below the most recent exhibit submitted to the board which included some additional documentation
additional documentation.
good morning this is an application for a consolidation of lots from multiple parcels
which is three deeded lots to the church of 502-04 506-18 and 520-22 north 61st street
the properties are being consolidated to permit the use of some of the additional lots as 21
parking spaces with a religious assembly which is a church to stay to remain with the 432 seats
generally speaking the code requires actually that a parking space is required for every 10 seats
44 would be required and 21 are being proposed. We have met with the community on this matter
and we have explained to the community what our proposal is, the size of the church,
and the church has been in the area. It actually took a prior building and has slowly updated the
building. It is now basically taking a lot that was already used by church members in essence for
parking to properly add it to the church's other lots and then have it marked as a specific parking
lot the area does have in addition to the lots that we're proposing and i'm going to show the
photo here this is the block uh and this is the church building in question as we move to the back
these are the lots that are already paved and available that are going to be marked specifically
as additional parking. The church has members from the area as well as some members that come
from further away. It holds events usually about twice a week. So generally, we have not ever had
a parking issue. The addition of the lot would only help generally to make sure that during bigger
events that there would be off-street parking provided. The church will provide volunteers to
help direct traffic during events where the lot might become more full. But on a daily and weekly
basis, the membership that is attending the church generally do not overflow the parking lot. So the
spaces that we have available has been enough. Some members are local, so they simply walk over
to the church. This is an area, this building is a kind of a commercial building that's been there.
They do have other mixed uses of various types around the building, but in general,
the addition of this lot as a parking lot has been well received by the neighbors who attended
the meeting for this application. We believe that despite the fact that it is a little bit short
compared to what is code required for parking, the reality is that having these parking spaces
is only adding and helping the situation. Even prior to this application, the church has not
had issues with parking or complaints from the neighbors for parking, and that's part of the
reason why the neighborhood ultimately supported the requested variance for the number of parking
spaces. So the consolidation is to have these lots combined into one and these two lots combined
into one. This entire L-shaped lot would be what is being proposed as parking for the church.
the I'm sorry the the plans for the actual parking is laid out here I'm
going to zoom in a little bit too so this this will allow the space to be
marked a little bit of greenery buffer put up to basically make this a proper
parking space a parking lot rather than just a big open paved lot at this point
without any organized parking so this is the way the parking is being proposed some greenery buffers
added and proper parking directions including driveway directions being given to people who
are going to come and use the parking so the church building this is the church building itself
It is basically going to be a large central area for gatherings, along with various rooms, which are classrooms for Bible studies.
Various rooms, which are classrooms for Bible studies, conference room, office, all used only by the church itself.
It is not going to be used by outside individuals, except, of course, if the local community has need of space for meetings and other things, the church is certainly open to working with the community on all those matters.
So while this has the seating count that is high enough to trigger the additional parking, the bishop has indicated to the community that the actual attendees almost never fill up the space.
It's right now, their congregation does fill up sometimes half of the space, but it has not had any issues with overflow of parking of cars during any of the events they've held.
So that is essentially our request before the board, which is a variance to permit less than code required amount of parking for the church operation at this location.
I believe my client, I believe he should be here.
um if uh uh bishop martin is here if if he could just uh raise his hand virtually to be identified
we did reach out to him they're being promoted to panelists thank you
hello good morning bishop could you please state and spell your name for this my name is
That's Clifton T. Martin, C-L-I-F-T-O-N-T-M-A-R-T-I-N.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
All right. Sir, is it possible, could you turn on your video?
I see. We're good. Okay. Counsel?
Thank you. Bishop, did you see my presentation before the zoning board on your screen and hear my representation?
before the board? Yes, I did. Can you verify what I have represented to be true and correct
in the document of your own testimony? That's true. Thank you. Questions from the board.
So, in terms of this lot, usually with the parking, you have to have the dry vials,
the spaces have to be a certain dimension, and I forget what it is now, but, you know, and
the landscaping so that by the time you get done doing all of that, there aren't that many spaces.
But even if you have a large space, that's my comment. That's not.
The code requirement with the buffers, greeneries, and other islands and directions
is why we're looking at 21 spaces. Leaving it as a completely open space, of course,
you could jam more cars in, but it's obviously not an organized parking situation.
Okay. And you do have the curb cut so that you have a means of ingress and egress.
Yes. The curb cuts are existing.
Okay. All right.
If you pull up the site plan, I think it's easy. Can you pull up the site plan?
Sure. I'll put that back up.
I have a question about like drop-offs. I'm thinking ride shares, transport vehicles,
especially for seniors um is there a designated area for that to occur yes there is
um bishop is that located in front of church it's in front of the church
is that like a loading area yes it's the loading zone we it happens every week
how how do they get into the loading area without impacting uh parking space number 10
okay the the loading area or the drop-off area is in front of the church it's not exactly here
parking lot okay so it's on the other street it's actually on the off of the street in front
of the church main door okay all the questions questions from our attorney uh yes i had a
Yes, I had a question about ownership of the three properties. With regard to the deeds that were provided, it looks like the 502-04 North 61st Street is owned by Better Way CDC.
question about ownership of the three properties.
That's correct.
And 520-22 North 61 Street is owned by Better Way Bible Church.
That's correct.
better way bible church and better way cdc are the same same people when we apply for from the city
uh they stated that we would have to do with the cdc in order to obtain the lot so that's what we
did that was what my question was are they all um do they both have come do all three of them
have common ownership yes they do thank you questions from the virtual audience
no hands at this time chair any commission the comprehensive
amy boy with the planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends no change in
zoning to the current cmx2 commercial mixed use the proposed parking count for an existing religious
assembly use is a closer approximation to the code requirements than the existing condition
the planning commission recommends that the board grant the requested variance for a parking space
count mi2026-001-680-50618 north 61st street i vote yes michael johns my vote is yes
cheryl gaston my vote is yes tanetta graham my vote is yes i win my vote is yes thank you council
Awesome. So we're going to hear... Bishop, you can leave at this time. Thank you.
Thank you, Sheriff. Thank you, Bishop. Thank you.
We're next going to hear 13 and 14 together. It's both 109 Hilltop Road. I think there's at
least four lawyers that I know of that are involved in this. So we're going to take a
little five-minute break as you decide to get set up, okay? Give a little water.
All right. So we're doing number 13, MI 2026-001-699-109, Hilltop. Alfred Fiscaldo is the attorney.
Good afternoon, Your Honor.
All right. And I have number 14, MI 2026-001-701-109, Hilltop Road. Steve Masters is the attorney.
yes so uh and i also i have
leonard reuter
and rachel pritzker and then i'm missing one right so why don't we do this why don't we start
please state your name is spelled for the doctor alfred fiscaldo last name is f as in frank u s as
in sam c-a-l-d-o counsel for uh valerie pierce do you swear or affirm tell the truth told truth
nothing but the truth i do mr masters good morning mr chair members of the board steve masters
here on behalf of um becky and and uh becky and roger right we're a firm to tell the truth the
whole truth nothing but the truth yes i do leonard uh thank you may it please the board
Leonard F. Reuter, R-E-U-T-E-R, senior attorney for the city of Philadelphia.
Also, I'm here with my colleague in the law department, Madeline Napierkowski.
Do you need me to smell that?
Do you swear it for me to tell the truth, told you nothing about the truth?
If she comes up, we'll swear it when she comes up, okay?
If she's going to testify.
Okay, just for the record, though, so he has it.
the reporter has a m-a-d-e-l-i-n-e first name last name is n-a-p-i-e-r-k-o-w-s-k-i rachel
rachael r-a-c-h-a-e-l pritzker p-r-i-t-z-k-e-r uh we represent the property owner
do you swear or affirm to tell the truth told truth nothing but the truth yeah and counsel
Nathan Ferris, F-A-R-R-I-S, F-A-R-R-I-S, do you swear or affirm the total truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Okay, we've scheduled 35 to 40 minutes for this, so we're going to have to see where we stand and things of that nature,
but we'll test it as we go along the way.
This is an appeal against Illinois, am I correct?
Correct.
why don't we start with you so um so i i think at the beginning i think there's some housekeeping
So, at the beginning, I think there's some housekeeping.
uh yesterday
Yesterday afternoon, counsel for property owner, Mr. Farris and Ms. Pritzker, filed
a motion in Lemonade regarding exhibits that were in both mine and Mr. Master's packets.
And correct me if I misstated, what we agreed to in the hall was that we've agreed, I've
agreed from my exhibit packet to strike exhibits three, four, and five from my exhibit packet.
um the the the goal being to limit this discussion so solely to the current permit we we've had some
discussions earlier this morning about okay but we didn't we weren't wearing this yep okay um
um I am not in a position to uh to agree to the the motion to eliminate and so
we're going to have argument on that.
Rachel?
Here's
where we think we want to be.
We want to hear the testimony, and
then we'll make the decisions as we go along
with the testimony. You'll have an opportunity
to object when there's things said that
you're doing, and we'll go then,
instead of hearing the whole thing.
Is that okay?
Housekeeping's done. Why don't you start?
I think the question before the board
Should I share my code packet?
You have to go to your
Not my audio.
Where's my hand?
No, sure.
Can you keep my audio off?
Yeah, you keep your audio off.
Okay. So in the exhibit package, the remaining exhibits, we have our application for appeal at tab one. Tab two is the section of the zoning code 14701-1 and the accompanying notes, which regard the side yard setback issue that's at the center of this discussion.
Tab 6 is a zoning permit ZP 2026-000745 issued by L&I. Tab 7 is a screenshot of the City of
Philadelphia zoning summary generator for the lot at 109 Hilltop, which is the subject of this
application. That zoning summary generator is on the Atlas website and allows you to get a summary
of the applicable provisions of the zoning code as they pertain to a particular lot that's at tab
seven at tab eight are photographs of 101 hilltop which is my client's property 109 hilltop which is
the property at issue and 111 hilltop which is owned by mr master's client those photographs
are intended to just to show sure that uh my client this is 101 hilltop owns a single family
detached house that 109 is a vacant lot and that 111 is a single-family detached house
also at tab 9 is just a screenshot of atlas of the 109 hilltop property just showing that
the nature of the dwellings in and around that neighborhood being that on on this side of hilltop
road it's single-family houses on the back side along wrecks it's it's single-family attached
across the street it's a single family attached and then a certificate of tax
clearance that my my witness is Valerie Pierce so it's going back to the code
section tab 2 I'm sorry this is the reporter I did not hear that we're making
change it. Apologies. Apologies. We object to a portion of Exhibit 1, which is the prior refusal,
which is this exhibit. That's fine. I agree that those should be redacted as well. Yeah,
thanks for the clarification. So this property is zoned RSA 3. It's a, as I said, it's a vacant lot.
Certainly entitled to have something built on it, but the question is how wide do the side yards have
to be in the RSA three district I've highlighted here in yellow the code requires two side
yards of eight feet each subject to caveats that had notes footnotes eight and footnote
night. And when we go to, apologies.
And when we go to, apologies, when we go to those, so in footnote eight, there are three
sections that apply to this particular, that apply, only one applies to this particular
lot, and that is, it says, for lots bounded on both sides by the side or rear yards of
a semi-detached or detached structure a semi-detached structure is not permitted so you couldn't you can
only put a single family detached house on that lot and then it says any structure any detached
structure must be constructed in accordance with b9 which is below so when we go to b9
b9 says in the rsa3 district for lots bounded on both sides by the side yard of a semi-detached
structure, which is not our case here, any detached structure must be constructed with
a side yard on both sides, each with at least 50% minimum semi-detached side yard width
required for the permitted residential uses.
The upshot being, instead of an eight-foot side yard on both sides, you can have a four-foot
side yard on both sides, but only in the case of a property that's bounded on both sides
by a semi-detached structure, which is not our case.
And so in that case, and also below that, I would note that there's a, there's a diagram here, an illustration by the, by the code drafters that shows the illustration of what happens if you have a single family detached house boarded on both sides by semi-detached.
Again, the instance in the language above, there's, there's no, there's no language regarding what happens if there's a single family detached house between two single family detached houses.
There's no illustration as to what happens when there's a single-family detached house
between two single-family detached houses.
And so by the rules of statutory construction, by which all language in a statute needs to be given meaning,
you then go back to the default, which is two side yards of eight feet each.
Otherwise, that language has no meaning because you can't put,