So, again, this same zoning board granted a variance under calendar number 26206 on January 13th of 2016.
So, again, not out of character to ask for three units and for this board to grant that under those circumstances as well.
And then, again, just want to show you 3595 primrose, the side of the property, and then the rear of the property.
And then, you know, because she'll be converting that garage, like she gets this, you know, just to clarify, she has a separate entrance to, you know, for herself, or she's hoping to have a separate entrance for herself.
So none of the building structure on the ground, you know, that she's using will be below grade.
But again, it's not uncommon to convert these garages
into livable space.
And we have many instances here on Lansford
that's nearby time and time again.
So we really try to do our homework, Kirkwood.
So, I mean, I don't know how many,
Primrose even on the next 100 block.
So, and now on Fittler Street as well.
And again, we're at the kind of like on the cul-de-sac-ish area, you know, where we are in the northeast.
There is actually a bus route here as well.
So, you know, there's ample public transportation around, all around here.
And then photographs of the property.
This is the front of the property.
and this is our zoning poster to show proof of posting for today's hearing you know and in the
rear as well even though I don't you know I don't know if it's a public street or an alley we just
asked our client to put a poster in the rear as well on that garage she's hoping to convert into
livable space and then this is a wider angle of our property at the rear and you can see it allows
for two cars to park there,
which, you know, they currently do.
They're two separate tenants.
And this is Primo's to the right of the property,
Primo's to the left of the property.
And the interior photos, again,
she hasn't done any work here,
but this is what she wants to do.
You know, she wants to take, you know,
a portion of her building structure,
which is above grade,
and convert it into livable space for herself.
And then we've made some simple floor plans
But, you know, we would close off that garage, add windows, but you would have a living room, a bedroom, a kitchen, and a bathroom.
And then the laundry facilities are going to be shared by all of the occupants, which is currently shared as well.
We met on November 15th at 6 p.m.
This is our proof of email to the community groups as well as the council member zoniate that we do it two weeks beforehand.
But, you know, we sent 126 mailers out.
These are the addresses.
As you can see, a lot of the places we were talking about, like Kirkwood and things like that, Fettler, are on that mailer as well.
But a lot of those addresses, people signed in support of that.
so again i can't speak to who came to the community meeting we don't have those proof
of mailing to those those addresses or application for appeal uh that miss cabani we prepared on her
behalf her deed to the property showing that she's owned it for some time
and the certificate of tax clearance there is a technical balance too but that's for 20
And the certificate of tax clearance. There is a technical balance, too, but that's for 2024 taxes, which are not due until the end of the first quarter of 2024.
With that being said, I would ask that Ms. Cavani virtually raise her hand, I think, through Mr. Goldberg's account.
And I'll have a couple of questions for her after she's sworn in.
Hi, could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
H-E-N-A-A, last name, C-O-B-E-N-I.
Mr. Kelly, did you get that?
Yes, Chair, thank you.
Okay, thank you. Proceed, Counsel.
I'm sorry, Ms. Cabani.
You swear, affirm, and tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
Thank you. Proceed, Counsel.
Yes, Ms. Cabani, you heard everything.
I HAD TO STATE TODAY ABOUT JURISONI MATTER AND IT'S TRUE AND CORRECT AND DO YOU ADOPT IT AS
YOUR OWN TESTIMONY AND MOST IMPORTANTLY YOU PLAN TO LIVE IN THAT HOPEFULLY THIRD UNIT IN THE
PROPERTY CORRECT THANK YOU OKAY QUESTIONS FROM THE BOARD QUESTIONS FROM THE BOARD NO CHAIR
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
Not at this time, Mr. Chair.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
I see no hands.
Planning Commission.
Good afternoon, Chair.
Peter Bernard for the Planning Commission.
Yes, sir.
The comprehensive plan recommends no change to the existing RTA one, two-family attached
at this location.
We feel the proposal represents an overuse and that the applicant has failed to demonstrate
any hardship.
Accordingly, the Planning Commission recommends the Board deny the variance.
Mr. Nakamason, I really want to take a little time and talk to the other Board members about
I appreciate that.
I think we're back January 10th, and I'll make sure we get that vote done that day,
Thank you. Thank you. I just would like to point out that this lot is almost 3000 square feet. So it's a rather substantially sized lot. Thank you. I appreciate that. Thank you very much. Thank you. Mr. Chair, I'll just note that we can vote it at January 10th. Yep. And everything is closed. Thank you. Thank you.
Number six, MI 2023-005-146-4315 Boone Street.
Alex Goldberg is the attorney.
This is an appeal against L&I.
Leonard Reuter is also involved in this case.
There was also a letter of opposition from the Manioc Neighborhood Council.
there's a jim kelly with their hand raised as well should they be promoted who's that
yes please yes yes please promote jim kelly thank you panelist he is he is with the city
leonard do you want to uh i mean uh alex uh alan are you doing this
okay all right all right just just for the record mention your name please
alan knockamson a-l-a-n last name knockamson n-o-c-h-u-m-s-o-n and and you've already been
sworn um leonard could you state your name please and spell for the court stenographer
Sure. Thank you. May it please the board, Leonard Freuter, R-E-U-T-E-R, Senior Attorney for the City of Philadelphia.
I'm also here with my colleague, Jim Kelly. Jim, if you want to introduce me.
Do you swear or affirm, tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
I'm sorry. Yes, I do. Thank you.
Mr. Kelly, please state your name for the record and spell for the court stenographer.
Good afternoon. Jim Kelly on behalf of the city, J-I-M-K-E-L-L-Y.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
I do. Mr. Nockmson.
Thank you. So, Mr. Chair, I represent VP 304315 Boone LLC.
And we're asking we have to we have two forms of relief here.
We first filed an appeal against L&I regarding the refusal that you'll see soon, but we also, in the alternative, if this board declines to grant our appeal against L&I, we would ask that the board grant a variance given the circumstances.
we would ask that the board grant a variance, given the circumstances.
So I'll do a full presentation, and we would ask that the board first vote on the appeal against L&I.
Okay, please proceed.
I would have to say this is one of the more convoluted zoning matters in my career.
It's very unique factual circumstances, but I'm here to present 4315 Boone Street, a property, a proposed single-family use in the Manionk section of Philadelphia.
And during our presentation, we'll review the notice of refusal.
We do have correspondence from the Manionk Neighborhood Council.
They sent two letters that I will summarize to the best of my ability.
I don't know if a member of many a neighborhood council, like they're a lawyer from the group, it will be here, but I will do my best to summarize their letter.
We do have a letter of support from the adjacent neighbor, the one that was most directly impacted by what happened, and we'll go over that as well.
We also provided an earth disturbance letter.
So, you know, long story short, we're on a steep slope.
originally we were under 1400 square feet of earth disturbance because of of a collapse of
this neighbor's uh patio we had to exceed that amount um and you know you'll see it from the
building permit this was a by right project because of that collapse we went over 1400
square feet of earth disturbance which you know again gave this technical refusal but in order to
rectify this situation. We worked with L&I diligently and we've been dealing with L&I
and the planning commission and such. We got to make safe. And at the time, we had a zoning permit
and a building permit for this as a freight project to build a single family house on this
property, which is on the steep slope. But we were allowed to because the earth disturbance
was under 1,400 square feet.
When we went above that amount
because we had to deal with the,
you know, dealing with the collapse
of someone's patio,
we went above the 1,400.
We didn't know,
L&I didn't really pay attention.
My client didn't pay attention to this.
We went above the 1,400.
We completed the work
that was approved by L&I.
I just want to object
to that characterization
that L&I wasn't paying attention
or didn't care about that but i apologize how about this i didn't i didn't mean that i think
he's already apologized yeah yeah thanks yeah i i don't i didn't mean it negatively it just wasn't
in the thought process of everyone i i we worked i respect all and i it just wasn't the thought
process the work was done no one really identified it until after the work was done and then the
planning commission pointed out the fact wait guys you're over 1400 square feet that's now we
have a situation where technically you have to go back and get a variance, which we'll have
legal arguments as to why not. But that's how we got here. So we got the refusal. We filed an
appeal against O&I. We separately filed for a variance, an application for appeal. And we met
with Manny Young, a community council. And I would have to say that the meeting didn't go very well.
And I don't understand why we have simply a single family home on a steep slope.
And, you know, one of the issues, I think, was because we have a front loading garage, which is as of right, like because we're not, you know, attached, like we don't need to get any approval for the front loading garage, you know, under the Philadelphia zoning code.
There was some indication at the community meeting that, and we'll go through that as well, but that we're attached.
We're not.
At the time, I was like, I talked to my client.
I was like, we're not attached, right?
He's like, no, we're not.
So we took pictures to show that there shouldn't be this other refusal as well.
And then we'll have maps of the area, photographs of the property, or plans and drawings, which will show the before and after the earth disturbance.
Our RCO meeting knows their application for a PLRD to the property showing that VP 4315 Boone LLC is the owner of the property and the Certificate of Tax Clarence.
And again, the virtual audience is my client's representative, Roy Aronovich, who is a member of the LLC, as well as Paul Looney, who is the engineer who provides the earth disturbance plan because that was one of the refusals.
The Earth Disturbance Plan, because that was one of the refusals and we provided that, so that should eliminate one of the refusals.
and we provided
And then I also have Zemir Garcia, who's the architect on this project.
So if there's any technical questions, you know, I have these professionals who are duly licensed and experienced who can answer those questions for the board.
So the notice of refusal is this. Again, all we're trying to do is a single family home, front loading garage.
We're on a steep slope. We know that.
You know, we're above 25 percent slope. Right.
And we get that because our earth disturbance was originally less than 1400 square feet.
We didn't need to do our earth moving plan. We didn't, you know, we didn't need board permission to build this single family home.
We got the zoning permit, got a building permit, which requires all these engineering reports and such.
Everything was blessed.
Unfortunately, like I said, because of this collapse of the patio area, we had to stabilize it, which requires some earth disturbance on our property, which made it above 1,400 square feet.
We made the property owner where there was an issue with the patio, we made them whole.
We spent almost 80, my client spent almost $80,000 redoing the patio, redoing his deck.
And there's a letter of support.
The one who was most directly impacted by this, to say the very least, inconvenience, he's in support of this project.
He's in support of us continuing the project.
And you'll see that from the pictures, we're almost done.
So anyway, we have an earth movie plan that City Planning reviewed.
I believe it was last week.
It was stamped. So one of the refusals should go away. The other one about the steep slope,
you know, we can talk about that as well. So we met with the Manionk Neighborhood Council and
they were 100 percent against it. I mean, we've been in front of them a few times with regarding
the same issue. There are some members of that community who don't want anything built on this
steep slope, even though it's a separately deeded property. They're like, no, I like the open space.
I don't want anything built there, even though they're probably the ones who are also on steep slopes.
And if they had to, you know, you know, justify their property's existence, they would probably have to go through the same process we're going through today.
So anyway, but, you know, they're completely, you know, and in their letter, which they gave twice, they said, you know, first, you know, originally we did not like meet the minimum.
At first, they said we exceeded the amount of 1,400 square feet of earth disturbance.
That's not correct.
We didn't exceed the 1,400 of earth disturbance until after we had to deal with the make-safe permit and deal with the neighboring property owner.
So that's incorrect.
The next thing that's incorrect, they say that we're attached to one of our adjacent building structures.
Thus, there should be an additional refusal for the front loony garage.
We took additional photographs recently so the board can see that we're not attached.
So that shouldn't be correct.
They took exception to the fact they think there should be another refusal for the height.
And, you know, we're allowed 38 feet.
We're on a steep slope.
You go by the average grade.