I was even approached by a car dealership to rent the lot for me.
However, after consulting with Ms. Ellen, I denied his request.
And it's your understanding that Ms. Ellen Douglas did, in fact, send an email or a reiterated email in support of this variance being granted. Is that right?
Yes, that's correct.
Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, I don't know if Ms. Ellen Douglas was able to come on today. I spoke to her about an hour ago.
She had just gotten done, not coming out of the doctors.
She may be here, but she said she was very tired, but was going to be emailing her letter of support.
Not sure she's on the line.
Is Ms. Mary the owner of the property?
Ms. Mary is a member of the LLC that has an investment in the property, yes.
All right.
Would she adopt your testimony?
yes ms ms mary would you uh did you hear what i said today yes i heard what you said and what
was true and accurate to the best of your knowledge yes everything was it true uh and
you adopted as your own uh testimony yes thank you thank you mr chairman for the
questions from the questions from the board no mr chairman no no mr chairman
questions from the virtual audience
chair we have Mr. Charles Richardson
sure Mr. Richardson you can
meet yourself and wait for the chair
good afternoon again Mr. Chair
just state your name Mr. Richardson you've already been sworn
Charles Richardson from the office of Councilwoman Cindy Bass
room 312 City Hall
proceed sir
Just referring to Mr. Anastasio's commentary earlier, just because there are currently no
single-family homes in that area does not mean that you cannot attempt to build them there.
30 units is too many. The councilwoman feels it's too dense for that location and therefore
she is supporting the RCO and those that came to the meeting and asking that you deny the variance.
Thank you. Other people in the virtual audience?
Chair, we have Kiana Shedrick. Ms. Shedrick, you can unmute yourself and wait for the chair.
Could you state your name, please, and spell for the court reporter?
Yes. Good afternoon, Chair. My name is Kiana Shedrick. First name Kiana, Q-I-A-N-A. Last name Shedrick, S-H-E-D-R-I-C-K.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Proceed.
Yes. I'm representing an affected RCO on the case, and I wanted to make several points this afternoon.
The first is our RCO was not notified of the scheduled community meeting date from neither the attorney on this case or the coordinating RCO.
And I just wanted that noted for the record. My second point is in our community, as Mr. Anastasio pointed out, there are over 500 lots vacant in our community.
And with the depth and size of many of the lots, reproducing single family homes in those spaces are not only cumbersome for people to purchase financially, but also the cost to build on those size lots.
It's just not supported by financial backing when people need to build.
And so not saying that our RCO does not support single family development, because we do.
We're in support of development that makes sense.
But if we continue to wholesalely deny developers for bringing lots in density, we will short
sight our community and continue to have vacant lots.
So we support development that makes sense. And this project does seem to do so.
If the case is kicked back to the community, we're just.
If the case is kicked back to the community, we're just requesting openly to be notified
of the date and have an opportunity to participate so that the members that are a part of our
organization, which is in excess of 30, have an opportunity to participate and voice their
concerns. And we're the North Neighbors Association. Thank you for calling it.
Other people in the virtual audience.
Chair, I see no hands at this time.
Planning Commission.
Good afternoon, Chair Bergman, members of the board, David Vecto, City Planning Commission.
The comprehensive plan recommends this property for residential single-family use.
The current I-1 zoning presents a clear hardship to reusing the land.
The surrounding lots on this block are zoned single-family, and with RSA 5 zoning, the unit count allowed by Wright would be 8.
So 30 units is not the minimum variance needed to allow the applicant to derive value from their land,
so we recommend that the Board deny the use variance for 30 dwelling units built over 9 separate lots.
MI 2021 004246 3629 to 51 North Smedley. I vote no.
Harold Tenere, my vote is no. Thomas Holliman, my vote is no. James Snell, my vote is no.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is no. Thank you. If I may ask,
Given that it's I-1, it could be, you know, as the Planning Commission said, a gas station or something, you know, other than single family.
But would a different number please this board at some point?
I think what would please this board at some point would be not just a different number, the whole issue, what the neighbors think, what other people think, and things like that.
And then that will come back to the board.
but i i don't want to tell you a different number i think no i understand that but if the neighbors
and i if the neighbors and my client could come to an accord with a lower number lower density
but that might not please all i would say is we would have an opportunity to take a look at that
if it came back to us yes thank you yes mr chair i would recommend the board not um make that
recommendation as the council's requesting okay thank you i appreciate it
have a good evening
MI 2021
004370
Larchwood Avenue
RCO West Philadelphia
Economic Development Council
letter of support coordinating RCO
Garden Court Community Association
letter of support
Isaac Slepner
attorney
Chair, Mr. Slepner will be coming back in as a panelist.
Hi, Mr. Slepner, state your name, please, and spell it for the court reporter.
Yeah, hi. Good afternoon. Isaac Slepner, I, India, S, Sam, AA, Alpha, C, Charlie. Last name Slepner, S, Sam, L, Larry, E, Elvis, P, Peter, N, Norman, E, Elvis, R, Robert.
Go ahead, sir. You have someone?
No longer with Matt Ione. New contact information. I suppose I should present that to the board.
Otherwise, I'm going to enter 201 South 18th Street, Suite 300, Philadelphia, PA, 19103.
Right. Thank you.
Do you swear or firm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Our vice chair has a few questions.
Hi, Mr. Slefner.
Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
And it appears that you have submitted everything that's required.
Is that correct?
It is correct. Yes. Thank you. You may proceed. Okay. I'm here today on 5100 Larchwood Avenue
and 5100 Larchwood Avenue. I, if I may just proceed to share my screen, I'll take
And 5100 Larchwood Avenue, I, if I may just proceed to share my screen, I'll take the board through my presentation materials and this whole situation.
So without further ado, I'm going to go ahead and share my screen here.
Oh boy, there it is.
We're going to go full screen on this.
All right.
okay so uh first up exhibit one is our notice of refusal which we just stipulated to uh exhibit
two is our original application for appeal uh signed by me appealed on 10-5-21 exhibit three
is our project information form exhibit four is the affidavit of service of mailing of notice to
neighbors the um mailing was on november 22nd um of a letter uh dated november 18th well yeah um
and this is our this is a copy of the letter that went out to the neighbors which
had both the rco meeting um listed as well as our hearing day right now um signed by me
CC to all of the various people you may know in the CC, including Andrew Goodman of Councilmember
Gauthier's office. This is, again, we had attached a copy of the refusal, and these are all of the
addresses that we copied with our mailing. There are about a hundred of them, give or take.
But five is our letter to the neighbors, noticing them of the RCO meeting held by Guard Court,
as well as this VBA hearing right now.
Exhibit 6 is the letter of support
from Garden Court Community Association,
dated December 10th of 21,
in which this is the summary of their vote.
It was 10 in favor, 1 opposed, and 1 non-opposition.
This is the letter from the Garden Court.
Next is the letter of support
from West Philadelphia Economic Development Council.
Also a letter, it says strongly support.
Exhibit eight, well, we're gonna go on to our site plan.
And I have out here my architect,
my architect Kenneth Johnson.
Ken, are you out there to walk the board
through the site plan and the floor plans?
Well, I guess I should clarify what we're seeking.
We're seeking essentially legalization of existing use.
um but there's a it's got a backstory I mean every property has a backstory um I guess I'll start
with well we'll start with the site plan we'll let my my architect take us through the site
plan and the floor plans and then we'll we'll move forward from there so Ken are you out there
Kenneth Johnson is my architect
yes mr johnson you can unmute yourself yes can you hear me yes could you state your name and
spell for the court reporter please kenneth johnson
could you spell for please k k-e-n-n-e-t-h johnson j-o-h-n-s-o-n all right do you swear
for him to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth yes proceed all right um ken uh if
you would take the um the board through this this site plan over here um given you know that we're
all on a zoom and etc right so we have a existing three-story structure with a full basement um
And the site shows that the entry is off of Lurchwood.
It's a corner property.
There's an existing curb cut for one car garage.
When you come up the front stairs to go into the building, there's an existing covered porch.
It's actually the porch is enclosed.
And you have a bay window on the second floor.
and if you go around to the back you have a fairly large rear yard and we're going to um there's an
existing like patio so we're rebuilding that and there is uh the second entry to the building from
the rear is in the back yeah um and ken what if the the plans don't exactly show it but i may have
photo that shows it at the entryway to the house is up one level correct so the basement is mostly
above ground correct yes but i mean it's mostly above ground from the grade that's why you have
that's why you have the curb cut that can go right the car can get into under the front
the curb cut that can go the car can get into under the front porch area
porch area but as you go to the yard the yard is raised and filled with dirt so that the basement
is is is further underground once you get into the yard okay i'm going to uh take you to the uh
floor plans next and have you um go through those with the board so oh boy exhibit nine is our oh
Exhibit 9 is some renderings, just some exterior finishes that the owner plans when it's finished.
Exhibit 10 are the floor plans.
And again, these, now Ken, are these as built?
Yes, this is as the building was existed the last time I visited the site.
Okay, let's take, oh boy, let's take the board through the plan.
So how many units is this?
It is currently configured for three units.
And take the board through the plan.
If you come from the first floor plan, which is label number two, you have a front door, which is actually the porch.
Then you go through the second door, which actually gets you into the actual structure.
And this is a common hall.
and a common space on the side and there's stairs that go up to the second floor
which is number three. When you come up to the second floor there's a common hall
but you have a door that goes into the first unit which has a bedroom in the front,
a bedroom in the back, a kitchen on the side, a large living space and its own mechanical
uh space and there's a bedroom suite and well actually it's two bedroom suites right and um
and laundry which i don't show but it's the laundry here and a mechanical one then when you
come back out the door the stairs continues up to the third floor you know the third floor you have
again a bedroom suite in the front bedroom suite in the back and a big large living dining room
space in the middle with a kitchen okay now to get to the third unit you have to go around to
the back of the building um well now we're in the basement plan go to the back of the building
and the porch that we showed that's on the site plan that's when you go up the steps and you get
back on the first floor i'm just going to take us back to that for a second well you can see from
the renderings also but right so this porch so there's an elevated porch and an at grade porch
correct yes or an at grade entrance and an elevated entrance so you call it it's a bi-level apartment
yes okay so if you come into the first floor you come in up that porch you come into this door
in the kitchen there's a bedroom on this floor a bathroom and then there are stairs that go down
to the basement and once you come down to the basement you have two bedrooms in the bath and
the mechanical rooms and you still have access um directly to the to the yard from this window from
this door sorry and are there are there egress windows in the basement yes egress windows in each
bedroom okay uh all right exhibit 11 oh wow these are photos i'm going to show the board some photos
This is the current view of the front of 5100 large wood. This is also a current view of the front of 5100 large wood. This is one of the interior units. These units are not finished. They're not occupied. And we'll explain that backstory in a moment, but I want to take the board through here.
This is the second floor unit with a bay window. This is one of the egress windows in the basement. You can't really see through it because it's boarded, because it's not occupied. That window on the outside is no more than two to two and a half feet off of the ground. It's not subterranean. It is all completely above ground.
This is a current side view. That's a gate in the fence that's being on back order.
And you can see the rear axis to the house, the side, and the front. Exhibit 12 are other
properties in the neighborhood that are also multi-unit. This is a property directly across
51st Street. That's 5050 Larchwood and you can see that that is a multi-unit.