this hearing the applicant
applied for an as -of -right permit for these for these apartment buildings and now they're coming
in front of you and saying like well now we decided it would be a good idea to have some
parking and as you're going to hear from the testimony of of our witnesses um and and as as
we agree with Mr. Holloman that the the reason the zoning code says do not put front -loaded
driveways and curb cuts onto a street like north 22nd is because of the traffic dangers and the
and the negative impact that it has on the inaccuracy of what you're saying the code does
not say that the reason for that is based on traffic i didn't say the code but you're this
is argument and i and you can't object to my argument i'm talking about a proof of of
offer proof of my witnesses so i didn't i didn't interrupt you rachel and i would really appreciate
that you would show me the same courtesy let's let mr masters complete his uh opening statement
please thank you we have a letter of opposition uh in exhibit one from council president clark
um he writes that um he opposes the granting of the variances um he's in receipt of the letter
from the saint elizabeth's rco that we'll look at shortly um there's overwhelming community
opposition to the creation of these four curb cuts the proposed driveways will disrupt the
pedestrian right of way jeopardize the safety of neighborhood residents making their way to the
nearby rec center health center there's a senior center and septa bus stops these additional
driveways will also create unnecessary traffic congestion along 22nd street and there is no
hardship in exhibit two we have the rco letter from saint elizabeth and that states opposition
to the zoning applications. 22nd Street is the home to residents, the MLK Rec Center,
SEPTUS 33 bus. In the 250 -yard radius, there's countless residents. Bentley Hall,
which is a very large senior housing facility from PHA, all of that is in the radius of those
institutions. The impact of these front -facing driveways will negatively affect traffic and
pedestrian walkways interrupt the sidewalk making it less safe for pedestrians including many seniors
to walk to Cecil B. Moore Avenue and to catch those buses and pedestrians going to the rec
center and the wellness center. Finally we have a letter from the 47th ward expressing opposition
to this application for variances, and it uses much of the same rationale that you saw in the
St. Elizabeth RCO. So, Ms. Franks Jenkins, I wanted to ask you if you took around a petition
around this. And is this the petition that I'm starting to show that you took around?
Yes. And are we going to be seeing 99 signatures on this of your neighbors who are opposed to this?
Okay. So walk us through this petition and tell us where you went and what kind of reception
you got when you talked to the folks about this project. So I went, I was basing it off of the
250 yard radius. So I started on the 1700 block of 22nd Street.
I also went to Bentley Hall. I also went to the Martin Luther King's
I also went to Bentley Hall. I also went to the Martin Luther King's Recreation Center.
I went to every owner. I went to every renter that I could find. I picked up more people along
the way. Some people work. A lot of the older people I had to get in when I could, when I
could catch them coming into Bentley Hall because a lot of the issue at that time was COVID. So I
more or less went on Mondays and Fridays and whenever I could to get all of the signatures
that I could get. I also worked with Ms. Denise, who I believe is the residential president of
Bentley Hall. So she also helped me get the petitions. I also went outside of that radius
of 250 yards because we in the community feel as though just because the 250 yards is a thing for
the RCO, we're represented by everybody that comes through that area. So I also got people
from the 1800 blocks of 22nd street. And some of those people are from New York. And the
overwhelming concern was not parking, but the safety. And we also have exhibits where
the safety issue is now more of a concern more than ever, especially from our older people.
All right. Now, you also took some photographs of this project and the surrounding areas. Is
that correct? Yes. Okay. So in this exhibit, we are looking at the intersection, I believe,
of Cecil B. Moore and 22nd Street, North 22nd Street. Yes. So on the right side of the street,
that's the Martin Luther King Recreation Center. And on the left, you can't really see it, but
that's the church. And there's also a white building. And I also have a petition signed
from the people that live in that building also. Okay. All right. What do we see? And it's also
the stop where the 33 is i apologize all right what are we seeing in this next photo so where
that lady is standing that's where the 33 bus stop is there's a community garden across the street
and then you can't really see it because of the car there's also another community garden
and where are the where are the projects that uh the the properties that are at issue today
are they right yes and then the community guard and they sell fruits and vegetables i'm not gonna
to lie, I cannot remember their schedule, but they definitely sell fruits and vegetables.
Okay. What are we looking at in this photo? So to your left is Martin Luther King Recreation
Center, and to your right is the Stephen Klein Wellness Center. So they do dental services,
wellness center, and I think they have a gym, and I think there's doctors in there also.
How far are these two institutions from the properties that we're at the hearing about today?
So Martin Luther King is in the 250 -yard radius, but the Kline Center is not. The 250 -yard radius stops at the Martin Luther King Center, but somewhere in the middle of the street, it stops.
Okay. And what are we looking at in this photo?
So the one building that you see that's white, that's the only owner -occupied building.
On North 22nd Street?
Yes, it's at the corner 22nd. The seats will be more.
And then you can see where the 33 is.
And the other thing that I forgot to mention is on the one picture where the big community garden was, that's also where the three bus runs right there.
So on the opposite side of the street where the lady is standing, that's where the three bus also runs.
And then right there on that side of the street, I'm sorry, where that car was, that's where the opposite, where it goes towards Fairmount.
Okay, so there's a lot of buses that are right at that intersection.
Right. It's three major buses. Okay. I mean, I'm sorry, two major buses, the three and the 33.
And that's the 33 in this photo? Yes. And that runs every 15 minutes unless things change because
of COVID. All right. Now in these photos, this is going to be the trajectory of the construction
of the apartment buildings? Yes. So that was before a ground was broken. That shows where
the original curve was I should say sidewalk and curve January 2021 original sidewalk no construction
yes okay and this is June 2021 yes
and here we see um what what is this concrete pad that we're looking at here in this photo
so everybody in the community wasn't aware of the previous design but we took it as though it was a
driveway we weren't 100 sure until the above picture came into play that it still looks like
The above picture came into play that it still looks like a driveway to us.
driveway to us
So you're saying that while they were constructing these buildings, they were also altering the sidewalk?
Yeah, so it's other pictures where you can see where the sidewalk was dug up.
There is one sidewalk that's still completely not done.
This picture was just to show you where, was it 1720 sidewalk used to look like?
okay and there's more pictures where that has been dug up and it's been like that for weeks
and that is the picture of what it looks like now and it actually looks worse because i think i took
pictures yesterday where you can actually see where the water puddles is and that's where they
were redoing the sidewalk so in some spots it's sloped it's almost like the sidewalk when they
poured it they met it where the original i want to say cobble brick from olden days are so if
it's like let's say it's like a two foot uh marble brick if at one spot it's like a half an inch high
that's where they met it but if at the other end is two inches high that's where they also met that
part at and i have close -up pictures where you can see where the sidewalk basically met wherever
the curb was all right and it's with the residency and this is one of the new constructed um apartment
yes okay yes and this is where the parking is going to be in here where this car is yes
so they're already parking there um that's the way it looks i do i will admit that i saw
speculation and okay i was i wasn't even i wasn't even i literally said that they are
transporting materials i apologize i wasn't trying to speculate i was going to say that
i do see them bringing in materials as you can see there are times when there are cars there
but not utility vehicles so i can't say for sure it could be the workers people who are
uh and i agree and i agree i agree but that's what i'm just telling you right from what i'm hearing
this is what i'm seeing um but kayla this is where the three parking spaces would be where
where my cursor is moving right here right yes part of the plans on that not this picture that
was taken and what are we looking at in this photo that's the utility vehicle where you can
see that they're um i guess put in vinyl signing on the inside and there looks like a slope down
from from the the parking area to the curb is that correct can i ask what the relevance of
this is based on these photos i appreciate that uh miss franks jenkins took these photos and i
appreciate her testimony i'm just a little bit confused from council with what the point of this
These are clearly showing buildings in construction, and you're speculating based on an unfinished
product where certain things are.
We're showing construction of the actual parking spaces and the driveways before you actually
have the variance to award them.
That's inaccurate.
Those are foundations and announcements.
They are what they are, and you can argue that they're something different, but we're
showing you the actual photos of what's been happening at this property, at these four
properties.
is mr masters you're not a construction expert you're not the lni examiner you certainly did
not have access to the building permits and plans so if you want to discuss what's actually going
on in the site i would relate to the photos and also we have the owner and builder on the call
who's letting me know that this is actually foundation and patio work
and not uh parking spaces as previously mentioned excuse me excuse me council you're not correct
THE COUNCIL IS NOT CORRECT.
I'M AN ISON ARCHITECT.
I CAN TELL WHAT THINGS ARE.
I WASN'T RELATING TO YOU, MR. HOLLIMAN.
I WAS SPEAKING TO MR. MASTERS.
MR. HOLLIMAN, WE WOULD APPRECIATE YOUR GUIDANCE
ON WHAT YOU'RE SEEING AS WELL.
SO IN THOSE PICTURES THAT YOU'RE SCROLLING PAST,
THE BEAM THAT YOU SEE IS KIND OF,
SO WHEN I TOOK THOSE PICTURES,
YOU CAN SEE WHERE, LIKE, IT'S PEOPLE THERE,
PEOPLE NOT THERE.
that's where the level
I guess they tried to level it and I'm
going to say this based on the fact that I'm not
a construction person
so I took this so you can
try to get like an idea where
I don't know if you can tell but it's kind of like
the beam is on the
angle but not
leveled
it does appear as though the
sidewalk that where that
new pouring is going on is somewhat
sloped yes on this photograph
And these last photos, Kayla, these are showing the condition of the sidewalk now.
And these last photos, Kayla, these are showing the
Is that correct?
So if you look there, you can see where it was newly poured and where the new pouring kind of met wherever the height of the old cobbled brick was.
And can you still see the curb at all?
So the curb, I guess, wasn't there. And I'm not honestly sure if what I'm seeing is curb because it might be covering the top of the curb. But I do have more pictures from an angle so you can see what I mean. So that picture, you can see where it's sloped and that the actual curb is kind of higher than that portion on the right.
well the street looks the street looks like it's sloping as well if you look up
right where there's a grade on that street that runs from where those white trucks are
yeah to a minimum curve down to the uh the bottom end of this photograph which shows a
higher a higher curve and i think it has to do with the the the angle of the street
and it looks like the new curb sidewalk looks like it butts up with the
sidewalk of the adjacent property at the lower end of this photograph
what are we seeing here uh kayla so that's basically if you look it's almost like a
non -existent curb because the brick is like in the ground and i tried to do literally i put my
hands on the ground so you all can see it um there is another picture at some point where
the curb is actually underneath the street and that's further up the block but you can see where
it's not across the board even so a lot of the older residents are concerned especially when
it rains or if it's snowing that the sidewalk is already slow so even if you shovel it that's like
trip and fall hazard to them and that's where their concern is and then here's a portion where
the curb is actually higher than the other pictures that i had shown you but it's not
You know, it's old brick from olden days.
And that's the opposite side from what you just saw.
So I could show you all from different angles.
it appears and correct me if i'm wrong as though the newly poured sidewalk is at the same height
that the exit of the existing curb yes well this is a there's no curb cut there's no there's no
curb cut no there is no curb cut but the sidewalk is sloped to me whatever well that's but that's
that's the nature of the street it's not wasn't caused by this construction is my point
there is no the the applicant who's here today asking basically to have all street parking which
would require a curb cut there is no curb cut currently it matches the existing curb all the
way down the sidewalk well i think i think i think your testimony kayla was that in some places the
curb is missing right so if you look at what is there 1720 what relevance does that have with this
application exactly this is sharing that's a city issue can we please move on from this this is not
i don't get any of it i appreciate your work mr thanks so there is no curb cut nobody's saying
that it's a curb cut we did not understand why the sidewalk that wasn't broken up why it was
re -poured and sloped down so it's like on the incline i think they did it to match this right
here which in any case has no offense to the issues it appears that the sidewalk the new pour
was sloped so it matches the height of the curve
which is actually the right thing to do but having said that mr masters yes i'm moving on to the
we've been on this case it's for an hour and a half so far i know certain people criticize us
because they say we don't let people speak but we do we're going to have to do a resumption hearing
there's no way we're going to get past this if you have four more and i don't know how many
And I don't know how many other people are out there that want to speak.
other people are out there that want to speak.
So you're going to wrap up this witness, and we're going to resume this hearing.
Excuse me, Mr. Chairman.
Yes, sir.
Can we take a look at the site plan?
i'd like to ask the architect do you have a curb section on the site plan
is logan dry still a panelist yeah can you guys hear me yes do you hear mr halliman's question
yes so you usually what happens is when we submit for the building plan for the streets department
we've got their typical driveway apron section it's drawn in plan here but we don't have the
section on the zoning plan uh because again it's just at a zoning level but for you know the
building level there would be the construction detailed section that the streets department
would approve the street department requires a section for curb correct
so where's the curved section well it wouldn't show up in the zoning plan we would have that
on our building plan that we submit for a zoning prerequisite they're just looking at it in terms
of the size and location and plan but then when we submit for the building permit updates that
would have the the section on it and the streets would be reviewing that building submission for
the actual constructability in the field uh do you have uh i'm not clear on what you said but yes
you should it should have
sex or city street department
tom you're breaking up
Tom yes we lost you there the there's no curb section so there's no intent to put a curve there
I'm not talking about I'm not talking about curve cuts I'm talking about curve all right
and so again to clarify this this would be a two -step submission to the streets department
we have the zoning prerequisite which again only requires the location of that to be shown with
the the flares if you want to zoom in rachel and then assuming that the zoning gets approved we
would make another building submission to the streets department they would review that would
include the site plan as well as construction details like their typical apron section and
things like that as it relates to the reconstruction of curb and non curb cut areas and the construction
of the what's called the apron at the actual cut location so you'd have two different sections
showing curb heights and, you know, streets approved construction details as part of a
building submission to the streets. Let me ask you another question. On the original plans,
did you have a curb cut section on the original plans, the plans before these?
Yeah, so the original plans, we didn't have any sort of curb cut section and we didn't have any
sort of curb cut shown only because we didn't have an application for legal parking spaces as
part of that because again the original intent was that that front area was going to be a covered
patio um so the original approved construction documents that are as uh l and i record you know
both the zoning and the building plans um they you know they aren't referencing or locating any sort
of curb cuts or driveways or anything else like that because at the time we were using that front
areas patio do you have drawings for the landscaping that you have on the original plan
uh the original plan uh doesn't have any sort of landscaping shown um but you said it was going to
be the garden area so that the area the area underneath is a paved patio that was covered by
part of the building and then the front you know they were going to either do grass or plants but
So we didn't have any sort of landscape plan done that was submitted, no.
Okay, I understand.
And the one thing I would add, and again, this is just based on construction experience.
A lot of times looking at those photos with your sidewalks, a lot of times there's a limitation on how long the sidewalk can be closed or impassable to pedestrians while construction's happening.
So sometimes what will actually happen is they'll have what's called more or less a rough coach of the sidewalk put down so that they can basically reopen the sidewalk, continue construction since the utilities have already been installed.
And then a lot of times they'll come back and install the actual new curbing and sidewalk.
And then a lot of times they'll come back and install the actual new curbing and sidewalk is kind of one of the last things that you do kind of as you work your way out from the back of the site towards the curb line of the street.
So, again, I can't speak to the conditions out in the field, but generally I've seen, you know, kind of where you have those transitions to existing granite curbs that you see and the slopes in the sidewalk.
And a lot of times that's just done as a temporary measure so that the sidewalk can get reopened so that pedestrians can pass while construction is still going on.
Otherwise, you'd have, you know, a good chunk of that sidewalk on multiple properties close, you know, until basically people are ready to move in, which, you know, the city usually doesn't allow that.
One last question, Mr. Dreyer.
Are you a licensed architect in the state of Pennsylvania?
Thank you.
Again, for the benefit of everyone out there who's waiting, has been waiting to testify, we apologize.
We know we signed up for this job, and it's going to take some time to hear these cases, but we're running up against the clock.
We have numerous cases to be heard, and we have to finish up this session somewhere around 1230 in order to provide a lunch break for the employees.
So having said that, we will have a, let me do this, MI 2021 -0002424, excuse me, start again.
MI 2021 -000242 -1720 North 22nd Street. MI 2021 -000784 -1744 North 22nd Street.
and MI 2021 -000242 -1750 North 22nd Street.
This hearing will be resumed on, Tanya or some,
Lakeisha, is someone going to have a date for us?
Yes, Chair, November the 10th at 9 .30.
November the 10th at 9 .30 a .m.
And we appreciate, Ms. Jenkins,
your uh the time you spent on this case to to demonstrate to the board what is going on out
there uh and again we will hear everybody back here on november the 10th at 9 30 a .m thank you
very much may we be excuse yes you may thank you all right case number one mi 2021 that's zero zero
302 -399 -1241 -North 28th Street.
Mr. Anastasio?
Mr. Anastasio?
Good morning, Mr. Chairman.
Good morning, sir. Please identify yourself, spell your name, and I'll swear you in.
Sure. It's Vern Anastasio, A -N -A, S -T -A -S -I -O, 1315 Walnut, Suite 1006, Philadelphia, 19107.
You swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
And according to my notes, the RCO has agreed to a resumption hearing that would be limited to reading their letter into the record. Is that accurate?
That is accurate.
We'll move forward. We'll hear your testimony and we'll resume the hearing to a later date for the reading of the record and the record of the RCO.
Thank you, sir. May I proceed?
Please proceed.
Mr. Nesk, do you agree to wait the reading of its refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
And have you emailed an exhibit packet with the required documents, proof of ownership, proof of tax compliance, copy of the refusal or referral photos and plans five days prior to this hearing?
I have.
And have you met? Oh, okay. Please proceed.
Thank you. This is the subject property in question.
For as long as the archives goes back, it's always been three separate units, two apartments above the first floor.
And the first floor has traditionally been commercial. It was an oyster house.
It was a fresh fish store for a while. It was a candy shop back in the 70s.
But for the last 30 -plus years, it's been vacant, like just about every other corner on that block.
It's been either converted or just empty.
It's not really a commercially viable block anymore.
It's primarily residential, some of it new construction, some of it older construction.
But what we're proposing is a three -family dwelling.
with instead of the commercial space, have an apartment on the first floor with the remaining
uh have a an apartment on the first floor with the remaining uh two apartments above
there's already separate utilities of course three waters and three gases three electrics and a common
area and let me show you the plans one moment okay so here's uh the basements just utilities
and mechanicals we've got the first floor here which would be a nice size two -bedroom apartment
with a nice large open living space in the front entering from the corner we got
two bathrooms as well there is a back alley here that is on my client's property deed completely
and exclusively and that could be used for trash storage for all three units and here's the second
unit on the second floor and the existing space on the third floor as another unit
the unit a comes in at 604 square feet unit b at 501 unit c is at 466 i'll pull out here
and we'll show you some interiors and that's about all i have to show you
again we anticipate here's our
flyer that was mailed out. We'll be meeting with the RCO on the 23rd and we mailed out to 166
individual households. Does the property itself have a unique condition that makes compliance
impracticable? Yes. As I showed you, this is a commercial first floor that hasn't been actively
viable for over 30 odd years. All the other corners that were once little mom and pop shops
have been either converted or vacant and any and all new development on that block, as
you can see, 100 % residential so that this would be more in line with the future of the
block and less in line with past uses from generations ago. And with that, I'm going
to have my client Mr. Akay raise his hand. Mr. Akay is allowed to speak he can just unmute himself.
Good morning. Good morning Mr. Akay.
Good morning sir please spell your full name for the record.
rami ak r -a -m -i last name a -k -k -e -h you swear for him to tell the truth the whole truth nothing
but the truth yes thank you mr on the stop thank you mr chairman mr ak did you hear my presentation
to the board this morning yes was it true and accurate to the best of your knowledge
yes and would you adopt it as your own testimony yes i have nothing further mr chairman
thank you questions from the board questions from the board no mr chairman no anyone else
like to testify in this case if so please raise your hand
chair we have mary jones mary jones you can i meet yourself morning ms jones please identify
yourself for the record and i'll swear you in good morning mary jones from council president
daryl clark's office uh room 494 city hall you swear if i'm to tell the truth the whole truth
nothing but the truth i do thank you please proceed i just have a question i stepped away
for a moment is this vote going to be held for the rco yes okay thank you thank you anyone else
to testify in this case no more hands chair thank you planning commission good morning mr chairman
David Fecteau, F -E -C -T -E -A -U with the City Planning Commission. Where from to tell the
truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth? Yes, sir, I do. Thank you. Please proceed. Thank
you, sir. Mr. Chairman, members of the board, the comprehensive plan recommends this property for
commercial misuse. The existing configuration of the building with two residential units and a
single commercial unit is a legal pre -zoning code use. Converting the ground floor unit to a
residential unit would not conflict with the spirit and purpose of the zoning code or the
comprehensive plan, the City Planning Commission recommends that the board grant the requested
variance. Thank you very much. MI 2021 -00239.
Thank you very much. MI 2021 -002 -399 -1241 North 28th Street. This hearing will be resumed on. I need a date and time.
As you wish, Chair. It's only going to be a reading of a letter, right?
That's correct.
That's correct.
Whatever date worked for you all.
i believe the rco meeting is september 23rd so perhaps two weeks from now to give them a chance
to that would be tomorrow's today's not the 20 what's today today's the 20th 21st today
first tomorrow's the 22nd so it'll be uh uh it'll be it'll be october hold on how about october
six over six yep october six thank you so this this hearing will be resumed on october the 6th
at 9 30 am at which time the board will consider any feedback related to the rco's position
thank you chair the rco has agreed that it will be limited to reading their letter into the record
still noted thank you thank you number two on our list mi 2020 -010184 1631 south 52nd street
mr mulvihill is the applicant's attorney mr fineman and mr horvitz are representative
protesters pidc and commerce department oppose we're awaiting an rco letter councilwoman gautier
has sent a letter or i think she made known to the our our council miss saletta that there's
she's not opposed but we'll get to that shortly excuse me this is sharon uh mr reuter will also
be participating if he could be promoted please yes and leo is now here as a panelist
mr reuter is already under oath from earlier this morning
okay uh mr mulvihill please proceed identify yourself and we'll swear you in yes good morning
members of the board leo mulvihill m as in michael u l v as in victor i h i l l address 315 green
street first floor philadelphia 19123 where we're from to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing
but the truth yes i do mr plaza has questions for you i'm sorry chair this is tanya sunkett
If I could respectfully request all attorneys involved with their case, raise your hand
so we can promote you now.
Thank you.
And Mr. Joshua is coming in now as a panelist also.
Okay, Mr. Mulvihill, please proceed.
I believe Mr. Plaza had questions for me.
chair you're you're muted at this point i'm sorry what was that i believe mr plaza had questions
for me yes he does thank you confessor you're muted can you hear me now yes yes do you agree
to wait the reading of its refusal and stipulate to its accuracy we do and have you uh emailed an
exhibit packet with the required documents proof of ownership proof of tax compliance copy of the
refusal or referral photos and plans five days prior to this here yes thank you and have you
met with the rco and have a letter yes we actually have three letters of support from three different
rcos in the area thank you please thank you so good morning members of the board this is leo
Mulvihill on behalf of West Philly Development 1 LLC for a property at 1631 South 52nd Street.
This is an application for the erection of two new mixed -use parcels on a lot that's approximately
45 ,000, 46 ,000 square feet. The area is mixed ICMX and I2. It's currently being used as a
surface parking and repair lot for what appear to be cabs and other vehicles,
And the applicant, in this instance, seeks to erect the new residential mixed -use building in an area that's transitory between existing industrial uses, which are directly behind this parcel, and existing single -family residential uses directly across 52nd Street and along Paschal Avenue.
I'll note as well, this is located right off of Woodland Avenue, which is a major transit line here in the city.
For purposes of today's record, I have my zoning packet. I'll note at the outset that unfortunately my numbering is off only because one, first page got put on the cover sheet, and second, there are some additions that came in after my zoning packet was submitted.
And second, there are some additions that came in after my zoning packet was submitted, specifically my client's commercial activity license, and the RCO letters, the last of which I received only late last night from Earth Keepers Incorporated.
I believe it was somewhere around 11 o 'clock, but I have included them in this packet.
And I will be referring to the orange numbers on the bottom of the pages for purposes of the record.
So members of the board, we are proposing a community new structure of approximately, pardon me, of 104 residential units, which is going to be a mix of studio, one bedroom, two bedroom units.
off -street parking is going to be provided. We added actually via feedback from CDR a loading
zone in which we obtained an amended refusal before and I have that in this application packet
as well. So members of the board I'm going to refer to what is on the screen now page 12 of my
zoning packet which is that amended refusal we received. It is again for the erection of two
detached buildings building a and building b and we'll get into the reason for three for two
buildings rather than one in a moment um we've taken commercial space to include 46 accessory
parking spaces three electoral parking spaces two auto share parking spaces one all street
loading space and 35 class 1a accessory bicycle parking spaces as shown on our plans we received
refusals pardon me members of the board for the use this is an industrially zoned parcel
split zone i2 and icmx we are proposing multi -family household living which is expressly
prohibited we received a minor rear yard depth refusal for building b and that's a de minimis
request it has to do with the rear section of the building and building height for building a
we're proposing to go slightly over at 64 .66 feet, and that is only the result of the pilot
house access structure being located along 52nd Street, which we'll get into as well when we get
into the plans. Just to orient the members of the board, here is page 13. You'll see indicated in
blue. That is our subject parcel split zone, I2 ICMX. 52nd Street runs parallel to us. What I'm
indicating here is Paschal Avenue. So this is located at the intersection of 57 and Paschal.
Along Woodland Avenue is mostly commercial use, including the Popeyes. And then otherwise in the
area, there is RSA 5 single family dwelling structures. So as I stated in the opening,
this is sort of a transitory use between the existing industrial and the existing single
family structures. At page 14, you can see the existing overhead shop from Philadelphia Atlas.
And as I stated earlier, this is essentially being used now for purposes of off -street car
storage, mostly cabs and other vehicles where some repair is occurring as well.
This is my client's agreement of sale at page 15.
We also have an amendment to extend the time due to the time that it takes to complete the CDR and zoning processes.
That's at page 33.
Unnumbered page here is my client's commercial activity license for Westfield Development 1 LLC.
at page 36 indicated at the bottom is my client's tax clearance certificate at page 37
a letter dated june 3rd from civic design review indicating that we had concluded with cdr effective
june 1 2021. are we held two community meetings for this project this is the notification that
sent out for the second community meeting which we held last week we held the second community
meeting after cdr so we'd be able to incorporate any changes from cdr into that meeting that meeting
was held over zoom on the 20 pardon me on the 14th of september in that we included a copy of
the amended refusal and here is the certificate of mailing showing that we sent out 58 mail pieces
to the list of properties that was provided to us by the city.
What I have here, members of the board,
is a letter of support from Southwest Philadelphia District Services.
This indicates that we initially held a meeting on March 31st,
and there were some questions regarding
how many units are being reserved for affordable housing.
how many units are being reserved for affordable housing.
Pardon the interruption, Mr. Mulder. Could you make that a little bit larger?
Yes. Thank you. That's good. Thank you.
Certainly. How many units are reserved for affordable housing? Is the event space we
proposed, which we'll get into in a minute, going to be open to the community and will
be an economic opportunity plan? As a result, during our second community meeting, we stated
the following to the members of the community, including that retail and event space is going
to be available for reservation by the community, including RCOs. We have an economic opportunity
plan, which includes pre -apprenticeship program and minority participation. In addition, there's
going to be qualified community personnel employed at the development to the best of the developer's
abilities. The project's going to assist with the improvement of neighborhood block during
development, including sidewalks and other amenities. And my client's going to offer 15 %
of the units at affordable below market rates. That's signed by Michael Ross.
I have as well, members of the board, a letter of support from King's Essing Area Civic Association
dated September 20, 2021. This indicates that it is a registered community organization with
boundaries, including this property. And based on our community meeting, they gave their support to
this project based on the following as well. Full -time employment positions at development,
event space and conference room to be used by the community, adjoining neighborhood block
improvements, 15 % of the units will be rented at AMI, that should say below AMI, and job opportunities
to workforce training programs and minority participation. My client is working with another
RCO to help sponsor a pre -apprenticeship program that's going to be available to, I believe,
25 individuals for purposes of training in the trades, which will help with my client's goal
of having minority participation and community involvement. Lastly, a letter dated September
20, 2021, from Earth Keepers Incorporated, indicating their support of the project with
essentially the same provisos as indicated previously in the King's Essing letter and
in the Southwest Philadelphia District Services letter.
Beginning at page 44, I have properties of the zoning notice and the amended refusal.
And this is just the existing structure.
Again, it's a surface lot that has a gate around it.
this is looking northbound on 52nd street and just going about our 360 to get a view of the
entire area this area is currently being used by a church to the best of my understanding
and we can see at page 62 for purposes of the record the existing single family dwellings
across the street it's just a photograph of the gate and again more photographs of the
surrounding structures this is looking down pascal avenue we're able to see again more
existing single -family homes which we previously indicated in the zoning map for the surrounding
area i made sure to take a lot of pictures for this one members of the board
one moment as my preview loads
there we go
so members of the board as part of this application we did go through the civic design review process
at this point, I'd ask Logan Dry to please raise his hand.
Mr. Logan is available. Thank you, Mr. Dry. You've been previously sworn this afternoon,
so I'm going to discuss with you and we're going to work through the relevant sections
of the civic design review submission. Sure. All right, so Mr. Dry, first I'm going to bring your
attention to uh let's see let's start with the overhead zoning drawings for the property which
is indicated here page 90 can you please quickly walk the members of the board through what we're
proposing and testify as to why we are on this structure in this lot rather proposing two
structures rather than one for this lot sure um so you know what you'll see here is is two buildings
uh you see building a which is over to the left and building b which is to the to the right
um they're both five -story buildings um the site plan that you're looking at sort of illustrates
They're both five -story buildings. The site plan that you're looking at sort of illustrates one of the main reasons why this development sort of took the shape.
You know, we centered everything around a central green space as well as some accessory parking at the ground floor level.
And the actual reason why we did this is there's currently a SOAR utility easement that essentially cuts the lot in half.
So, you know, that made it a little bit difficult to put one big building on the site because of, you know, that obvious easement that's there.
So, you know, instead of figuring out, you know, hey, how do we move this easement?
How do we, you know, engineer around something that really, you know, probably can't move?
You know, there's always a way to move things.
They just become expensive and timely.
You know, we said, okay, let's let this kind of influence the site design.
Let's view the central area as sort of an extension of Pascal Avenue visually, and let's also use that as an opportunity to provide as much on -site parking we can, as well as common green space.
So that resulted in basically us taking a site and kind of designing two buildings that are, you know, complementary to each other, as well as reflective of some of the existing context in terms of materials and things like that, that we'll see as we get a little bit further.
As Leo mentioned, again, it's a split zone district, industrial and ICMX.
So we designed two buildings, a smaller one and a larger one.
We gave both of them green roofs as well as partially occupied roof decks that are all ADA accessible.
You'll see on building A with regards to that front pilot house down there where Leo's cursor's at.
um because that's not set back from the front facade that's what's triggering our um height
refusal that we have on the application um i would note that you know again anytime that that pilot
house isn't included in uh you know isn't isn't meeting the front setback what happens is it gets
included in the overall uh building height uh so again here you know you've got essentially
two different height limitations ICMX and I2 one has a unlimited height restriction the other one
has a 60 foot height restriction in this case the the controlling portion of the lot the
the 60 foot height limitation is in place so that that pilot house is is the only area we're
slightly over the rest of the buildings fall well within the 60 feet they're maxing out about 54
feet to the top of the roofs. And Logan, if I may, what is the reason for the location of the
pilot house along 52nd Street, where you have it located, where I'm indicating with my person?
Sure. So the reason why we had the pilot house and the staircase there is when we get into the
floor plans, you'll see how the units are laid out. We laid all of these units out in such a way that
they all have their own private outdoor spaces in addition to the shared roof deck. But the location
of that staircase also serves uh as internal uh access to um two of the uh work share community
spaces that we're proposing on the ground floor thank you um so again you know as you can see
here leo if you if you want to um you'll you'll uh kind of move your way over to the to the right
side um and again when we get into the floor plans you'll you'll understand this a little bit more
But, you know, on the right -hand side, Building B, you've got 64 units.
The way this building is designed is in the top sort of right -hand corner of the screen.
You'll see the building is partially overhanging parking spaces that are proposed on site.
So you have a combination of open air and some covered parking spaces.
You'll kind of zoom, Leo, right into the very back there where those balconies are.
And that'll kind of just touch on the refusal we got for the rear yard.
Um, so again, the, the, uh, the rear yard refusal that we have is because each of these
buildings has a three foot, uh, projecting balcony on floors two through five.
Um, so while the building itself, you know, meets and exceeds the rear yard dimension
that we need for the minimum, um, because those balconies protrude out into the rear
yard, um, L and I counts that, uh, they take their yard dimension basically on every floor.
So what happens is on those upper floors, units two through five, those balcony projections, which as you can see, there's four of them that are about 12 to 15 feet wide.
Those are the only portions of the building, which again is really just the floor of the balcony and some metal railing.
That's the only portion that technically protrudes into what's otherwise a compliant rear yard dimension.
okay can you discuss the layout of the roofs of these properties please
Sure. So again, like I mentioned, both of them have green roofs and both of them also have roof decks that can be used by everybody in the building. On the big building specifically, you'll see there's two pilot houses, one on each side, left and right.
sure um so again you know like i mentioned both of them have green roofs and both of them also have
The sort of basket weave style texture that you see on there is the green roof.
And again, this will be much clearer when we get to that illustrated site plan.
But, you know, that's green roof.
And then the hatched area that looks like little dots, the sort of more solid poche is the occupiable roof.
You'll see, again, we've got two elevators going up there.
And then you've also got kind of two air lights in the middle marked with X's.
So kind of think almost of the building as kind of like a square donut, where that central void space has additional opportunity for windows, light and air, so we can lay out our units inside the building.
So, Logan, I'm going to advance now to that illustrated drawing so we can give the members of the board a little bit better ideas of what we're talking about.
So moving for a purpose of the record to page 96, as indicated below in the orange. Do you see that, Logan?
Mm -hmm.
Okay, can you please explain to the members of the board what we're looking at then?
So, again, this is a little bit more of an attractive version of the zoning plan that we worked on for CBR.
So here, you know, the things I would point out again is because we were developing, you know, a good portion of the site with parking, you know, we obviously had to keep stormwater and things like that in mind.
So, you know, we designed these buildings to have, you know, green roofs.
You know, we aren't seeking any sort of bonuses or anything from those green roofs in the
industrial district, but, you know, we felt it was important that, you know, as a trade -off
for having the on -site parking, you know, we try to integrate as much green space as
possible.
So we've got, you know, green roofs on both of the buildings that comprise about 60 to
75 % total roof coverage.
Those brown areas you see are the portions of those decks that people can walk on and
occupy.
Again, you'll see the pilot houses and the elevators on both buildings for full ADA access.
Again, that centralized green space we have and the parking is in line with that easement that's on the property and also that little portion of Pascal Avenue you can see down there kind of goes back to that extension visually of the street.
um as as we look at at the larger building you know some things i would i would point out that
again we work close to a civic design review to improve was uh the integration with the landscaping
screen over there at the dog park that you have all the way over to the right um we also um we
also have uh worked into the design um essentially a reconstruction a partial reconstruction of south
52nd street um to leo's point previously where it's you know kind of gated off and being used
um as as some sort of um parking or storage you know the part of this plan and to really engage
that larger building of 52nd street was to to return that street to you know its use as a street
so you've got you know sidewalk there with five street trees um and the buildings are set back
from the sidewalk the large buildings set back from the sidewalk so you've got additional
opportunities for uh so landscaping you can see there as well as some green space uh and again
the previous iteration of the design we didn't have that extension of the street but um after
working with civic design review as well as um some of the community groups you know we really
wanted to make um that building not only accessible to people living in it but also people uh from the
community that you know can directly engage with the spaces on the ground floor um because we'll
see on this, you know, it's a, it's a multifamily residential building, but on the ground floors and
cellars, you know, we have all sort of public, public spaces. So it's not a fully residential
building. We've got, you know, amenity and some public spaces. And we, we really aim to make the
ground floors of both of these buildings as active as possible, both through the floor plans and
their connection to the street and the streetscape with, you know, details like the street trees,
lampposts and direct paths that you know take you into some of those common spaces. Now Logan just
speaking for one moment about the easement that you mentioned earlier can you please explain
specifically to the members of the board how this easement is located and how it works in relation
to the subject property and why that affected the design? Sure so again if you kind of look down at
the very bottom center there you can see Pascal excuse me Pascal Avenue. The easement lines up
with that and runs directly through the site. So anytime there's utility easements and things like
that, you know, what happens is in this case, I believe, and I'd have to look at the plans, but
the easement itself is about 80 feet wide. Usually what happens is an easement is, you know, a width
that's much wider than the actual utilities running down the center of it. All I'm getting
much wider than the actual utilities running down the center of it.
All I'm getting at with that is basically you can't build any sort of structure on top of easements.
out with that.
What it will let you do, of course, if there needed to be any sort of maintenance or any sort of redoing of utility lines and things like that,
you know, it does provide for you to do built improvements such as landscaping and the paving on top,
with the understanding that it's obviously easier to dig up pavement and grass and replant plants
instead of, you know, having to dig through a building. So again, you know, we use that as an
opportunity to, you know, start the language of spacing between the buildings. And then we also
expanded upon that total space just to, again, have that central green space and work in,
you know, as much accessory parking that we could. And does that constitute a unique feature
to this lot that would constitute a hardship in your experience i would say yes because generally
you know the most um the most efficient build might be one building where you've got then
additional room for green space and things like that on the side but because of where this easement
was located not right down the middle sort of almost one third to the left um you know it
constituted something where you were either going to build on one half of the site and max it out
the other half of the site and max it out or you know some variation of the two so it does present
a unique challenge in that it really shaped this into becoming two structures with some open space
that we luckily had some flexibility with that I think at the end of the day actually you know made
it a little bit more attractive in the prospect of you know green space and site amenities like
parking something that you know a lot of other more urban sites in the city might not have the
flexibility for just because it's, you know, usually surrounded by much more dense urban
context. Now, Logan, I just moved to page 101 of my presentation packet. Do you see the page that
I'm indicating now? Yep. And what is this? So this is a, this is a site, a more or less an aerial
view of the site. The one thing I would just point out for everybody's clarity and, and, you know,
It sort of helps understand what we're doing with that extension of 52nd Street.
If you look kind of right there in the middle where it looks like the street's extended and there's a kind of mess of cars and things like that there, the rendering's a little outdated because what happened was when we went with CDR, we initially just proposed this much of an extension that you see there.
Leo, if you can kind of motion with your cursor there, that pavement.
that, so we started with a partial extension of 52nd Street, but again, after, you know, working
with CDR, we've extended that essentially all the way down to where you see that tree line there by
the railroad. So the trees would stay, but the extension of 52nd Street, you know, continues
where all of those cars currently are at. And again, what it does is it allows us to have then
very similar to the small building, connection points from that new sidewalk, some additional
street parking but more importantly the the ability to access the ground floor of the larger
building the whole entirety of that building you know rather than just putting a fence up and
calling it a day so we felt that that really helped create much more engagement both physically
and visually with the ground floors of that building and the program that's inside. Thank
you Logan. For purposes of the board's edification this is just another site aerial photo
indicating our subject lot by this red dot here 161 south 52nd street for purpose of the record
page 102 of the packet mr mobile hill she's in a room could you go back to that previous
uh photograph the rendering chair yeah the one that's uh yeah the one that mr dry did yeah
um behind the larger building to the left are they what are they active warehouses
to yes to the right to the left behind where i'm indicating with my cursor
yes yes and that's my understanding is that mr horowitz mr fineman who are present on the line
represent the owner of that parcel mr chairman mr chairman can i i can just identify i can
identify that where you mr fineman mr fineman please spell your full name and i'll swear you
in? S. David, F -I -N -E -M -A -N. Do you swear
if I'm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth? I do. Thank you. Please
proceed. Judge, Mr. Chairman,
hopefully you can see what I'm pointing at, where
that FedEx truck is. Yes. That is
D .C. Humphreys slash Cover Sports.
D .C. Humphreys is who we represent in this matter.
is who we represent in this matter uh dc humphreys cover sports um has been a philadelphia manufacturer
D .C. Humphreys Covered Sports.
for over 87 years located in the city of philadelphia mr feinman i i don't mean to
interrupt you i just want it is an act we'll get to your testimony is that it's a manufacturer
it's a okay plant that manufactures uh it's operational now as well absolutely and and
you'll hear testimony as to how it's going to extend okay the area the area the area
next to it on on one side is basically um owned and is a storage facility for buses
and actually operates on a general on a on a daily basis sending out school buses and other
buses and that's over here okay everything around it is active okay thank you we'll get back to you
we'll get back to you thank you mr mobile i didn't mean to interrupt you i just was wanting to make
sure what i was seeing was an active commercial industrial use understood so logan i'm now going
to proceed to the floor plans for the property this is at page 106 of my zoning packet
can you please explain what we're looking at here sure so so much like the zoning plan this is a
full site plan that shows both buildings but what this one does show is sort of one of the
intentions of our design you've got the ground floor plan so the inside of each building again
building a to your left building b to your right this plan is helpful in showing again when we
designed the building, how we designed the ground floors of these to be active spaces. So if you
look here, you don't see any sort of residential units. You don't have any private residences that
are on the ground floor here. Instead, what you have is you've got the site parking with that
loading space that you see right there in the middle per CDR's request. You see towards the
lower right -hand side of the screen that extension of 52nd Street that again allows for the
opportunity for street trees, lampposts, and direct pedestrian access from the sidewalk to
some of these active spaces on the ground floor. You've got event spaces, conference spaces,
you've got an outdoor pavilion area, you've got the building lobby. That's all in the large
buildings. So again, all of these spaces, you know, in the large building, we wanted to be
able to have accessible from both outside and inside the building because they're, you know,
non -residential uses um kind of working way over to the left again the same sort of thought was put
into the design of building a again you see your accessory parking spaces the street trees and
things like that on the sidewalk that we've integrated and you'll notice that again there's
there's co -working spaces there's lounge spaces lobby spaces gym conference centers
as well as some outdoor space over to your uh very left as well that work in conjunction with
those, um, conference and again, more active public spaces. Um, you'll also note that, you know,
we have sort of, uh, trash and things like that, uh, more utilitarian uses, uh, located towards
the back of the property far away from, uh, 52nd street. Um, so that, that's kind of what you've
got here, uh, just the ground floor that kind of shows everything in context, but it's important
because again, it shows, you know, we feel the design of this departs a lot from other multifamily
see going up where it's all residential here you know we felt like we provided a pretty good
opportunity of amend these spaces for the residents as well as you know residents of
the community too all right so logan let's go to the floor plans from building themselves starting
with building a yep i'm now at page 108 of the packet yep so to orient everybody this is you
know 52nd street is over to your left side and then towards the bottom of the screen would be
that common central green space, as well as the parking that you saw in the renderings.
Here you'll see in the cellar, we've got the bottom floor of the work share spaces. So these
work share spaces are actually two stories. So they would be entered from the ground floor,
and then you've got additional expansion opportunity down in the basement for those.
You see your bike storage, as well as your building mechanical and storage for residential.
And you'll also see the gym space, which is also bi -level with the ground floor.
All right, moving to the next page then, Logan, we're looking at the ground floor for Building A at page 109.
Yep. So, again, you can kind of just get an idea, 50 -second over to your left, your portion of the parking lot down to the bottom of the screen.
You know, you've got your lobby and things like that right off of the parking lot area.
You've got some lounge space, again, that bi -level gym space, conference spaces, and the co -working spaces, again, with some outdoor workouts.
conference spaces and the co -working spaces again with some outdoor workout space as well as space
for you know outdoor uses right off the conference spaces as well and you'll see kind of again
towards the top right that trash and recycling area as well as the you know general site access
for that back there. Okay Logan so I'm going to move to the next page and this is the typical
floor plan for pay for floors two through five would you please uh explain this to the board
sure so again typical meaning you know this is the exact same floor plan that you'll find on
floors two three four and five um each unit i mean sorry each floor has 10 units um that again
uh range and size from 525 square feet 640 square feet they're all primarily one bedrooms there's
a couple studios in this building as well um the things i would point out again is just your two
staircases to the left and right um your elevator in the middle there for again full ada access
and then each one of these units has its own private outdoor uh own private outdoor space
in the form of balconies um that you can see again on the sides and the fronts
in addition to that shared roof deck so again we felt it was really important to give everybody
their own you know little slice of the outdoors in addition to that shared amenity space on the roof
which I think is the next slide probably.
Yeah, so Logan, just to orient the members of the board as well,
you see my cursor where I'm circling this staircase to top of the 2nd Street?
Is this the pilot house that causes the height refusal?
Correct.
That's the only reason why we have that additional refusal for four extra feet
is because that pilot house is counted as part of the overall building height.
Is this staircase required under code?
For anything over, let's see, what is it?
anything over four stories at this point with this number of units, definitely you would need
two staircases. Even if this were a three -story building with this many units, you'd still need
your two independent means of access, both for the residents in the building, as well as
if you plan to have your roof deck as a common element, which in this case is.
Speaking of which, let's go to that next slide, which is page 111. What are we looking at, Logan?
Yep. So again, here, this is just the common roof deck area that you see for building A.
You know, again, the basket weave texture around the perimeter is the proposed green roof.
And then the area in the middle would be what would be used as common space for everybody in the building to share.
Again, you've got your two pilot houses, left and right side, and you've got your elevator in the middle for, again, full ADA access to the roof.
All right, let's move on to building B, which is the larger of the two.
What are we looking at here, though, in page 112?
Yep, so again, to orient yourself, South 52nd Street is down at the bottom of the screen,
and that shared parking area and green space is over to your left that, again, we saw in that rendering earlier.
So, again, the building B basement is, again, very utilitarian in nature.
You've got your two staircases, your two elevators, and then a mix of bicycle storage, elevator mechanical,
uh building storage which is very sizable your pico vault and your mechanical space
and that unexcavated area you see kind of in the middle you'll understand a little bit more when
we get to the upper floors and that's kind of one of those donut holes that i spoke about earlier
all right let's go to the ground floor then at building b okay what are we looking at here
so again you know here you'll see there's uh your main lobby space for the building is right off
of the parking lot and and you can also kind of see again that highlighted loading loading zone
area per the request of cdr the ground floor here you'll see there's again lobby and mail space
you've got multi -purpose lounge space event space and conference spaces again all down towards 52nd
street and you can kind of see that newly extended sidewalk as well as some of the paths to get into
the building which again provided a nice opportunity for some landscaping too having that front setback
as well as that street really allows people to engage these spaces directly off the street kind
of making it more open and accessible to everybody rather than just a amenity on the street i mean
sorry an amenity for the building again over the right side you can kind of see the dog park in
that outdoor pavilion area and dog wash work in there as well and you can again kind of see how
we kind of work the parking and things like that towards the back you know off of 52nd street really
kind of wanted to keep the front more active and we've got an additional trash area for this
building back there. All right so let's go to the floor plans and then of floors two through five
for the purpose of the record we're at page 114. Would you mind explaining this to the members of
the board? Sure so again this floor plan is typical in that it's the exact same for floors two three.
Sure. So again, this floor plan is typical in that it's the exact same for floors two, three, four, and five.
So in the building total between those floors, you've got 64 units. Each floor has 16 units.
And again, that spread is broken into 32 two -bedrooms, 12 one -bedrooms, and 20 studios, sizing ranging from 500 to 988 square feet.
again similar to the smaller building you know things we wanted to kind of do here
was to give all of these units their own outdoor space so each one has their own balcony again as
we touched on before towards the top of the screen those balconies were the troublemakers that that
kind of gave us the rear yard refusal but again you know we felt for the livability of the unit
it's it's just nice to have so you know we went for it even if it even if it did mean getting a
yard refusal. You know, here you'll see the two air lights in the middle as well for additional
light and air. You'll see the two elevators and then your two common staircases on left and right
sides. And then on page, what's marked as 115? What are we looking at here?
This is the roof plan. Again, the basket weave texture being the green roof extents and the
The other areas being the usable portions for the residents of the building.
Again, you've got your two staircases, two independent means of egress, and your two elevators for, again, full ADA access.
And then lastly, you've got those two courts in the middle, which, again, kind of reemphasizes the donut sort of nature of this building, having that void in the middle.
Okay, Logan. So I'm going to skip ahead in the presentation packet to the renderings, showing the materials of the structure.
That's what they're going to look like overall.
So we're now at page 125 of the packet that I submitted.
What are we looking at here?
So this is the 52nd Street elevation of the smaller building.
And again, things I would just kind of point out really quickly here is, you know, you've
got your commercial glazing and window fenestrations on the ground floors sort of appropriate with
the use that we're proposing on those areas.
And then as you work your way up towards the midsection of the building, we've got a red
brick material reflective of some of the homes around the area each unit again with its own
private balcony space and then again to further break down the massing as you got to the very top
floor we we integrated a standing seam metal material and I just draw your attention to the
slope of the roof there because when we get to the front elevation of the larger building you'll
kind of see how again the buildings were meant to complement each other also meant to frame that
you know sort of extension that we've been speaking about about pascal avenue um and again
just be something that you know as a pedestrian uh at a pedestrian level and even from further away
the buildings kind of really complement and speak to each other as as a whole um so kind of create
a sense of cohesiveness between the two designs all right now i'm just going to go to a different
view of that building a what are we looking at here excuse me excuse me mr chairman can we
summarize yep i'll move it along and just simply so logan we're looking at building
a from the interior courtyard here is that correct yep so again we wrapped the same
52nd street material along the side of this because again it's something that's going to
be visible from the street as well as people that live in the area so we continue that same
material palette through the side of the building which faces the parking lot
all right logan i'm just going to go through this and you can just indicate whether i'm correct
so this is the rear of the building and we're looking to put party board siding on that is
that correct correct and you can see the the door down there for the trash room and again
private balconies for all the upper units and then page 128 this is just another view side yard
correct yep this is opposite of the parking lot so this would be that area facing the uh yards
that the gym and the conference room were accessible to of that small building okay moving
to the next page just to give the bosoni board some orientation this is building b uh and this
is what you were discussing earlier by having the stance of the roof yep again just the same the same
same sort of you know uh geometry to kind of tie the two buildings together and same material
pallet carried across and again the same attention to detail with uh commercial fenestration and
things like that on the ground floor level okay logan i'm just going to move through just for
purposes of the record showing the zoning board what the finished renderings would look like for
the finished structure yep and then this would be from pascal avenue is that correct correct
this open area is the circulation loading zone where the easement is currently located is that
correct correct okay and just to orient pascal avenue is pardon me woodland avenue is to the left
correct and we have train tracks to the right behind this structure the larger building b
correct and then we have train tracks to the right behind this structure the larger building b
correct and pascal avenue is is right behind you that intersection that you're that you're
standing at all right thank you members of the board before we move on any further uh i know
we're running late uh before we get testimony from uh mr feyman and mr horvitz does the court
reporter need a break yes please okay we'll take a five minute break and we'll be back
thank you thank you members of the board
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
has the court reporter returned yeah i'm ready yeah and do uh show your room now later on today
anytime you need a break just let us know please thank you thank you okay uh mr mobilehill
yeah so members of the board in some we have community support from three registered community
organizations this is the highest and best use of this property and we've designed it into
implementing the hardship that's endemic to this parcel due to the existing easement that runs
across it by structuring it with two structures and an open area we allow for parking for the
The residents and the parking spaces will be available to neighbors.
My client has extensive contacts in the community, and we receive community support there for.
And there's going to be community benefits in the improvement to the sidewalk along 52nd Street,
reopening a portion of 52nd Street, along with improvements to the sidewalk and streetscaping there.
My client's dedicated to an apprenticeship program for 25 people to apply for for working in trades.
And my client is involved with a group called BEAT, B -E -A -T, which identifies and works towards improving neighborhood developments as well.
This parcel, although it's zoned ICMX I2, works as a transitory structure between the existing industrial behind it and the residential uses directly across the street.
And we've taken some cues in terms of design with respect to red brick and other materials in so designing this.
In addition to the all -street parking, we're also located near transit lines as well to help facilitate any of the new residents to this structure.
And finally, we're dedicated to having 15 % of these units be available for rent at below market rates.
And that was something that we did after further discussion with the community group and the community leaders themselves.
LeVar, are you available right now?
If so, please raise your hand and unmute yourself.
Mr. Chairman, I have at least 20 minutes worth of questions.
We're going to get to that.
We're going to, Mr. Mojo is going to have his client adopt his testimony.
And then we'll move on.
Is that all that's going to happen if he just adopts his testimony?
I believe that's all right Mr. Mulvihill that's correct correct thank you
Mr. Clark is available he can unmute himself great good afternoon sir please spell your
full name and I'll swear you in name is LeVar Clark um L as in Larry E as in Edward V as in
Victor A as in Apple R as in Robert C as in Cat L as in Larry A as in Apple R as in Robert
k as in cat you swear from to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth yes thank you
yes now mr clark you've heard my testimony today yes i have is my testimony true and accurate to
the best of your knowledge yes it is and you've heard logan's testimony today as well yes i have
this testimony is true and accurate to the best of your knowledge yes it is do you adopt my testimony
and logan's testimony as your own for purposes of today's hearing yes i do is there anything
you'd like to add at this time? No, I don't. Thank you, members of the board. I'd be happy
to turn it over to you or Mr. Feynman. Thank you. Before Mr. Feynman, before we begin, just let me
read a letter that was sent to the board this morning by Councilwoman Gautier. The letter is
The letter is as follows. The council member is choosing not to oppose this request of variance in recognition of the hard work of the local community organizations in advocating for meaningful community benefit as part of this project.
as follows. The council member is choosing not to oppose this requested variant.
We hope such benefits can be a model that sets a precedent for other development underway in the same neighborhood. With that, Mr. Feynman, you're under oath. You may proceed.
um i if if please i'd like to ask mr um the the architect i guess uh some questions if i can
about his presentation mr dry yeah he's available thank you um and mr chairman um i've appeared
before you on numerous occasions so that we're clear and that i um i think i keep good reputation
that I have with you. It's now about 12 .11. My understanding is that you want to break at 12 .30
and I suspect that I'm going to spend about 20 minutes, 25 minutes on cross -examination and then
have to make a presentation to you from my clients available and some of it might depend
on what happens during a cross -examination.
So I suspect it would go well past 1 .30 in the afternoon.
So I'm doing that to ask you how you would like to proceed.
You know, obviously you're in charge of this.
I appreciate that.
We do have another, we have several other cases,
but there's one in particular that we have received notice
that the witnesses are going to be leaving
and they all want to testify.
um and sheriff this is sharon if i can mention this is also the fourth hearing in this matter
so these witnesses have come back several times would it be possible for us to pause
the case that you are on yes and i think that'll work in mr feyman's favor as well mr feyman
we can pause your case we'll move to the next case that uh we must have a hearing on it was
it's a resumption hearing and then come back to you at what time i don't know maybe we're
going to go in we're going to complete this list today so it's not like we were done after uh at
one o 'clock so we can go forward with the western street case and correct me if i'm wrong tanya and
or sharon and then come back to this case probably after the lunch break most it will be after the
lunch break. So understanding that, can myself, my client, Mr. Horvitz, can we excuse ourselves
until, I don't know, 1 .30? Two o 'clock. Two o 'clock? Okay. Thank you. Does that work, Tanya?
Is that the right time? No, I'm getting a little confused here. So we're going to pause this case.
We're going to go to the Worcester Street case
Once that is complete
We will break
And then come back at 2
Oh, we had no scheduled breaks
Oh, I'm sorry
I apologize
It was just a 9 .30 session today
Yeah, I know
That's why we're going to go later than that
That's why I thought we had a scheduled
We don't have a scheduled break, correct?
And if it's going to interrupt with
whatever else people had planned
for later on this afternoon.
Okay, I thought we had a scheduled break.
That's what I was basing on.
No, I just had all of these scheduled for 9 .30
expecting them to be done by one.
So it's pretty much your call.
If you want to talk offline
to do a resumption for one or two
and whatnot,
I do have Mr. Reuter with his hand up.
I believe, with information or discussing this case.
Reuter, you're still on their oath.
Let me grab him.
I'm here.
Thank you, may it please the board, Leonard F. Reuter, R -E -U -T -E -R for the city of Philadelphia.
First, I just wanted to make it clear that I was notified that the Planning Commission
and commerce uh departments were both uh opposing this uh variance which is why i'm here just to
represent them i'm not planning on calling witnesses other than of course the city planning
representatives um recommend the recommendation to the planning commission uh that would be made
um you know and i may ask for you know everybody's indulgences if i have uh might have an opportunity
to ask a couple questions later after Mr. Feynman does. As far as the break goes, the only thing I
would say is that the Board of L &I Review starts at or about 1 or 1 .15. I just have two matters to
at or about 1 or 1 15 i just have two matters to continue there they shouldn't take more than 10
continued there.
minutes because they do that at the beginning although they typically won't start until about
1 30 so um but other than that anytime you want to start i'll just simply make sure that i'm you
know can be back here uh whether that's 1 30 2 o 'clock whatever that's fine with me
mr chairman i'm i'm at your mercy whatever whatever you whatever you should decide to do
we're willing to work with you chair can i suggest that if you want to go forward with
worcester street agree that there will be a half hour break after that and i will text or email
all the parties to let them know exactly what time you will be resuming that that's helpful
thank you and if i could state one last thing this is tanya sunkett here um unfortunately we only had
one a morning session scheduled so we will not have the support of it and others to continue to
zoom after two just so that you're aware well based on what i'm hearing from mr fineman we may
not be able to complete everything by two o 'clock i believe that's correct mr chairman
chair may i suggest in that case that it would be best just to schedule a resumption hearing for
that now for this case we're hearing yes i think that's the only way we're going to be able to get
this uh the other cases heard and the date that i previously sent you would be the same date for
this that was no October was it or November 10th at 9 30. Mr. Feynman Mr. Mulvihill Mr. Horvitz
uh through no fault of anyone we're running up against this clock and I in the best interest
of all parties I think it would be helpful if we have a resumption hearing we're agreeable Mr.
chairman mr mobile i mean really have no other options unfortunately i understand
chairman i'm simply checking my calendar right now that would be november 10th yes at 9 30.
we are available mr chairman
i am available i just wish to confer with my client and my architect to ensure they
are available i'm available this is logan the architect
i'm on there for other zba hearings anyway so i'm i'm good
client mr mobile and mr clark are you still on the line yes he can just unmute himself
i think mr clark said he was available
hello can you hear me yes yes yes i'm available thank you and the only other one mr horvitz
yeah he's available yeah i'm available thank you okay thank you all right thank you all for
resumed on november the 10th at 9 30 a .m at which time the board will consider well we'll consider
the entire case so thank you again gentlemen for your cooperation uh having said that we will now
move to case number 12 for your courtesies thank you uh now we will move to case number 12
MI 2020 -001171, 541 East Worcester Street.
Mr. Whelan is the attorney of record.
This is a resumption hearing.
Mr. Whelan is coming in now as a panelist.
Thank you.
Good afternoon, Chairman.
Good afternoon.
Please identify yourself and I'll square you in.
Sean Whalen, W -H -A -L -E -N, 6 Coulter Avenue, Suite 1000, Ardmore, PA, 19003.
Do you swear to affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Thank you. Mr. Plaza has questions for you.
Good afternoon, sir. You agree to wait the reading of its refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes, I do. And just to advise the board, this is actually the fourth hearing after almost two
years in this matter. So this has been put on the record a number of times. I certainly agree to it
now again and stipulate that I agree to everything I previously agreed to each prior time.
It is my understanding, Chairman, I can do a very quick reintroduction, 30 to 45 seconds if you like, but this matter was continued. It was actually called and decided on June 16th, and then that vote was rescinded to allow certain community members who I believe are on the call today to put their individual testimony on the record.
It is my understanding, Chairman, I can do a very quick reintroduction.
I'm happy to allow that to happen, but would very much press for a decision, a re -decision today, given that this, again, has been almost two years in the making, and this is the fourth hearing.
The RCO opposition letter has been on the record for almost that entire time.
I believe it's dated early -ish 2019.
I could actually pull up the date itself.
And the last thing I would note, just so that everyone is brought back up to speed, is that
this is, there were a number of provisos that we agreed to.
I sent in a letter to the board on March 11th, 2021, two hearings ago, with a number of
provisos that relate to an agreement that we made to correct, or not correct, but to
revise the plans based on community input, RCO concerns, and the comments of the Planning
Commission who we met with individually. This is not a CDR matter, but we met individually with
the Planning Commission to find out what their comments and questions would be, and we addressed
as many of those as possible. So again, this has been an exceptionally long process.
um you know i i understand that miss brodus from the rco was here earlier today uh at the june 20
at the june 16th hearing you heard that uh for over seven months the rco refused to meet with
us or speak with us and i entered into the record at that time uh 80 some odd pages of email
correspondence between myself and the board um trying to answer not the board uh the rco rather
trying to answer any and all questions that they may have.
So if the board is up to speed on the case, I'll stop there
and let the community present its individual opposition
since we already have the position of the RCO.
The last thing I would say is Mr. Charles Richardson
from Councilwoman Bass's office got involved
between the April hearing of 2021 that was continued until June.
He was actually extremely helpful to move this forward.
And then he bowed out in May at the time when the immediate neighbor retained her own lawyer.
And that was who you heard from on the June hearing requesting another continuance of this matter.
And after the immediate neighbor had raised a number of non -zoning relating concerns, but concerns with regard to construction and traffic and
people parking in her parking spot and things like that. So again, I'm happy to share my screen
and show the board any questions, any documentation that they may have questions about,
including the proviso letter that I sent in if the board doesn't have it available.
But otherwise, I would, in the interest of time and getting this case heard and, you know,
re -decided today, since it was already decided in June, I would just say that all the documentation
is in the record um you've got probably six hours worth of testimony on the record at this point
i think we're ready to move forward for my purposes and maybe the purpose of the other
board members could you give us like a three -minute uh encapsulation of what we're looking at again
today. Absolutely. Okay. So hopefully, again, I can't see what you're seeing, but hopefully
you're seeing a letter from myself to you, chairman and the board. This just outlines
the proposed revisions. Here is a copy of the refusal. There were significant refusals. This
was going to be a proposed mixed use building with commercial on the first floor with apartments
above. The primary, and obviously the RCO letter speaks for itself, but the primary issue that the
RCO had was that there was going to be commercial at this block that they did not deem appropriate.
So we have removed all of that and then, in fact, reduced the number of units that we will have down from 22 to 16 to try to assuage some more of their concerns.
so again we have the you can see the date june 17 2019 is the first letter of refusal
So, again, we have the you can see the date, June 17th.
and uh opposition we presented 39 signatures of in petitions of support
and here very quickly i can try to and of course i'm going to go quickly because of
the timing that you guys just laid out in the last hearing but please interrupt me at any point
is this the case where your client uh owned the it's like a an attached duplex or a twin
yes so that this parcel right here this is right okay i got it now yeah um so i can just show you
one quick picture if that's um so here you can see basically everything around us has been
granted prior variances yeah uh here you go okay i i don't know about the other board members i
recall this now yeah okay yes yes mr chairman all right so i'm i'm happy to stop there um again we
are we are this uh built out one story garage uh this side of the twin the other half of the twin
is there, and these are the properties immediately adjacent to us. That's just an image of what we're
doing. Originally, you had retail or commercial on that first floor, correct? Originally, we had
retail and commercial on that floor. You received an expert planning report and testimony regarding
the use of this project. And so the last thing I would show you is simply we have this triangular
parcel. Here's the twin. Right next to us is a very large LaSalle associated. It's not LaSalle
building, but it's associated with LaSalle for rentals. And then there's a lot kind of going up
around here around our property. You can see what we've done. And then specifically, we removed all
the commercial uses from the proposal. We've reduced the residential units from 22 down to
16. I don't believe that this item is a zoning matter, but there was a concern that there would
be rentals here, and so we agreed to make all 16 units condos. We removed all proposed upper
floor residential balconies which the neighborhood did not like we agreed that all the trash will be
screened from the neighboring properties there is some off -street parking here and then finally
in accordance with along with some other design changes in accordance with the planning commission's
comments the building's amenity space will be relocated to
what would have been the
this would have been the commercial space
and this will now be the amenity space for the building
to kind of activate the street.
All right. Does the board have any
questions for Mr. Whalen before we move on with the rest of the testimony?
No, Mr. Chairman.
All right. Thank you. Who else would like to testify in this case?
Please raise your hand.
In case you're breaking up.
We have Sharon Harvey. Sharon,
you can unmute yourself and wait for the chair to swear you in.
Good afternoon, Ms. Harvey. Please spell your full name and I'll swear you in.
Sharon Harvey, Sharon, S -H -A -R -O -N, Harvey, H -A -R -V -E -Y.
You swear for them to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
And your address, ma 'am?
It's Harper and Paul, 140 West Maplewood Avenue, Philadelphia, PA, 19144.
And I'm the attorney for the adjacent property owner at 453 Worcester Street.
thank you please proceed thank you uh at the last hearing on june 16th 16th we asked for a
continuance um so that i could be brought up to speed in what was happening over this two -year
program and i thanked the board for granting that continuance um after talking to mr whalen looking
at the plans and discussing it with my client uh we have a better understanding of what is going
on and there have no immediate objections to the plans as stated and with the provisos
to the plans as stated and with the provisos
so you're correct me if i'm wrong your client is not objecting as provided the board if the board
were to approve it we approve it with provisos that's correct thank you uh is there anything
else you need to add miss harvey no not at this time no thank you uh anyone else would like to
testify in this case. Yes, Chair, we have Sandra Broadus. Ms. Broadus, you can admit yourself.
Ms. Broadus, please spell your full name and I'll swear you in.
My name is Sandra, S -A -N -D -R -A, Broadus, B -R -O -A -D -U -S. I am the president of the RCO,
coordinating RCO, a concerned community association, and we are the RCO that hosted
the meeting with this applicant. You swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the
truth? I do. Thank you. Please proceed. First of all, I'd like to thank the board for taking the
time to allow us to present. This has been a long journey for this community and the community
members. I'd like to start by making some clarification of some misinformation that
was provided by Mr. Whelan that has possibly swayed the board in their understanding of this
RCO's participation in this process. This project did come before us in 2019. Mr. Whelan was
not the attorney at the time. There was, in fact, a community meeting that was held by ACCA,
participated by Bellfield Area Neighbors Association, Penn Area Neighbors Association,
and LaSalle University. And they all collectively and strongly were opposed to this process. And the
2019 letter has been followed by two additional RCO letters reporting on our concerns in that matter.
Even though this project has been conducted as though it is about the house at 543
The letters that you have received are not, the opposition of the community is not reflective
of what is going on at the house, even though we are, we're grossly concerned that the detachment
of the home was an issue.
That was not the reason for the community concern.
Further, Mr. Whalen, who was not at the 2019 community meeting, is not aware that the conduct of his client was very concerning,
starting with the fact that the refusal letter itemized undesirable uses that would we felt
and put in our letter that we felt were being used to frighten the residents at the 543.
Did you speak to what those uses were that raised that concern?
um and let me ask you this and are they the uses that the applicant has agreed to
remove well that is the point that i'm trying to make we confronted the applicant at the
the 2019 meeting and suggested to him that they were in fact the scare tactic and he all but
conceded that he didn't care about any of that and he'll take it all off he just wanted to know
So if the resident next door would sell their home, and in fact, if the other residents on Armstrong Street wanted to come up and to discuss selling their homes to him, he said he would take it all off then.
And we were then confident and comfortable that it was being used as a scare tactic because the removal was not after talking to city planning and agreeing with the RCO, but in fact did happen at the RCO meeting in 2019 because the applicant was only interested in the acquisition of property.
and he basically conceded that we put that in our letter based on the the manner in which this this
this whole hearing was conducted we were very concerned about the intentions moving forward
um miss brutus pardon the interruption again uh i hear what you're saying
Ms. Brodus, I hear what you're saying, but could you speak specifically to the application that we have in front of us with the provisos, and do those provisos meet with the RCO's expectations?
No, no.
Let me just say to you again that our applet, can you hear me?
Okay. The community concern is not about the house or what is happening to the house or pretty much anything in those provisos, except that in the provisos, there is no trash plan because streaming trash from neighboring properties is not a trash plan.
But, Mr. DiCicco, in that we have waited since 2019 to present this case and understand that because in 2019 it was continued as moving parties, in 2020, October 2020, Mr. Whelan showed up as a new attorney without announcing himself to the RCO.
But ma 'am, again, I need to interrupt you. I hear what you're saying, but a lot of things have happened since that first, since the first hearing.
Absolutely nothing has happened.
Ma 'am, ma 'am, ma 'am, Mr. Whelan is proposing several revisions, provisos to the original plan. So if you can stick to those issues, that would be helpful.
They're saying they've reduced the number of units from 22 to 16.
There are no longer any balconies.
Trash will be screened.
No commercial use on the first floor.
So what is the concern of the RCO?
You can unmute yourself, ma 'am, and continue to testify.
Ms. Brutus?
Excuse me, ma 'am, you need to unmute me.
Okay, I was muted.
Did you hear what I had to say?
Yes, and I'm just begging your indulgence to allow me to say what I have to say.
The community concern in the letter that you received from the community, and I'm just looking for the date,
in April 2001 made it clear that this variance poses concern about traffic and what the traffic
being proposed by this project will do to the surrounding community. Even though it is
unfortunate that the neighbors at the attached twin did come to some kind of agreement that
they are willing to agree with this, that the overall concern that this project proposes
affects the entire community along the Olney 2 and Olney corridor, impacting residents
trying to access I -95 along the Ogons Avenue corridor, and that the traffic will be grossly
affected for the entire surrounding community. This case for us is not about that house
or that building. It is about what the proposed use is going to do to the entire community and
the traffic flow. If you remember, for a decade or more, the entire impacted community protested
when LaSalle sought to have 20th and Worcester made one way, which created an off jump for
commuter traffic in route to I -76. That closure did occur. So the only off jump for the community
now is Worcester Street and this project along Worcester Street will grossly impair the traffic
flow going to I -76 for the entire community. We are not focused on what is happening on that
property and it was indicated very clearly in the 2019 letter and it is stated repeatedly in the
additional letters um once the only um i have allison weiss on the on the line and i'm sure
And I'm sure this board is aware that I can't fumble with my screen or I'm going to be cut off.
this board is aware that i can't fumble with my screen or i'm going to be cut off she
She has the photo exhibits that will easily, and if I may say, more quickly demonstrate the concern than me reading the letters that were written, which are in quite detail.
So if Allison Weiss can be allowed to share her screen, we can just briefly go over the actual community concern.
And while Allison is, is that okay?
If she wishes to testify, have her raise her hand, please.
Allison, can you raise your hand and then let them instruct you on sharing your screen?
LaSalle University has worked with the community since this project has come about
because they are aware, and when her screen is up, I'll...
Ms. Weiss, would you please identify yourself, spell your full name, and I'll swear you in.
Ms. Weiss?
Ms. Weiss, can you not mute yourself?
Sorry. Sorry.
Please spell your full name.
Allison Weiss, A -double -L -I -S -O -N -W -E -I -S -S.
You swear if I'm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Please proceed.
Can she share the screen for me, which is what I asked her to be?
Yes, just one question.
What is she sharing?
she has a photo exhibit um of uh that outlines the community concerns with regards to this project
okay miss sunken is that okay
okay miss allison you can proceed
okay it's not did did that work i
no ma 'am um you can just hit the share screen
button at the bottom of your uh right okay yes it's coming up now
and right now we're just looking at an email
did that come up
so what did you you have to do is just unshare
unshare yeah just um put your dot okay here it go is up now okay
Are you able to see it?
No, we're still looking at an email.
What would you have to do is unshare, have the document up already, and then share the screen.
unshare stop share okay yep if you have your document up just click the share screen and then
choose the document document is up do you want me to open the document i guess yes open the document
okay and then you can hit your uh share screen
and just click on the documents
that you want to share.
Ms. Weiss, maybe you can just,
let's see if it comes up now.
Here we go.
And she's already swore in, right, Chair?
Okay, so you can proceed, ma 'am.
I'm just acting to...
Sandra will be speaking
Sandra will be speaking.
Ms. Brodus or Ms. Weiss
someone needs to begin speaking
we have photograph of what looks like
Ogons Avenue and I'm not sure what the intersection
street is that's all we see so could someone
begin speaking about
speaking about this
this application and what
your concerns are
I think
Sandra has her hand raised
she's already unmuted she could
begin talking
am I unmuted yes you are
Ms. Brodus all right thank you very much
okay so
as you can see
The first picture is the Omni Avenue corridor that extends back to Worcester Street, where this property is located.
Partially down the street is 20th Street.
Allison, if you can present, and you can see the traffic backlog, and this is in the afternoon.
It's very -
Ogon's, where is this intersection, the one with the bus?
Where is this intersection in relationship to the 541 East Worcester?
Worcester Street, if you look at the next screen, 20th Street is the next block up, and Worcester Street is half a block up from there.
20th Street used to be a jump -off for this traffic you see in this photograph, the first photograph.
So their cars trying to get to I -76 and major highways could access Belfield Avenue.
20th Street was closed after much protest by the community about this exact traffic log.
So Worcester Street is now the only jump off for this traffic.
And halfway, Worcester Street, Allison, can you move the screen, can you move the screen down some more to the next picture?
Next picture.
So we're leaving 20th Street down to the next picture.
Okay, this is Worcester Street, which is half a block up from where you saw, from 20th Street.
Go back, Allison.
No, you're going the wrong way.
You're going the wrong.
Okay, stop there.
Go back.
I need you to go to the third picture, Allison.
One more.
Right.
Okay, I can't see what you're seeing, so I'm just going by you.
Okay, and you know what?
You all might not be seeing what I'm seeing because my screen is huge because I can't see.
So am I directing her properly?
Are you looking at Worcester Street at this point where the new library for the school is?
all i see is a residential street and it's heading towards a four or five story okay stop
stop stop now can you see it stop can i see what can we see what can you see worcester street the
the new la salle um library uh medical school is is uh on the corner i i assume that's worcester
street it is worcester street okay worcester street is currently a two -way street and halfway
down Worcester Street is where this project is proposed. The buildings that you see next to the
medical school are new projects that have gone up along Worcester Street, some of which are
apartments that Osal was participating in, and what has occurred is that Worcester Street is now
a traffic nightmare. It has relied upon artery for the community, for people coming from as far
as Mount Airy from Germantown who traveled to I -76 using this route. It backs up intensely.
Students coming to LaSalle, students coming to and from Central High School, as you saw on the
first slot picture at Ogun's Denali and parents dropping off children, plus residents driving
from as far up as Sheltonham Avenue, down Broad Street.
down Broad Street, to access I -76 are all piled up at the next corner in the first picture.
This artery of Worcester Street cannot be compromised by additional traffic, which is
what this new project is proposing. The bigger issue is that LaSalle has indicated to us and
we have walked through and we have looked that the pre -existing and new apartment buildings
that have been put along this corridor have vacancies. There is absolutely no need for this
new project to go up. There was certainly... That's a decision that the developer has to make,
whether it makes sense economically to build or not, whether vacancies... We're saying there was
no need economic there was no need for the neighbor to have to um compromise their home
and and live with a detached project there was no urgency because the project is not even needed
um to go there um allison can you go down a little bit further i'd just like to i'm sorry
chair this is for you guys we need for i'm sorry tanya yeah no sir i'm just i apologize for the
interruption i just wanted to make everyone aware that um we do have others waiting some who have to
go to lerp as well and we do have four other hands up to testify for this particular case
just to make you aware to you tanya can you hear me ma 'am with all due respect you have said
repeatedly you talk about the traffic about you know i haven't even begun to talk about the oh
I think you have. With all due respect, you've talked about the traffic, about I -76. This is a thoroughfare to I -76 and other points. Would you please summarize so we can get to the other witnesses? Thank you.
Okay. Mr. Chair, we have been on this line since 9 .30. This is the fourth time that we've had to do this.
And we moved.
We should make our case.
I need one at a time. I need one at a time, please, for the accuracy of the record. Thank you.
And we have moved other cases that are ahead of you to get to your case first.
And I just please ask that we now be allowed to present our case because we've been very
indulgent listening to other people test to present for hours.
Our case is not about that house.
It is about what the proposed project is going to, how it is going to impact the overall
community.
And next to Worcester Street, and as you can see where the yellow building is on the first
and the above picture is a residential block of Elkins Avenue.
They too can only exit their block by entering onto Worcester Street.
And they are literally entrapped in their block as they're trying to get out.
There's no right of way. And Worcester Street, as you can see from the photos, backs up and there's no right of way.
This corridor cannot handle any further traffic, any further traffic in this area.
It is posing a hardship and endangerment to not just the immediate neighbors, but it is endangering the rest of the community that has to navigate around this.
The Penn area neighbors have agreed to this.
The Bellfield area neighbors have agreed to this.
LaSalle University is strongly concerned about this.
And I'd like to just show you some of the things that are going on that you asked me,
what were the concerns with the other concerns about this project?
So let's just move off of traffic and go down to the next picture, please.
Can you go down to the next picture, Allison?
I'm going.
Okay, I'm sorry.
All right. You're somewhere in between. Go back. Okay. Okay. How many? You're going kind of fast. Okay. Go back. Go back. Okay. Stop. Stop there.
Okay, so this is the intersection of Worcester and Armstrong Street, the corner, the exact property that is being proposed for this use.
As you can see, the cars park all along the corridor, this parking all along the side of the property.
This is essential parking.
There is hardly any parking on that block already.
There are apartments to the point of hazardous saturation, and they park everywhere, anywhere, because there is no place else to.
and they park everywhere, anywhere, because there is no place else to put another car or another
human being. The picture to the right is, in fact, cars trying to jump off of Armstrong Street
into the Worcester Street traffic, and at the bottom of the hill is Belfield Avenue. These
pictures were taken at around 11 o 'clock in the afternoon, I mean in the morning, and the traffic
was that bad at that time of day.
So you can only imagine that multiplied
by rush hour traffic and cars coming in
and out of that corridor.
It is simply not,
it is going to present a hazard to the community.
Go down one more picture, please.
Again, here are the oncoming cars.
And as you can see in the rear, the trees,
that that is the proposed location for this new condo development and next to it is the residential
home of the residents um um there is there there is no access to this street and one of the bigger
issues is there's no parking across the street that's that side street that does not allow parking
and um the emergency vehicles if built as proposed would not be able to access residents at this
location because it's a one -way street. And the only way to enter Armstrong Street that you see
in front of you, Armstrong and Worcester, is to go all the way around Bellfield and come up a very
narrow street. Can you show the next picture, please? Stop. This is the entrance from Bellfield
Avenue into Armstrong Street. And when they get all the way to the end, they have to try to turn,
which as you see, trash vehicles, can you go up a little bit further, please?
Trash vehicles that service the existing apartments, there is one to the left that you see, must back into the street.
The proposed condo is all the way around the other side of Armstrong Street, and that is not possible.
the trash plan that is proposed is non -existent what did he say jumping the trash off from other
locations does not define how or what matter the trash would be handled in this process
and there there is absolutely no more room for any more for another multi -family dwelling that
is proposed in this area, let alone on the corner of Worcester and Armstrong Street.
The area is hazardously saturated. And can you go down a little bit further?
a little bit further. This is one of the stop. This is what it looks like on Armstrong Strait
next door to where this project is proposed. And as you can see, there are developments
everywhere. The existing residential homes, which were referred to as the holdout homes
and Mr. Whelan's June testimony.
I'm not sure what he's referring to
that they're holding out from,
but these homes have been engulfed in development.
Clarkson Street, which is the street
that you will see in the rear
where there is the gray building
is totally saturated with cars parked everywhere.
And as you know, when there's cars parked everywhere,
there's conflict.
There is absolutely no more room in this street. It is oversaturated. In the application, the developer said that his hardship was that his project doesn't fit in the space. And yes, indeed, that is a hardship. It doesn't fit in the space. It doesn't belong there.
There is nowhere to put it. And the idea that abutting it to a residential home and displacing or inconveniencing residents of 30 years is unconscionable as far as we see it.
um go down a little bit further i'm not sure um what i have left but therein lies the community
concern um um there's no there's no room for this complex the streets are too small
um it is going to impose um very severe hardship on the residents in the surrounding community
the residents in the surrounding community because they are going to lose access they're
because they are going to lose access.
going to it's going to enhance the uh traffic burden that the community is facing la salle
and the community have reached a peaceful and harmonious place because we recognize
that we would like to see these concerns addressed we would not like to see any more development in
this area until there is a traffic study that is conducted by the streets department of traffic
impact study to determine exactly and to what extent the community will be burdened by such
a development but as you can see this is a very very very dangerous situation that is being
presented here i'm sorry chair this is tanya sunkett again i again i apologize for interruptions
but it's now 1 p .m., and we're closely getting to the time when our IT Zoom personnel will be
unavailable to support an ongoing discussion. Can I ask that Stephanie Pritkin from LaSalle
University be allowed to speak? I will yield the floor. Something new and different? If it's
something new and different, yes. Can I just testify that I haven't been involved in that
Alice and Weiss.
I have been involved in that traffic, and it is terrible.
I go to the shops at LaSalle.
Ms. Weiss, pardon the interruption.
I think that's been, Ms. Brodus has testified to the traffic congestion numerous times during her testimony.
So, is anyone else who would like to speak on this case and something new and different?
Chair, I have Onita. Onita, I'm sorry if that's not the right pronunciation. You're going to unmute yourself.
Hi, good afternoon. This is Onita DeBrady, the resident at 543 East West Street.
Yeah, but just please spell your name and I'll swear you in.
O -N -E -I -T -A -D -E -V -R -A -D -Y.
You swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Thank you, ma 'am. Please proceed.
Okay, I just wanted to go on record as I stated in the questions and answers that my family is not opposing or for the project, we are remaining neutral. And that was what my attorney was supposed to state. But I do also want to go on record and do state that personally, at this time, I also have a problem just getting out of my residence.
I literally am bombarded by traffic every single morning.
It's very dangerous for me to pull out of my driveway.
Sometimes people don't even allow me personally to come out of my driveway so I can get to work in the morning.
It takes me sometimes from 10 to 30 minutes just to get to out of out of traffic.
and the, excuse me, the traffic does go all the way from Belfield, all the way back up to Chu and
Aune, and sometimes beyond that, all the way up to Wincote and Worcester. Again, I just want to
make it clear, we are neutral, our family is remaining neutral on this project. That was a
stipulation of our agreement with the opposing council for the agreement that we're now seeking
with them, but I do want to make sure that it's clear that we're not opposing, nor are we for the
project. And Mr. Whelan, you can state that that was a part of our agreement as well,
based on the papers that were sent to us. Is that correct, sir? Mr. Whelan?
Mr. Brady, I'm happy to get into a final 30 -second summation, but I want to make sure that we get
everything heard, because if we're not done in the next five minutes, I'm terrified.
You only have to answer yes or no, Mr. Whelan.
Ma 'am, ma 'am, I'm sorry. This is the administrator. Questions will not be asked of an attorney by just someone who's testifying. So if you finish with your testimony, we're going to move on. Thank you very kindly.
Anyone else?
We have Stephanie Pricken. I'm allowing to speak. Please unmute yourself and wait to be sworn in.
Good afternoon, ma 'am. Please spell your full name and I'll swear you in.
Hello, I'm Stephanie Pricken, S -T -E -P -H -A -N -I -E. Pricken, P as in Paul, R -I -C -K -E -N. My address, I represent LaSalle University, 1900 West Balney Avenue, Philadelphia, PA, 19141.
Thank you. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Thank you. Please proceed.
So I'm going to make this brief because I think the sentiment has been heard from the community about the extreme danger of Worcester Street and the congestion and the traffic volume.
I will just I want to corroborate that.
But I also want to bring up the concerns for emergency vehicles, ambulances, police, fire trucks, the route on.
ambulances, police, fire trucks. The route on the one -way street of Armstrong poses a
particular problem. There's a hairpin turn there. The street itself is extraordinarily narrow. There
is illegal parking in that area that remains unticketed, unsupervised. Residents from the
Armstrong Lough Apartments, which is not even fully occupied, park on the curbs, our curbs.
We have, because the street is so dense as far as traffic, we have had multiple accidents where
cars have jumped the curb and destroyed run -through fencing on LaSalle's property, which is a good
feet from the center of the Worcester Street. Of course, we have many students that walk up and
down the Worcester Street corridor because we own the property on either side of this project and
adjacent diagonally across the street. So we are opposed to the project based on the traffic flow.
There is no trash plan that I am aware of that is feasible, again, because as you saw in some of the pictures, a trash truck actually has to back up on a one -way street, which then blocks traffic for everybody else.
So again, it's mostly due to safety of students
and other pedestrian residents
that are walking up and down Wester Street.
The fact that as someone testified,
Elkins is a blind entry onto Wester Street,
which causes problems.
And the location of the one -way street on Armstrong,
which people have to pull out onto traffic
to actually make the turn.
onto worcester street either way and folks are parking and you can see in some of those pictures
right up to the stop sign on curbs residents block off parking spaces with cones because
there is not enough parking for the existing residents let alone adding on new folks into
this neighborhood thank you thank you anyone else to testify in this case please raise your hand
We have Sherry Cohen. Sherry, you will be sworn in at this time.
Ms. Cohen, please spell your full name and I'll swear you in.
Thank you. My first name is Sherry, S -H -E -R -R -I -E. My last name is Cohen, C -O -H -E -N.
You swear if I'm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do, Chairman.
Please proceed.
All right. Thank you. I want to say good afternoon to members of the zoning board.
My name is Sherry Cohen, and I'd first like to extend my personal greetings to Chairman
Frank DiCicco and Attorney Sharon Suleta.
I live a few blocks from 541 East Worcester Street and drive down that street at least
once a week on my way into Germantown, and I always experience the heavy and dangerous
congestion that currently exists on the street.
I'm here today as a community resident, as an attorney, and to provide historic context to today's zoning matter.
Chairman DeChico, from his time on City Council, might recall the historic issue in this neighborhood, which was alluded to earlier, and came to be known as the Battle of 20th Street.
LaSalle University, who we are so pleased to be working with on today's zoning case,
had wanted to completely close 20th Street between Bellfield and Olney Avenues to any through traffic
in order to protect their students from traffic and build a more cohesive campus.
20th Street had historically been a two -way street.
This neighborhood has long had a highly congested traffic pattern,
as a few of our streets are major traffic arteries germantown residents travel on chew avenue to
access i -76 and broad street central high and girls high school parents and students travel
on chew avenue to get to these schools and septa bus routes also travel on chew avenue
also upper west oak lane residents travel on nearby ogons avenue access i -76 and broad street
The Battle of 20th Street took place over a 40 -year period, 4 -0, 40 -year period.
My late father, Councilman David Cohen, was a champion for the community over all these years, as were scores of community residents and our community organizations at that time.
The Ogons Area Neighbors Association, for which my mother served as vice president, Bill Field Area Neighbors Association.
for which my mother served as vice president, Belfield Area Neighbors Association, and Penn
Area Neighbors Association. Community meetings about this very issue place often monthly.
Many hundreds of people signed petitions in protest of the proposed closure of 20th Street.
Daily Street protests began in the early 2000s. Every weekday morning, neighborhood residents
came out to protest with many car drivers honking their support as they passed by.
So many of the residents were our community elders in their 70s, 80s, and 90s. They came out
every morning with signs demanding keep 20th Street open and explaining why they opposed the
closure of 20th Street. Then and now, we wanted and still want to be able to enter and exit our
neighborhoods in safety without danger and without encountering huge traffic bottlenecks.
The Battle of 20th Street came to a head in 2004 when legislation was introduced by our former
district council member to change 20th Street to a one -way street. The neighbors were outraged and
a hearing was held in city council. A number of hearings had been scheduled for that day and we
all arrived in the early afternoon at the scheduled time of the hearing. Yet our hearing did not start
until after 1 a .m. in the morning. Our neighbors, led by our elders in their 70s, 80s, and 90s,
had to wait until after 1 a .m. to testify. The hearing did not conclude until after 4 a .m.
The city government that day showed massive disrespect to the people of our neighborhood.
Unfortunately, this legislation passed City Council and 20th Street became a one -way corridor.
This was an act of tremendous disrespect to the people of our neighborhood, especially after a 40 -year struggle.
This change to 20th Street led, as our neighbors had stated for 40 years, to increase congestion and danger on our neighborhood streets, especially on the 500 block of Worcester.
Worcester Street, as another traffic artery in the neighborhood, was frequently discussed during these years as a traffic alternative to 20th Street.
In fact, a traffic study was conducted by Orth, Rogers, Thompson, and Associates in 1987 to 1988,
which made clear that Worcester Street was the closest and most convenient traffic alternative to 20th Street.
Since 20th Street became a one -way street in 2004, traffic congestion and danger has only increased on the 500 block of Worcester Street and the surrounding streets.
Today, our community is more united than ever. As you just heard, LaSalle University is also opposed to this project.
We joined together to urge the Zoning Board of Adjustment to deny this request for a variance
as it would lead to more traffic congestion, more danger, more parking problems, and so much more
as expressed eloquently by other speakers. As an attorney, I also asked the Zoning Board of
Adjustment to follow long -standing legal precedent. The burden on an applicant seeking a zoning
variance is a heavy one. Variances should be granted sparingly and only under exceptional
circumstances. The reasons for granting the variance must be substantial, serious, and
compelling. Not one such reason has been shown by the applicant in this case. Thank you for
this opportunity to speak with you today. Thank you, Ms. Cohen, for your presentation.
you're reminding me of many sleepless nights in city council uh anyway uh is anyone else to
testify in this case no that's all chair chairman if if i may just have 45 seconds i'll i'll blow
through this as fast as i can um certainly what you've heard about today is that this is a
commercial you know commercial corridor more than half a mile away um significant traffic all
throughout an extended neighborhood, and frankly, one all through the LaSalle neighborhood, which
is not part of our project. It's not relevant to our specific site. We are offering 12 parking
spaces off street. So we are taking parking issues off the table and trying to do what we can there.
There's also extensive public transit in this area. And what you have heard is both through
the land planner, her expert opinion in her letter, and essentially from all the people
testifying today, there's been a significant change in the neighborhood and this densification
And this densification and change of the neighborhood and the multiple variances granted all around our project are actually completely in line with the 2035 plan for this neighborhood.
and change of the neighborhood and the multiple variances.
In fact, you know, LaSalle objects to development.
However, it's been the largest developer in the neighborhood for some number of years.
And, you know, we are with regard to trash, I'm not sure what people were referring to.
and obviously I didn't want to do it to slow down the process, but I object to any and all of the
mischaracterizations of my prior testimony. We have, with regard to trash, finally,
we have private trash collection, which will be required, as this board knows, because we have
more than 10 units. The city therefore requires it. With regard to our parking and plan and usage,
all of our parking will be off of Armstrong, all of our vehicular access will be, and purposely not
off of Worcester. And as the board is also aware, this all has to be approved by the streets
department. So any issues and, you know, suggestions that the emergency vehicles may or
may not be able to make certain turns, etc. That's, you know, obviously an issue that's
highly concerning, but it's not one for this board. That's a decision for the streets department
to make whether or not our project warrants that. And lastly, aside from the significant
change in the neighborhood, you have not heard today, but the property you saw is very large
and triangular in nature, and currently only zoned for a twin house, which you heard again
from the land planner is highly inappropriate for that use. So with that, I'll end as quickly as I
can. We've met all of our burdens for a variance, and I don't believe that this board has heard
anything today that would warrant it overturning its decision of granting the variance from
uh last june 16th thank you very much thank you any questions from the board
no mr chairman no no okay i think there's no one else on this to testify correct
akisha we do have one additional hand deanna cartwell as you wish chair
okay please ma 'am spell your full name i'll swear you in and if you could
Limit your testimony to something new and different that would be helpful.
Ma 'am, please unmute yourself.
Ms. Cardwell, you can unmute yourself.
Ms. Cardwell, please spell your full name.
diana cardwell d -e -a -n -n -a c -a -r -d -w -e -l -l you swear from the total truth the whole truth
nothing but the truth i do please proceed uh basically i wanted to you know i've sat here
since 9 30 and i did have a statement to read um it is about uh traffic and i just wanted to let you
know how extensive this problem is that the houses that are, you know, I agree with everything
that everybody else has said. It is such a problem that our driveways from 20th Street
down to 18th Street are used as a city street. Cars that are stuck in traffic on the main
thoroughfares, they're stuck. So what do they do? They come through our driveway and, you know,
it's very dangerous. I want to say that the Belleville area neighbors are opposed to this
project. We're not against development. We're just against development that does not add a good
benefit to the community. This project adds hardship to our community. It's not necessary.
it's an obtuse triangle that needs to be left alone. You have, we've talked about the local
traffic, but we also have 18 wheelers and people coming from the suburbs using Route 309 getting
to I -76 and I -95. It is a traffic nightmare. And I just want you to, it's not just something that,
you know we just decided to just come up with it is horrible we do need to try to study and
you know i just agree with everything that everybody else has said thank you very much
you know i disagree with everything that everybody else has said thank you very much
okay we can continue on please uh planning commission
it's uh ron bednar city planning that's his first name r -o -n last name bednar b -e -d -n -a -r
you swear for him to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth i do thank you ron
please proceed. City comprehensive plan recommends no changes in the existing residential zoning at
this location. Proposed uses are greater than the minimum necessary variance to provide zoning code
relief. Recommended requested the requested variance is not granted. I just have one other
question. Do we have anyone from the councilwoman's office? I believe this is councilwoman Bass's
district? Again, Chairman, Mr. Richardson is heavily involved until Ms. Oneida Grady.
I heard that. I heard your testimony earlier. No all due respect. I just wanted to make sure.
I'm chair. I'm sorry. This is Tanya. I see a person with their name, a hand raised named Oscar.
Oscar, if you could unmute and answer if you're from the councilwoman's office or not.
I am not.
I was just a community member that wanted to.
Thank you, Chair.
No one from the council's office.
You can continue.
Where am I?
MI 2020 -001171, 541 East Worcester Street.
My vote is no.
confessor plaza my vote is no james snell my vote is no thomas holliman my vote is no
thank you uh when i go back to our regular list again uh case number
9 on our list, MI 2021 -002, 318 -3693 -95 Morrell Avenue. Mr. Anastasio is the Attorney of Record,
West Toursdale slash Morrell Park RCO support, and Councilman Brian O 'Neill sent a letter of
non -opposition. Chair, hi, this is Tanya. I am very, very sorry. I have just received
correspondence from an attorney who has a conflict and would like to come next
because he has to be in LERP for a hearing momentarily. Mr. Sean Ward, would you allow
that, Chair? Which case is that? I don't see his name on the sheet here.
Mr. Ward, could you unmute yourself and just speak to what case at this moment that you're
here about?
Mr. Ward, unmute yourself.
There you go.
Mr. Chair, this is the last case, Jackson Street, 6816.
I am new counsel, new counsel for the applicant, replacing Cheryl.
Mr. Anastasia.
Do you have a problem with that?
If we just hear Mr. Ward's case and then come back to you.
As long as he's quick.
I'm always quick.
He is quick.
So let me read that case into the record.
MI 2021 -0008667816.
Jackson Street. Mr. Ward, please identify yourself and I'll swear you in.
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. Members of the board, Sean Ward, on behalf of the tenant applicant,
that's S -H -A -W -N -W -A -R -D -331, East Street Road, Trivos, PA, 19053.
Mr. Ward, do you agree to waive the reading of his refusal and stipulate to attack him?
I confess there was two refusals, the original refusal and an amended refusal, but I would
stipulate to both of them and waive their reading.
Thank you. Have you submitted a package with the required documents, proof of ownership,
prove a tax -compliant copy of the refusal order for floaters and plans five days prior to this
hearing? Yes, I have. And have you met with the RCO and have a letter? Yes, I do. Thank you.
Please proceed. Okay, very quickly, Mr. Chairman, I've submitted my typical exhibit packet.
Okay, very quickly, Mr. Chairman, I've submitted my typical exhibit packet.
I believe everybody can see my screen at this point.
I represent David Givindad -Nadzi, G -V -I -N -I -A -N -I -D -Z -E.
He is the principal of the tenant company that is leasing the property.
Present with me today, I have Eunice Roziev, who is the representative of the company for
today's hearing purposes. It is 6816 -24 Jackson Street is the subject property. As you can see,
the original notice of refusal was for a child daycare group. This application was
followed by Cheryl Pritzker Esquire on behalf of the property owner. The tenant engaged my
services for hearing purposes. However, we had to amend the notice of refusal for an adult daycare
center. So the original refusal is attached at A1, the amended refusal at A1 .1. The refusals did not
change, but the specific use did. So A2 is the ZBA application, A3 project information form, A4 proof
of ownership a5 proof of tax clearance i would point out that 20 and 21 uh involve brt appeals
and there's only a minor amount due uh but the appeal is still pending a6 or site and floor
plans a7 or photographs a8 is my rco meeting notice and certificate of mailing a9 is the rco
letter of support from taconi civic a10 if councilman heenan submitted anything i would
asked that that be marked as 810. I don't believe he did, though. A11, as far as zoning history,
in 2010, three lots were consolidated. 6812 was a parsonage, 6816 is the church proper,
and 6822 was the church hall and education center. Beyond that, from pre -1935 through 2019,
This property was used as a church, parsonage, and education center for the St. Petrie Lutheran Church.
A12 is the zoning map. A13 is the aerial photograph.
This application represents the adaptive reuse of the church hall and education center from its previous use to that of an adult daycare center.
So moving quickly, we have the original refusal, which was dated January, for a group daycare.
The amended refusal July 27 for adult daycare. And then we have, obviously, Cheryl's application of appeals. Our project information form. I entered my appearance in this matter at the last listing on June 23rd. Here's a copy of the deed.
i'm sorry mr ward yes ma 'am this is tanya sunk at the administrator my apart my interruption
but um the attorney previously handling the case has just requested a clarification
that it's rachel krisker for the record not sure oh i'm sorry sorry rachel that that was my fault
I stand corrected. So again, here's the proof of tax compliance. Again, there's a $355 balance for
2020, but those two years are under BRT appeal. So I submit that they are substantially tax
compliant. Here is the floor plan as prepared by my client's design professional. As you can see
on the site plan, there are three structures on the site. The church is located in between
the two other structures. To the left was the parsonage, and to the right, this T -shaped
building was the church hall and education center, and that is the area and the building
that we propose, the adult daycare center. With regard to the floor plans for the adult daycare,
From the front of the building, you have a vestibule entrance, a library to the right,
a proposed nurse's office to the left with a handicap bathroom and shower to aid and assist
the adult clients in the event they need to clean themselves up for obvious reasons.
To the right, we would have a game room. Beyond that, arts and crafts. Beyond that,
recreational room and a computer and movie room at the far back would be the office reception area
across from that are the men's and ladies rooms and then this larger room on the left side of
the building would be the dining hall they do have the assembly hall at the rear of the building
there is a performing arts stage existing in the assembly hall along with a commercial kitchen
where the lunches and other foods would be prepared for the adult clients who would be fed and served at the site.
where the lunches and other foods would be prepared for the
The main entry would be at the rear of the property.
The clients would be delivered by paratransit van, which would pull in off the street, unload in the driveway area,
and then they would enter the building through the side rear entrance where they would register with office and reception.
and then be taking in um moving down uh this is just an overhead aerial photograph you can see
the church is uh in the center with the red dot on it the t -shaped building represents the uh
adult daycare center and again the parsonage which is currently used as a single family residence
uh to the far upper right corner of the block is three children's place
preschool located right behind us is the distant elementary school
distant playground to the north, and Jackson Street, North Street, Gillespie Street, and Longshore Avenue.
Again, just some photographs, the existing parsonage building, the existing church,
and this is the subject building that would be used for the adult daycare.
Again, just another aerial photo showing the layout of the three buildings.
This is Jackson Street facing south. You can see the building on the right is the assembly hall.
Jackson Street facing north. Again, the building to the left this time is the assembly hall.
The existing performing arts stage in the building, the kitchen.
And these are just some of the rooms. Obviously, no work has commenced since we are still waiting
for our zoning approvals before we can obtain uh the fit out permits to do the work inside
it's pretty much left as is when the uh when they purchased the property
again just some of the other rooms the library
this would be the dining hall room that was referenced earlier typical shots of the bathroom
copy of our notice to the rco and neighbors regarding the meeting copy of the refusal
was sent to them as well to the addresses provided by the planning commission and a certificate of
mailing showing that 78 identical pieces were sent out in the mail to those addresses
the letter from taconi civic as you can see the vote was seven to nothing in support of the
application the zoning history again this is the permit for the lot consolidation back in 2010
And then I have all the associated plan with that application. And then, of course,
the description and then the zoning permits dating back to 1935 for the use as St. Petrie's
Lutheran Church. Also in the packet, obviously, is the zoning map and another aerial photograph.
just to summarize the adult daycare again it's an adaptive reuse uh there's four buildings on
the site the church the church hall the parsonage and a small accessory garage it would be adult
daycare only no overnight stays no child daycare we anticipate eight to ten employees hours of
operation generally monday to friday eight to five saturday and sunday to be determined
client transportation is provided by uh paratransit vans to and from the location
and we have five off street spaces for that drop off and pick up so they're not
getting out of the car in the street but definitely i would say that there's ample
parking on jackson street and gillespie street um for the employees so that that being the sum
and substance of our presentation uh unless the board has any questions i can have mr
uh unis sworn in and he can adopt and verify hold on a minute just give me a second i'll be right
back, please. Okay.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
that uh do you have your client mr uh ward he said right next to me mr chair please have him
identify himself and i'll swear him in you know please state your name and spell your full name
for the record yunos rosia y -u -n -u -s r -o -z -y -y -e -v you swear for him to tell the truth the whole
truth nothing but the truth i swear thank you all right yunas you've heard my representations to the
board yes are they true and correct to the best of your knowledge information and belief yes and
you adopt them as your own testimony yes thank you any questions from the board no mr chairman
no anyone else would like i'm sorry anyone else would like to testify in this case please raise
your hand no hands thank you uh planning commission ron bednar city planning city comprehensive plan
recommends no change to the existing residential zoning at this location proposed use is a common
accessory use associated with church facilities. Therefore, we recommend that the board grant the
variances for the daycare and the multiple uses on the line. Thank you. Mr. Ward, I think I have
a note that says there's a proviso as per the amended refusal. They did indicate that there
There was provisos, but they never submitted them.
It dealt with the hours of operation, but that's -
Excuse me, this is Sharon.
Let me explain.
Mr. Ward, when there's an amended refusal,
we simply add a proviso referencing that refusal
and the date it was issued.
Okay, thank you.
MI 2021 -000866.
My vote is yes with proviso as amended, as per amended refusal dated 7 -27 -2021.
I'm sorry.
Before we continue, Chair, I would ask that you state the address because it was misstated.
Thank you.
I just did.
I'm sorry.
And MI 2021 -000866, 7816 Jackson Street.
My vote is yes with the proviso as per amended refusal dated July 27th, 2021.
Professor Plaza, my vote is yes.
James Snell, my vote is yes with proviso.
With proviso.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes with proviso.
Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, members of the board, thank you very much.
And thank you to Tanya and Vern.
Thank you. You're welcome, Sean. All right.
We're back to case number nine, MI 2021 -002 -318 -3693 -95 Morrell Avenue.
As I stated earlier, there's a letter of support from West Toursdale and Morrell Park and a letter of non -opposition from Councilman Brian O 'Neill.
Thank you for your patience, Mr. Anastasio. Please proceed.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm still under oath. And if a confessor has some questions for me,
I'll answer them. Yes. Do you agree to wait the reading of its refusal and stipulate to its
accuracy? I do. And have you emailed an exhibit packet with the required documents, proof of
ownership, proof of tax compliance, copy of the refusal, or referral photos and plans five days
prior to this hearing? I have. And have you met with the RCO and have a letter? Yes.
thank you please proceed thank you so uh 3693 -95 morale is a referral it is not a refusal
is a referral it is not a refusal uh and what we're doing here is i'll zoom out for you
uh and what we're doing here is
we're taking this parcel and we are subdividing it so that my clients uh can purchase one of the
spots and uh it's a church is the existing structure my client is apple tree child care
and learning center it's a four star blue ribbon accredited preschool uh currently operating in
the lower level of this existing building.
We wanna just expand upstairs.
It was a previous house of worship
and I'll walk you through the subdivision plan.
Here's the photos of the interior of the first floor.
we've got exterior shots
let's see if i can paginate them correctly
again this is the bird's eye view of the property and the church itself
on the lower level is where the preschool is currently they want to go upstairs
This is the interior of the lower level.
They've been in the neighborhood for quite some time.
They provide an incredible service to the community.
There's currently a waiting list for the expansion.
And that is why we have been able to secure.
I'm also moving into evidence.
Of course, the D, the Certificate of Bulk Mailing, 168 pieces, as well as the flyer, both flyers that we mailed to the near neighbors, practically unanimous support with only one unaffected member opposing.
and of course we also received a letter from council even councilman o 'neill sent a letter
late yesterday via alice and you should have that in the file i don't have that in my packet
it was sent over after my it people put this together but i did personally forward it to
miss sunkett and attorney saletta as well and with that i respectfully request the granting of this
special exception. Thank you. Do you have a client? Yes, I do. If Mr. Borenstein could
please raise his hand. It's Robert Borenstein. And Mr. Robert, is it available? I am here.
Can you hear me? Yes, please spell your full name, sir. Yes, it's Robert, R -O -B -E -R -T.
Borenstein is B -O -R -E -N -S -T -E -I -N.
Do you swear if I'm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Thank you, Mr. Anastasio.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Borenstein, did you hear my presentation to the board this afternoon?
Was it true and accurate to the best of your knowledge?
And would you adopt it as your own testimony, please?
Unless there's any questions, that's all I have, Mr. Chair.
Thank you.
Any questions on the board?
no mr chairman no anyone else like to testify in this case if so please raise your hand
no handshare you planning commission
ron bedmower city planning
this property is um comprehensive plan recommends that the residential at this
location no change uh is proposed the um special exception application we believe is uh
is sufficient and we recommend request the board that they thank you mi 2021 -002318
three six nine three dash nine five morelle avenue my vote is yes
professor plaza my vote is yes james snell my vote is yes thomas holliman my vote is yes
thank you all thank you thank you now go to case number 10 mi 2021 dash zero zero two four two six
4920 -50 city avenue gussie o 'neill is the attorney of record rco submitted letters of
non -opposition they are the city avenue special services district and winfield residents association
good afternoon good afternoon please spell your full name
Good afternoon.
Good afternoon.
Please spell your full name and I'll swear you in.
My full name is Augusta O 'Neill.
My last name is spelled O -apostrophe -N -E -I -L -L.
You swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
Thank you.
Mr. Plaza has questions for you.
Yes, ma 'am.
Have you await the reading of his refusal and stipulate to his accuracy?
And have you emailed an exhibit packet with the required documents, proof of ownership, proof of tax compliance, copy of the refusal or referral, photos and plans five days prior to this hearing?
Yes, I did.
Okay. And have you met with the RCO and have the letter?
Yes, it's part of my exhibit package.
Thank you. Peace for the seat.
Thank you so much. I'm just going to share my screen.
it's going to be fairly brief i know you guys are uh interested to get done before too so
i'm with the law firm of clara harrison harvey brandsberg um i'm here this afternoon on the
property at 4920 uh city avenue which is commonly known as the balla apartments i've been before
the board um within the past couple months on several similar applications uh my clients had
entered into a partnership with Woodward Properties for a handful of multifamily properties,
including this one. This one is zoned RM3. And after entering into their agreement with Woodward
Properties, they just were doing some due diligence and discovered that a number of the city's records
for the properties were incorrect. This property is one of them. This property is reflected in the
city's zoning records as having only 55 units, when in actuality it's 56. But the reason that
I'm here before you this afternoon is because we are asking for a use variance. There is an office
in this building. It was previously, according to the zoning files on Atlas, the zoning, I'm sorry,
the office had been used as a barbershop back in the 70s, and then it was a doctor's office.
So we are asking for the use to be approved as a business and professional office on the first floor.
So there's not going to be any construction. The office is already at the property.
We did meet with the designated RCO, the Winfield Residence Association, on June 15th of this year.
The neighbors had no opposition, and their letter of support is in my exhibit package at tab number two.
kim white is with me this morning from the uh representing the ownership and she is available
to answer any questions that the board may have about the application um and so with that being
said i just wanted to call forward ms white to adopt my testimony kim if you're available if
you could just hit the raise hand button right please raise your hand and spell your name and
I'll swear you in.
Ms. White is available.
She can unmute herself.
Hello?
Ms. White, yes.
Your full name, ma 'am?
Kimberly White.
I'm sorry.
If I could.
Somebody has another device on.
Ms. White, do you have another device on?
If so, please turn that off, please.
We're getting feedback.
Mr. O 'Neill, you being an officer of the court, you stipulate that your client would
have adopted your testimony.
Any questions from the board?
Thank you.
No, Mr. Chairman.
Anyone else to testify in this case?
If so, please raise your hand.
no hands chair thank you planning commission ron bednar city planning the comprehensive plan
recommends no change in the existing residential multi -family zoning at this location the proposal
for the first floor office complements the existing uses in the surrounding area with purpose and
spirit of the zoning code therefore we recommend the request of variance beginning thank you
am i am i 2021 that's zero zero two four two six four nine two zero dash five zero city avenue my
vote is yes professor plaza my vote is yes james snell my vote is yes thomas holliman my vote is
MI 2021 -0007874918 Walnut Street.
4918 Walnut Street.
Darlene Threat is the attorney of record.
Darlene Threat is the attorney of record.
Councilwoman Gautier sent a letter of non -opposition
provided the number of units is,
a number of units did not exceed three units.
And Ms. Threat is coming in now as a panelist.
Thank you.
Tanya, how are you all doing on time?
We're going to lose the Zoom.
Chair, you can continue until completion, and I will be available as you wish to help with that process.
All right, thank you.
There's only one other case after this.
Thank you.
Mr. Chair, please spell your full name, and I'll swear you in.
You're muted.
Ms. Threat, Ms. Threat, you're muted.
okay i should be unmuted now you're unmuted now please identify yourself and i'll swear you in
good afternoon commissioners darlene threed on behalf of the applicant rahabat properties
main principal abby l moosey my address is 45 east city avenue felicanwood pa 19004
you swear a friend to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth
Yes, I do.
Thank you.
Mr. Plaza has questions for you.
I'm sorry, Chair.
Mr. Plaza, I apologize.
But could we just have her last name
spelled into the record, please?
That would be T as in Thomas.
H -R -E -A -T -T as in Thomas.
Thank you, Kylie.
Kate, do you agree to waive the reading
of its refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes, I do.
And have you emailed an exhibit packet with the required documents, proof of ownership, proof of tax compliance, copy of the refusal or referral, voters and plans five days prior to this hearing?
Yes, I have.
And have you met with the RCO and have the letter?
Yes, I do.
Thank you. Please proceed.
Commissioners, I would just like to begin by amending my application.
We originally applied for three, excuse me, five units, and we negotiated with the community
whereby we will only be presenting three units.
Can you see my screen?
I have submitted a presentation package.
In the package contains the zoning permit application, a refusal, the appeal, the deed
and tax info.
I'd like to specifically say the tax info shows a one cent balance and you cannot pay a one cent
balance on the city website. There's property information, zoning history, plans, pictures,
community flyers, and a letter of support. Commissioners, we applied to have a five
family dwelling at 4918 Walnut Street. I'm just going to give you a little background. We met
with the community several times initially they were very very opposed to the five units
we went back and forth and we had another meeting and we met near the property we ultimately agreed
to reduce the density of the request to three units so at the end I would like to have the
new plan stamped if that's acceptable yes ma 'am so I'm not going to go through every single document
here. I'm just going to kind of scroll down. Here's the deed which shows that my client
Rahabat property bought this property I believe in 2020. Excuse me this is Sharon. One question
is three. Is this the reuse of an existing structure? Yes. Okay then the board cannot
add a revised plans proviso. Any proviso would then be simply limiting the number of units.
Thank you.
Very well.
Here's the one cent balance on the taxes.
I gave you some property information just to show the general mandates of the property.
Commissioners, I included in my package here today some what I would call property history.
I wanted to show you that the neighborhood and the character of the properties here are changing.
There are many multi -families on the 4900 block of Walnut Street.
I counted 10 myself.
There's a six -family dwelling at 4950 Walnut Street.
Oops, there's a two -family dwelling at 4909 Walnut Street, excuse me, a three -family dwelling.
and there's a
And there's a two -family dwelling at 5 ,000 Walnut Street.
I have attached a set of plans for a review. Here we have what we would call
the site plan. You can see that this property is a little different from the other properties on
the block. It actually sits alone by itself. It's not attached on either side here. There
is a breezeway here on both sides of the property. It's not an attached dwelling.
This is the current condition of the property. It's actually a six -family house. The utilities are in the basement. The living and dining area is on the first floor. The second floor has two bedrooms and the third floor has four bedrooms, a six -family dwelling.
What are we proposing is to put three apartments in the structure.
We agreed to no basement use.
The community did not want any apartment or any living space in the basement.
So we took it out.
Can you hear me?
Commissioner?
Your computer keeps freezing.
Am I back?
The back now, yes.
So I'll try to do it very quickly.
Here we have a two -bedroom apartment.
You see you can enter from the front.
You can get to each floor from the stairs.
Each has a two -bedroom apartment.
They're pretty spacious apartments.
They're approximately 750 square feet plus.
I don't know what happened to my previous room.
Here is the actual property. It's a large dwelling. It has the entry in the front and I have a picture
of the posting there. I took a wider view of the property to show that this is a standalone property
and most of the other properties on the block are attached properties.
it's just another view of the property
you can see both of the breezeways where the trash will be stored until trash day
this is just an insignificant close -up of the property i'm going to
And this is how the block looks in general. That's a look going west down Walnut Street.
The houses are very similar, but most houses are attached on this block. There are various
corner apartment buildings. This is at the actual corner of 49th Street. I show these
pictures to show you that we're not really changing the character of the neighborhood,
that most of these large houses have been converted into multifamilies, and there are
several apartment buildings in the area. We did meet with the community, and I took a picture of
some of the multifamilies in the area. You can see there's a four -family dwelling there.
I believe I have a copy of a six -family dwelling. That's a picture of the community looking west
down walnut street and on the corner here is a legal six -family dwelling i i gave you the
zoning documentation and the property history we uh did meet with the uh there's another
apartment building we did meet with the community two times i fired the neighborhood uh
we lost you again today we had a second meeting where we agreed units and uh we were able to get
the support of the community association walnut hill community association they did send in
a letter of support and commissioners that's pretty much all i have and i'm open to any
questions that you may have. Do you have your client available to adopt your testimony? Yes,
I do. Mr. Moussi, can you state your name and address for the record, please?
Hi, my name is Abel Moussi. Please spell your full name. My name is Abel Moussi A like Apple B like boy.
My name is Abel Musi. I like Apple, B like Boy, I like International, I like Elephant, I like Lamp. Musi, M like Mary, U like Umbrella, S like Sam, S like Sam, I like International, I like Elephant.
You swear from the tell truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Thank you. Mr. Street?
Mr. Musi, are you part owner of 4918 Walnut Street?
And have you heard my testimony today?
And would you adopt it as true and accurate?
Thank you very much.
That's all I have, Commissioner.
Any questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
Anyone else would like to testify in this case?
Please raise your hand.
No, no hands, Chair.
Thank you.
Planning Commission?
City Planning, Ron Bednar.
City comprehensive plan recommends no change in the existing single family residence.
zoning at this location however walnut street is wide with excellent transit access and can
accommodate increased density some of the buildings on the block have been converted to multi -family
based on the original application revisions we recommend the board grant the requested
variance has provided three dwelling units only thank you mi 2021 -000787 4918 walnut street my
vote is yes with the proviso maximum three units. Professor Plaza yes with proviso. James Snell
yes with proviso. Thomas Holliman yes with proviso. Thank you. Number 14 on our list
MI 2021 -002639. 6501 -95 East Roosevelt Boulevard. Brett Feldman is the attorney of record.
There is a letter of support from the community on the rise, RCO.
Mr. Feldman, if you're in attendance, can you please raise your hand?
Hi, Chair.
It appears as though we have a hand up of Melanie Lacey.
may I allow her to speak to determine if she's the attorney being
handling this case yes please thank you Ms. Lacey unmute yourself
it appears I'm unmuted can you hear me yes are you the attorney for this case
I am I will be presenting okay thank you chair if you give us one moment we will
promote her to a panelist thank you when you're ready
when they're ready Ms. Lacey please spell your full name I swear to you
and Ms. Lacey you just have to unmute yourself
sorry about that can you hear me now yes please call your full name
sure Melanie Lacey that's M -E -L -A -N -I -E last name L -A -C -E -Y on behalf of the applicant I'm with
Claire Harrison Harvey Brandsburg, 1835 Market Street, Suite 1400, Philadelphia, 19103.
Do you swear if I'm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Thank you again.
Please proceed.
So this is the application of Pediatric Dental Associates, which applied for a variance relief
to open a dentist's office in the strip mall called Roosevelt Plaza, located at 65.
Hold on, man.
I apologize.
Professor, before you speak, Ms. Lacey, your camera is not on? Are you aware?
Yeah, I have it on, but I don't see myself either.
Okay. Do you have something over your actual camera?
No, I do not. I saw myself when it loaded.
Do you have a button maybe that you have to move so your camera comes on?
Let's see what's going on.
We typically like to have all those attorneys presenting to be visible on the screen.
Sure, of course.
But if it doesn't work for you, you're quite welcome to proceed after Mr. Confessor Plaza reads the questions.
Yes. Ma 'am, you agree to waive the reading of its refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
And have you emailed an exhibit packet with the required documents, proof of ownership, proof of tax compliance, copy of the refusal or referral photos and plans five days prior to this hearing?
I did.
And have you met with the RCO and have a letter?
We did, and we have the letter.
Thank you.
Please proceed.
For some reason, it appears as though my camera isn't working at the moment.
I apologize.
No worries.
We'll allow it this time.
Okay, thank you very much. All right, so this is the application of Pediatric Dental Associates,
Thank you very much.
All right.
So this is the application of Pediatric Dental Association.
which applied for variance relief to open a dentist office in a strip mall called
Roosevelt Plaza, located at 6501 -95 Roosevelt Boulevard. The property is zoned CA -2,
but we're here because it falls within the Northeast Overlay District, which requires
DBA approval for medical, dental, and health practitioner uses. So the applicant is a tenant
of the subject property as evidenced by the executed lease in the exhibit package that I
forwarded last week. And Pediatric Dental Associates actually already has a presence
in this neighborhood. Its previous offices were located diagonally across the street at 6404
Roosevelt Boulevard in the basement of a freestanding medical office building.
Let me see if I'm able to share my screen with you. I know the camera.
okay please let me know if you see my screen yes we do okay wonderful
okay so here is a map uh that shows the proximity of the two locations and this is a picture of
the former building and a picture of uh the new location which was previously occupied by
in a page, which you can see right here, if you can see my cursor.
So they're relocating, as I said, to Roosevelt Plaza to build a state -of -the -art facility
that will serve as their flagship office, increase their services, include orthodontics,
increase their patient capacity, and serve a larger population. So as for the application
history, they received a refusal on June 4, 2021, which I will show. They submitted an appeal on
June 14 and presented at the Coordinating RCO's meeting, which is Community on the Rise, on July 14.
And Community on the Rise submitted their letter of support to the ZBA on July 22, which you can see here.
To our knowledge, the application remains uncontested.
So other items in the hearing package include the Tax Clearance Certificate,
which was issued on September 14th. And the zoning archives in connection with the last tenant
show that it was actually a health practitioner use as well. It was adult daycare center,
and that permit was issued in 2015. So as for the relief being sought today, granting the use
variance will not result in any adverse impacts on the community. The proposed use is consistent
with the surrounding tenants in the strip mall, as well as other commercial buildings along
Roosevelt Boulevard. The dentist's office will occupy an existing commercial space, so there
won't be any increase in congestion in the public streets. It won't burden public facilities, cause
any damage, pollution, or danger. And lastly, the applicant's specialization in pediatric dental
services serves a much -needed demand, particularly for lower -income patients in this district.
Let me actually show you some pictures of or renderings rather of how it will look after
construction or signage at least in the interior. Okay, so that more or less sums up the application.
I'm accompanied by the applicant's representative, executive vice president and CIO
So, Jim DeFruccio, who will swear in.
Thank you.
Sir, would you please spell your full name?
And Mr. Jim, is it available?
Yes, good afternoon.
How are you?
Good afternoon.
Please spell your full name and I'll swear your name.
My name is James DeFruccio, J -A -M -E -S.
d as in david e f as in frank r u s c i o as an oscar you swear affirm to tell the truth the
whole truth nothing but the truth i do thank you um hey jim did you hear my testimony to the board
i did do you affirm that it is true and accurate to the best of your knowledge
i do and do you adopt the testimony as your own yes i do great um if you feel there's anything
necessary to add feel free to do so now i'm good with what you presented thank you wonderful thank
you thank you miss uh miss lacy any questions from the board no mr chairman no anyone else
would like to testify in this case if so please raise your hand no hands chair thank you planning
commission so ron deadnard city planning this property is uh city comprehensive plan recommends
This property is a city comprehensive plan recommends no changes to the existing zoning at this location, commercial zoning at this location.
Opposed dental medical offices is consistent with the existing neighborhood shopping center uses.
We recommended the board grant the requested use variance.
Thank you.
MI 2021 -002639.
6501 -95 East Roosevelt Boulevard, my vote is yes.
James Snell, my vote is yes.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
Seems we may have temporarily lost confessor.
My understanding that there was a case that should have been added on earlier for today's list.
And that case is MI 2021 -000467, 3613 North 16th Street, is represented by, the applicant's represented by Rachel Pritzker.
before we begin is there anyone beside miss pritzker who wishes to be heard in this case
if so raise your hand i just want to get a show of hands
no hands chair hands are up um is miss pritzker available yes and she's coming in now as a
parents that's good identify yourself you're sure this is Sharon you're breaking up I'm sorry chair
just to confirm this is I'm sorry chair this is a resumption hearing it was last heard on
August 3rd and it was to be resumed today because another ZBA or rather RCO meeting was going to be
held and it was held for feedback from the community that's accurate thank you you're
breaking up again but uh this is a resumption hearing waiting for feedback from uh the rco
is that accurate miss pritzker yes okay just identify yourself you're already you're already
under oath from earlier today rachel r -a -c -h -a -e -l pritzker p -r -i -t -z -k -e -r 1635 market street suite
1600 philadelphia pa 19103 please explain about the rco letter yep i'm just going to share my
screen uh we met with the rco it was the 13th um democratic ward rco and they submitted a letter
of support essentially as you can see during the thursday september 9 virtual hearing
we met with the community and reduced the project from six units to three units
um and uh they have now um submitted you know support and approval for the project
uh there are um revised plans that we sent in i believe it's one page um and that reflect
the reduction from six units to three units i'm looking at the proviso so far
number c i believe we can enforce um number five no
number okay uh i i believe and correct me if i'm wrong sharon or someone i think the only
enforceable proviso would be under number letter c under item four i don't see what's above that
number three and then what's one and two could you scroll down rachel uh property was recently
affected residents i think that's it chair i agree um but even that even see it doesn't specify
where the trash enclosure is ms pritzker is that shown on the revised plans a trash enclosure
yeah i believe it is um i have the plans okay in which case it would
simply be revised plans one page yeah it's the trash enclosures at the rear
okay and that's reflected as sharon said in the revised plan correct correct okay any questions
from the board no mr chairman no anyone else to testify in this case
i have the owners on i don't know if the board needs them to swear if you would like to have
him adopt your testimony that's fine sure that would be justin john
mr john you can unmute yourself hi this is justin yeah spell your first and last name
yeah spell your first and last name first name justin j -u -s -t -i -n last name's john j -o -h -n
first name justin j -u -s -t -i -n last
you swear if i'm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth yes thank you miss
pritzker justin have you heard my testimony today um do you believe it to be true and accurate and
do you adopt it as your own yes thank you nothing great rachel the revised plan shows only maximum
number three units um well they it's a site plan so i believe it does probably in the description
i'll put it in there but that's fine yes okay thank you planning commission
planning commission may have taken a position on this before but uh based on the revised plan
if we have no objection to the planning of defense. Thank you. MI 2021 -000467
3613 North 16th Street. My vote is yes with the following proviso one
proviso one page revision one page approved today. Maximum three units. Thank you. Professor Plaza
yes with provisals james snell yes with provisals thomas holliman yes with proviso
thank you um is there anyone who believes that they've not been
given opportunity to testify today if so please raise your hand
no hands chair okay any uh any uh unfinished business tanya sharon no chair no nothing for me
all right thank you this was a crazy day on my behalf i apologize if i got a little nuts earlier
but hey i'm 75 i deserve to get crazy no worries chair see everyone back here tomorrow morning
see you tomorrow morning thank you all okay bye thank you okay thank you good night