a window in between. And we have again the door on the left takes you straight
upstairs to the second floor unit. The door on the right takes you into a
a living room, a dining room, a kitchen with a full bath.
Give me one second, please.
Our second floor up the stairs
takes you into a large kitchen living area.
There's a bedroom in the center,
large living room in the rear, and then three full bedrooms on the third floor.
We have plenty of ample space for storage of trash, which has been used on the side.
Both tenants will have access to this gate so that trash can come in and out easily.
proof of posting
and now let's walk that there's the property again
now let's walk down the block a little you're going to see several properties
that are set up exactly the same way two doors equaling two units here's a property
with one, two, three mailboxes right down the block.
This is all on the same block, same street.
Two mailboxes, one door, one mailbox,
another door, a large triplex.
Another duplex right down the block.
Duplex on one side, duplex on another.
Again, property with two doors.
so this was a common thing to do back in the 50s. Across the street is a very large multifamily
dwelling and by the way all of these have been approved by L&I and or the zoning board as
recently as 2017-2018. Again we are 4917 North 13th and here are the following neighbors.
4903, a legal three-family dwelling, 4905, a legal three-family dwelling.
a legal three family dwelling, 4905 a legal three family dwelling, 4907 a legal two family dwelling,
4909 a legal three family dwelling, 4911 a legal three family dwelling, 4915 a legal three family
dwelling, 4919 a legal duplex, 4923 legal three family dwelling permit issued 2018,
4927, three-family dwelling, 4931, three-family dwelling. And that's before we get across the
street to this very large multifamily dwelling. So I just want to make sure that we're clear
that if this were to have to be reconverted somehow facade-wise and interior-wise as a
single family home it would be one of maybe four single family homes on the entire block and one
of those four uh in addition to this particular one is is you know well not this particular one
but one of those four is vacant boarded up so i've already showed you the history of this
particular property and it's our position that because the property has a standing use as a
two-family dwelling and a history of it, and because a multifamily block, and it's uniquely
laid out inside and unique outside to suggest a two-family dwelling, where making it one family
would, in fact, as a single family, be both physically impracticable and financially
unmarketable. For those reasons, we respectfully request the granting of this variance,
And if there's nothing else at the moment, I would like to ask my client, Leran, to raise his hand.
My name's last name.
Shoshan, you can unmute yourself and speak now.
Good afternoon, sir.
Please, I spell your full name.
Leran Ben Shoshan.
L-I-R-A-N
S-H-A-N
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth,
nothing but the truth?
Thank you.
Leron, did you hear my presentation to the board
this afternoon?
Is it true and accurate to the best of your knowledge?
And do you adopt it as your own testimony if need be?
Thank you, Leron.
Mr. Chairman, I'm open for questions.
Could you go back to the print that shows the second floor interior?
How many bedrooms are there in that second and third floor unit?
The second and third floor unit have four bedroom total.
First floor has?
One bedroom total.
Questions from the board.
Oh, no. All right. Anyone else would like to testify in this case? Please raise your hand.
We have Mr. Charles Richardson. Mr. Richardson, you can unmute yourself and speak.
Richardson, just identify yourself. You're still on the road.
Good afternoon again, Mr. Chair. The Logan Civic Association, unbeknownst to us, had conducted a RCO meeting back on
May the uh 10th and uh there were 18 people in attendance uh 17 and the vote was 17 to 1
in opposition the one uh who voted in favor was the uh the young lady who lives in the property
right now and has been you know living in the entire property uh with her family from my
understanding so uh there was a according to the logan civic they they uh feel that there was a
misrepresentation on the layout of the building because of the fact that the young lady has been
living throughout the entire property so uh in support of the of the uh civic association and
the near neighbors we are uh going to be opposing the granting of the variance for this property
Mr. Richardson, is Logan Civic the same as Logan Community Enterprise Center?
No, those are two separate RCOs.
And the coordinating RCO, I want to be clear again.
The one that we had selected was the Logan Community Enterprise.
And they didn't respond.
The individual who is on record to be the chair of the RCO received the email, but he did not respond.
The Tina Marie Russell is that is the actual person who handles all of the RCO business.
But from my understanding, and I got no further.
But from my understanding, I got no further communications from anybody with regard to this. This is why I was tracking down everything at the last minute today, trying to figure out who actually did this, if anything had taken place.
So there actually was an RCO meeting. But, you know, we had no knowledge of the RCO meeting taking place or anything. So, you know, again, we support the community. So we will be opposing the granting of the variance.
Mr. Chairman, respectfully, I just saw this letter that came out, because it was just forwarded to me on my cell phone minutes ago. I don't believe it says that 17 attendees opposed it.
uh it it only says it said there were 17 attendees and one attendee who was a near neighbor who is
in fact the property occupant um and and that the community group in and of itself is opposing it
they're opposing it but they don't tell us the number of folks who actually voted against it
or the number of folks who voted for at least i didn't see that in the tally
at all and as far as the misrepresentate you can't misrepresent two separate doors and the
facade nor can you misrepresent the photos the fact of the matter is because it's not zoned
for a duplex one person is there uh and we can't put another person in there and she's using both
units well we can't put one person in there until we have zoning for the two separate units she's
been there for quite a while uh she at one point one part of her family was living in one unit and
one and she and another part of her family were living in second but there's never been any
question or dispute that there's not two separate units richardson you sound like you were about to
say something yes sir uh you know and and and verne will say this is hearsay but i did speak
with charlene samuels who is the the the person who runs the rco over on you know for logan civic
and she was the one that did say that it was 17 to one and that the only person that voted for the
for the property for the property to be changed was the lady that's living in the property at
this point so uh you know while i don't you know it may be hearsay but that is an actual fact though
he's correct i have to object as hearsay for the record of course i understood sustained
uh the current what we're looking at now is that the current layout of the of the second and third
floor or is that what's being proposed absolutely no this is it absolutely positively there's two
separate doors in the facade of that property one door takes you right upstairs to the second
and floor unit one door takes you right uh to the first floor for that one bedroom i get that i just
again i wanted the second and third floor are laid out exactly what we're looking at now do you have
any photographs there are yes of course interior photographs of course yes
they're not marked perhaps which floor and what you know what unit but yeah this is all
renovations to be done here wow yeah so it's a lot and and um again we're we're on a multi-family
block a single understood i think you made that point single family home isn't going to work here
regardless so market market wise understood understood i think you made that point quite
well thank you uh any questions from the board no no no anyone else to testify in this case
please raise your hand yeah we have a tammy stanford the stanford you can unmute yourself and speak
hello good afternoon please
because i'm at room right now so i'm in one of their rooms so i'm not going to talk too loud
could you spell your first and last name please okay s-t-a-n-f-i-e-l-d
first name tammy t-a-m-m-i-e where and from to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the
truth? Yes, I am. Please proceed, ma'am. I can't hardly hear you. Please proceed with your
You please proceed with your testimony. I was just wanted to say the way he described the
testimony. Okay. I was just wanted to say the way he did.
house that I'm living in it for 18 years right now is not the way it is. That door, extra door
there. Excuse me, excuse me of interrupting. You live in the property? Yes, I live there.
I've been living there for 18 years. Okay, continue. Okay, so I'm not disputing that he
wants the place for that. I don't have nothing against that. I'm just going to describe this
house to you to get a better picture of what it looks like I have a kitchen on the first floor a
dining room and a living room and it's a bathroom like in the kitchen area in a shared kitchen
now with the bedrooms part it's all open if I come in my living room I can walk where that
door is open at that door doesn't have nothing to do with me going up them stairs it never was a
two place my family when they lived there they was kids and it never was a duplex when I lived
there where it was a two-family dwelling. It was always one where my family and I lived there. As
the kids got older, they moved on. I had three bedrooms on the second floor. It's three bedrooms
and a bathroom. On the third floor, it's also three bedrooms, no bathroom up there. It's just
three bedrooms, and it's a closet. But if that extra door that he keeps saying goes into another
property, it doesn't. It goes straight to my mother's bedroom. If you walk up the steps,
you're going to hit my mother's bedroom, and you're going to go down the hall, you're going
hit a middle room and then you're going to see a bathroom then the room i sleep in
it's it's made into just a single family home it's not no i'm not i didn't ever live in a duplex
where it was a two-family home it can be a two-family home if that's what mr leron wants i
don't have no problem with him saying that's what he wants this is home but i just want me to it to
be fairly said what it what it looks like inside thank you thank you okay anyone um i'm sorry mr
Anastasia you have any questions and I think we may have lost Vernon for a while can you unmute
yourself I think it bellies the point that we were trying to make with the two as you said the side
door opens up to a a whole other bedroom suite which is a one-family dwelling now whether or
not throughout the years certain things may have been taken out of kit you know of a kitchen or
a bathroom I can't say but this is two separate units that it has been treated as one family
dwelling. Are these utilities separated? They have not been no. Anyone else to testify in this case
please raise your hand and that's only that's because it was used by the same family for
generations anyone else to testify we have miss tina marie russell yeah miss russell sorry to cut
you off earlier we're trying to get an understanding of who was the rco so please
uh identify yourself you're still on the roof thank you tina marie vessel um local community
civic association local community enterprise center i'm sorry my brain's all torn up
local community enterprise center um and i'm calling i'm i'm going to side with the
um the coordinator um local community local civic association um i don't really see we had
testimony from the woman who's lived in the building. And also Vern, also the attorney said
that this was being used as a single family home for generations. And he also testified to said that
the building was used as a single family home. So it exonerates what the woman who lived there
said that this is a single family home. The separate door that she identified is just because
her mother was elderly and she has a space for her mother most people most logan houses do have
a space for their grand their in-laws in-law spaces so it doesn't mean it's a separate as
its utilities show you it's not a duplex it is definitely a single family home also we did a
20 35 year plan right before covid in which one of the focus points for almost all the community
organizations was to regain home ownership. The oversaturation that's shown on this block
is one of the reasons why. It's oversaturated. It actually removes home ownerships. And that's
not something that the community organizations, along with the Philadelphia Commerce Department,
is working with us to try to rebuild our communities. And so this particular project
will take us away from that planning process that we did work so hard for on the 20-35 year plan.
um so as you know we've been really trying to focus our multi-family homes um different areas
So as you know, we've been really trying to focus our
and we're really wanting to reduce the multi-family homes that we have and bring back home ownership
um because it's something that is we felt there's a value and it's what we planned for along with
the city in the planning commission which is one reason why the is zoned the way it is um so we
don't really feel that the applicant will have a hardship because people are already living in that
property as single families and we also would like to reduce that trash as well as the parking
issues and this will I don't we don't really see that this is a hardship and we are working
we're siding with the coordinator at this time which was Logan Enterprise and Logan
Civic Association with keeping this as a single family home. Mr. Chairman if I may just briefly
i want to clarify my comment i said that it was operated for generations by a single family but
both units were used and as the occupant said herself that separate door leads to a an entire
suite you know call it a mother-in-law suite call it a second family dwelling the fact of the matter
There are two units and to convert not just the interior, but the exterior facade would not only be, you know, physically difficult to do, but financially impractical, unmarketable when you're literally surrounded by two, three, four, five family dwellings.
And again, refresh my memory. When was your when did your client purchase this property?
2013, I think the D is somewhere around there.
Seven, eight years ago.
All right.
Anyone else to testify in this case?
There are no hands up this time.
All right, Planning Commission.
Ron Bednar, City Planning.
This property is indicated for single-family residential use on the city plan.
We believe the applicant has not demonstrated necessary hardship regarding the use requirements in the code.
Application is not consistent with our adopted district plan.
We recommend the request for variance not to be granted.
And Mr. Chair, I thank Mr. Ron for that.