I see no hands Madam Chair. Planning Commission? Thank you Madam Chair. Ian Hegarty for the
Philadelphia City Planning Commission. The comprehensive plan recommends no change to
existing multi-family zoning at this location we believe the proposed variances are minimal and do
not conflict with the purpose and spirit of the zoning code city planning commission recommends
that the board grant the variance thank you calendar number 0983 1542 fontaine street
my vote is yes my vote is yes my vote is yes my vote is yes thank you very much i'll see the
board this afternoon. Thank you. Have a good one. You too. Calendar number 1-008-2903
2903 frankfurt avenue the attorney is alan knockamson
Frankfurt Avenue. The attorney is Alan Notcomson.
madam chair i promoted miss clementa amazon to panelists thank you
miss amazon can you hear me
yes i can can you hear me yes i can hear you can you put your name and address on the record and
spell your last name good afternoon comenta amazon c-l-e-m-e-n-t-a last name is a-m-a-z-a-n
address is 123 south broad street suite 1600 19109 do you swear or affirm to tell the whole truth
and nothing but the truth. I do. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate
to its accuracy? I do. Have you emailed the exhibit packet with proof of ownership, tax
compliance, copy of the refusal or referral, photos under plans of the property five days in
advance of this hearing, and have you met with the RCO, and do you have a letter? Yes, and we
have a letter of support. Thank you. You may proceed. Thank you.
The letter of support comes from Somerset Neighbors for Better Living, and there's a letter of non-opposition from Councilman Squilla.
Yes. So this is 2903 Frankfurt Avenue. It's a pretty straightforward project in that we are proposing multifamily uses to CMX2 property. We're just looking for one additional unit.
So during my presentation, I'll go through the deed, certificate of tax, clearance, notice of refusal, application for appeal, maps of the area, photographs of the lot, our plans and drawings, and as the Vice Chair mentioned, we do have a letter of support from Somerset Neighbors for Better Living.
So here we have the deed to the property, our certificate of tax clearance, the refusal of the property is zoned to CMX 2.
We are allowed to have three units as of right, and we are actually looking to have only four units.
So we would be willing to enter a proviso to that effect.
We are not looking for five units.
We're only looking for four here.
We have the application for appeal.
Again, the notice of refusal and our project information form.
We have a map of the area, so we are located on 2903 Frankfort Avenue in between East Cambria
and East Monmouth.
Another map of the area, here we have a view of the front of the property, a view to the
right of the property on Frankfort Avenue, a view to the left of the property on Frankfort
Avenue, and we also have some nearby CMX2 properties that are also five units of multi-unit
use, so it's not uncommon for this particular area.
and here we have our site plans and the floor plans and drawings again we're just looking for
four units here and we are allowed to have three as of right again we have the letter of support
we did meet with Somerset neighbors for better living on April 16th and they did express support
for the project this is the notice that we sent out to the community on March 24th for the community
meeting and we sent it out to all 172 properties as required by the city and our certificate of
mailing showing that it was in fact mailed out with that if i could have my client adam
kesselman is at my testimony
kesselman has been allowed to speak hi this is adam kesselman first name adam adam last name k
k-e-s-s-e-l-m-a-n my address is 1516 north 5th street philadelphia pa 19122 thank you do you
swear from the shelf the whole truth and nothing but the truth i do thank you miss amazon thank you
adam did you hear my presentation today yes and was it true and correct yes correct and would you
adopt it as your own testimony i would adopt it as my own testimony yes thank you adam so i'd be
happy to answer any questions the board may have does the board have any questions no no no is there
anyone in the virtual audience with questions no further hands at this time madam chair thank you
planning commission thank you madam chair ian hegarty for the philadelphia city planning
commission members of the board the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the existing
commercial mixed-use zoning and dislocation. The dwelling unit count, as it appears on the refusal,
does exceed the minimum variance necessary to overcome hardship as presented. However,
we would agree with Council that if the condition was added to limit the dwelling unit count to four,
then the City Planning Commission would recommend approval of the variance.
Thank you.
Thank you. Calendar number 1-008-2903 Frankfurt Avenue. My vote is yes.
My vote is yes. Madam Chair, it's also with the proviso of four units.
For four units. Yes.
calendar number 1008-2903 frankfurt avenue my vote is yes with a proviso for a maximum
of four units yes with proviso yes with proviso yes with proviso
calendar number we're on to 11 0657 4154 north 7th street
Mr. Vaccaro is he here
Mr. Vaccaro
I don't see Mr. Vaccaro's hand but uh Mr. Foulkes's hand is raised again
Madam Chair, do I allow them to speak? Excuse me, Chair, this one was continued.
Number 11? Yes. This was the third party continuance request.
You are absolutely right. So again, I will put that on the record. Calendar number 0657-4154
north 7th street this is continued next case is calendar number 0769 4356 josephine street the
attorney is verne anastasio
mr anastasio if you're in the audience please raise your virtual hand and madam chair i'm not
sure this is included in your summaries but we did receive a letter in opposition from councilwoman
sanchez it is and also from frankfurt knack yes thank you thank you is mr anastasio here yes
good morning good morning name and address for the record please and spell your name
Sure. Vern Anastasio, A-N-A-S-T-A-S-I-O, 1315 Walnut Street, Suite 1006, Philadelphia, 19107.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
Do you also agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Have you emailed the exhibit packet with proof of ownership tax compliance,
a copy of the refusal or referral photos under plans five days in advance of this hearing
and have you met with the rco and do you have a letter yes to all that okay you may proceed
thank you i'm going to share my screen if that's okay sure that is
all right adam chair this is a 4356 josephine street it's very uh fairly
straightforward. It's an application for a retail sale of consumer goods. There would be no check
cashing, but there would be money transfer on the first floor, the same building with a single
family dwelling above. This property is, in fact, a commercial property on the first floor
and a single family residential on the second. Now, because it's been vacant for quite some
time. The property itself is now zoned RSA 5, but if you look at the history, and here it is right
there, RSA 5, you look at the history of the property, and I'll take you there in a moment.
First of all, here's the, I'll pull it out.
Here's the first floor commercial space and the one family dwelling above.
There's a handicap ADA compliant ramp to the first floor, suggesting, of course, that this has been historically commercial property.
There's the ramp. This is the property. There's the rear. And I want to take you to since the last 60 years, I guess.
um this has been
first it was a vacant storefront with one family then there was a barber shop
with one family this is 1962
and the entire history of this property there's never been a permit pulled for a single family
and the entire history of this
dwelling again here's another barbershop one family dwelling
at some point it was uh well it's again a long history of being a barbershop
and as you can see based on the history
here's a store in a one-family dwelling
here's just another store in one family dwelling so this is you know where we are
so we have a property that is you know commercially set up for commercial use
and we simply want to utilize the first floor for that commercial use.
I understand that the RCO sent a letter of opposition based on two items.
First was parking, which is not a part of this analysis at all.
And it's a local neighborhood store.
So the fact that people may be driving to actually go to the corner store,
that doesn't typically happen very often.
and the other point that with which they based their opposition was in fact that the property
has always been a single family dwelling i think i've just given you ample evidence
that that's not the case and also the rco's position is in direct opposition to everybody
on the on the block i mean here's everybody on josephine street and the side in the side street
on John. Again, all fully supportive of this use. It's what the property is designed to
do, and we respectfully request the granting of this variance. With that, I'd like to call
my client. Here's proof of posting, by the way. Thank you. Yep. And with that, I'd like
I'd like to call my client Jose Cristostomo to raise his hand.
If you're in a virtual audience, sir, please raise your hand.
Jose, can you please raise your hand?
Jose, can you hear me?
he's been allowed to speak
please unmute yourself sir
hi sir can you put your name and address on the record
and spell your name
can you hear me
spell your name jose
can i spell for him because he doesn't speak well
english is j-o-s-e jose and the last name is chrisostomo c-r-i-s-o-s-t-o-m-o and the address
is 4356 josephine street can you also ask him to raise his right hand yes
do you swear or affirm to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth
yes thank you you're welcome
thank you jose did you hear what i said today to the board yes okay and was it true and accurate
to the best of your knowledge yes and do you adopt it as your own testimony yes thank you
Jose. Madam Chair, I'm here for questions. Is there anyone in the virtual audience who has a
question? Star Dixon has their hand raised. I will allow them to speak at this time if it is
okay with you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Star Dixon, please unmute yourself if you wish to speak.
hello can you hear me
we can move on madam chair okay does the board have any questions no no no i'm sorry we still
have another person. Just move on from Ms. Starr. So we have Sloan Folks. Okay. Okay.
Good morning. Good morning again, Madam Chair, ZBA Board. Sloan Folks, S-L-O-A-N-E,
f as a fire o lks office of councilman ria canyona sanchez room 508 uh city hall um prior to uh the
F-S-A-F-I-R-O-L-K-S, Office of Councilwoman Maria Keyona Sanchez.
statement that the councilman wants to read into the record i'd also like to um respond um to uh
to um mr anastasio's statement regarding um the petition um one of the things that uh happened
uh since the original uh hearing was um continued was there was not there was a there was an attempt
to bring the community together to have further discussions with the property owner to discuss
the variance. And that didn't happen. That didn't happen because the members of the community
were vehemently opposed to this variance request. At the original meeting, the attendees,
and there's only seven attendees because it is a small block, but the seven attendees that were
at the community meeting, voted unanimously not to support the ban's request. I am now going to
read the Councilwoman's statement to the record. Before you do that, Mr. Folks, I want to know,
who's the entire block supporting this? Ma'am, I don't know who the entire block is supporting
that. We don't have a copy of the petition. We gave you the binder with all the folks who
signed the petition in support. We've attempted to meet with the community after this case was
continued. We sent no less than 22 emails to the councilwoman's office and to the community, RCO,
asking for an opportunity to present. Since there were further questions, we wanted to
provide those answers. We were denied that request. The state representative in the area
just flat out refused to meet with us and a council uh council member canuna sanchez was
trying to defer to the state representative because the state rep had some concerns we
were willing to meet with them we were turned down flat out each time okay mr folks you can
continue now just would just just to respond to that uh in response in response to that the state
representative was working on behalf of the community the state representative did not
flatly denied, the community flatly denied it. That was their, that's how they wanted to proceed
with that, unfortunately. So I'm going to read the response, read the councilman's
response into the record. The councilman states that the applicant has met the RCO
and received a letter of opposition. The RCO's letter cited the former use of the property
and the hopes that it would be maintained as residential, as well as parking issues that may
arise if the property were granted a variance from its present RSA 5 designation. This block,
while very small, has an active senior residents who have stated that they will be negatively
affected by an opening of a phone, card, money transfer business on this corner due to the
aforementioned concerns. Our office would also stress that the Franklin community has recently
had several operators come into the community with no business plan or track record and request
variants for converting a single family residence into a business. Upon granting of the variants,
most of these businesses have failed and the succeeding operators have not been good nativers
and have effectively and actively caused or contributed to blight by safety litter or noise
issues. While we recognize that the owner made significant investments, commercial use will not
be supported by the residents he was asked by the councilwoman to develop a residential plan
that the residents might consider and as and as of now has not been forthcoming
the councilman's office stands with the community and she's supporting this letter of opposition
for the variance request and she urges the zba not grant this various request thank you
i'm chair if i may just address those two points quickly i i fully understand and appreciate the
position of the council office. One of the reasons why they proffer opposition is because of the
actions of some other business folks. My client is not associated with any of those previous
businesses that have failed and turned into decay or disarray. It's very obvious just by looking at
the property that this is, in fact, a corner property that was, and by the history, a commercial
property this has never been a single family home so and I think I've offered enough evidence
to that now if there's a concern that maybe this particular project won't work and therefore it
would be shut down and there would be decay or blight then this board has the opportunity
and the option of granting a variance for a certain amount of time to see in fact how long
this property, you know, my client can succeed here.
this property, you know, my client can succeed here. He believes he will succeed here.
He believes he will succeed here.
And, you know, he's put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears
into this property to make it happen.
And so that's just an option.
I know this board is aware of it