Both properties. Yeah, I've read both properties. Absolutely.
Thank you.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes with proviso on both.
Emily.
Emily Bresico, my vote is yes to both with proviso.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes to both with proviso.
Thank you, Thomas.
Thank you, Mr. Clinton.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the board.
Number 10.
No, wait, wait, wait, no, no, no, hold on.
Number three, MI 2022-004-784-536 Brinton Street.
Sharon Harvey is the attorney for the owner.
Letter of support from Chew and Belleville Neighbors Association.
An applicant also provided a petition in support by 10 neighbors, nine from the 500 block of Brighton.
Coming back in as a panelist.
Good morning, counsel.
Good morning.
Could you state your name, please, and spell for the court stenographer?
Sharon Harvey, S-H-A-R-O-N Harvey, H-A-R-V-E-Y.
Do you swear or affirm the total truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client in relationship to this property?
The owner, Lisa Terry, and the property is at 536 Britton Street, calendar number MI2022-004784.
Right. So I understand, talking to our attorney, we're going to hear the case and then hold it for discussion.
Yes. I did submit the exhibits, but they were late.
No, no, no. No, I mean, OK. So our vice chair has just a few questions for us.
Good morning, counsel. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes. Yes.
I've emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that are needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing.
Not five days in advance, but I did email the exhibits to the board.
And there is no tax clearance. We applied for one, but there is no tax.
and that there is no tax clearance. We applied for one, but there is no tax clearance because
there are no other businesses. And the only taxes that would be due would be the real estate taxes,
which are paid through her mortgage. Fair enough. So as the chair said, we'll hear the case and
hold it and make sure we have all the proper information that is needed before we vote.
Please proceed and share your screen.
Yes, good morning again we're here for 536 Britain Street and sometimes it's called East
Britain Street.
Can everyone see the screen we can we're good.
And we have the table of contents, the posting, the deed infusal, and the property history.
Copy of the posting and the deed showing that Ms. Terry purchased this property in 2022 from Brock, Weldon Brock.
as we have already uh weighed the right of the reading of the refusal the property is a zone
uh a single family use and the multi-family uh which we are requesting is a prohibited in this
RS3A zone. Initially, the property in 1962 was zoned as a three-apartment building and became
a multifamily building, which continued through the purchase of the prior owner, Mr. Weldon Brock,
who had an active rental license until 2012, December 2012, at which time he allowed it to lapse.
But he continued to have tenants in the property.
miss terry is proposing to uh have the property rezoned uh or variance for a three apartment
building uh and miss terry plans to live on the first floor of the building and then rent out the
other two spaces. You can see it was also posted on the porch. This is a side view of the property
and her property, if you can see, runs right through to the grass line. So all this property
is her side yard. And here's the back view of the property. Ms. Terry is not proposing to make any
changes to the height or the width of the building. This is the rear of the property.
There is a single, or actually a two-car garage that can be used for this property, and Ms. Terry plans to get parking permits for this back area.
and the back cellar, the back of the property has a cellar, which will have a deck on the
cellar over the, or on, on the rear of the property. So that would be a change.
These are the floor plans that propose the three apartments. And I have a picture where each
apartment would be for the first floor apartment. This is the first floor apartment. So
a one-bedroom, and it's 818 square feet, which the first floor apartment is where Ms. Perry
will be living. The second floor apartment is a two-bedroom apartment, which has 827 square feet,
27 square feet a two uh the two bedroom apartment and then a third floor apartment is 792
And then the third floor apartment is 792 square feet, and that is a one-bedroom apartment.
These are interior pictures for the building.
This is the first floor bedroom, and you can see that it's in need of repair.
And work has not actually been begun.
And some demolition has been done in the property to clear it out, but no work has been done.
This is the second floor front bedroom and the third floor bed, the third floor and the kitchen area.
Keep on listening.
And this is a side view of the property, which is here, and it's facing Chew Avenue.
And to the rear of her property is an apartment complex on Duval Street.
So this particular aerial view shows the red dot is Ms. Terry's property, and all these blue dots are already three-story, three-bedroom multifamily units on that same block.
And this is just a list of the multifamily units.
Again, this is another picture of the rear, and by allowing the variance, her tenants, at least two of her tenants could park in the rear of the property.
and this is a view of the the back of the property and right now this is the this is
actually the area of her her property right there and she's going to have parking for permit parking
for her tenants in that area um the miss terry uh plans to have cameras uh which is uh and security
around the building and um the i think that is it for us um miss terry went out and got several
of her neighbors to sign the a petition um in support of her her application the rco we did
meet with the RCO after posting and sending out the letters twice, once, and we received, it was
not very well attended. However, we did get support of all those who were attending with a
request for emergency ladders for the second and third floor, which Ms. Terry agreed to.
Uh, there's a copy of the letters and copy of our, our mailings with their 15 pages of the mailings. I did not put all 15 pages in and, and that is it.
And Ms. Terry.
You're applying to come on and adopt your testimony.
Yes, I do. Ms. Terry.
good morning could you state your name please oh good morning could you state your name and
spell please for the court stenographer good morning my name is lisa terry l-i-s-a terry
t-e-r-r-y right do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth
I do. Proceed, counsel. Thank you. Ms. Terry, have you heard the presentation? I did. And would you adopt the presentation as being truthful? I do. And your own testimony? Yes. Thank you. Okay. Questions from the board? No, Chair. No, Mr. Chairman.
questions or comments from the virtual audience mr chair i have a tiffany thornton with the hand
raised i have allowed them to speak this time hi could you state your name could you state
pardon me counsel mr chair uh tiffany thornton is an attorney in my office uh and she
pardon me council mr chair uh tiffany thornton is an attorney in my office uh and she was
helping run the the okay good good good thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you
is there anyone else in the virtual audience um yes charles richardson i've allowed them to speak
good morning mr richardson good morning again mr chair charles richardson office of councilwoman
ascended bathroom 508 city hall councilwoman has no opposition to granting the variance
thank you very much for calling in is there anyone else in the virtual audience
i do not see any further hands so hillary do we want planning to weigh in or do we want to
go to l and i first um i think that's up to planning um just to be clear that the issue
in this matter is that parking uh three parking spaces will be required and it sounds like there
are one to two on the site and so that needs to to be documented and i need to speak with l and i
about how they would like to do that um but let me see let me see where david david yeah david do
you want to take a position or do you want to wait to see what l and i says sure why don't we wait
until l and i that's fine that's okay okay terrific all right good so we're going to hold
we'll have a resumptive hearing am i right hillary yes we'll schedule um a resumption
um do we have something in well actually if we do an amended refusal it might take a little while
we're just we're just going to have to post the resumption because i don't know exactly when we're
going to have a result of hearing in this we're going to hold this for discussion with ellen i
regarding the existing and required parking and amended refusal may be needed okay council
yes okay all right thank you both very much
oh wait excuse me just go back to the parking really quick and let them know that
you're going to have permanent parking right yeah so i'm sorry as i stated we are going to have
permit parking on the property uh so in the rear in the rear in the rear yeah but i i think we
still have to go back to l and i am i right hillary yes because so there's if there's already
parking on the site it needs to be documented in the refusal and you're also required to have
three parking spaces so if you don't have three you may need a variance for not having the required
three spaces as well so i just have to clarify that with l and i all right all right thank you
Thank you very much.
Number 10, MI2022, 004789, 1821 North Natrona Street.
Lynn Nichols is the attorney.
There was a meeting held with Strawberry Mansion.
we don't have an RCO letter
that I have observed yet
there was a petition in support
signed by 14 neighbors
6 from the 1800 block of North Natrona
good morning counsel
could you state your name
and spell for the court sonographer
yes my name is Lynn Nichols
L-Y-N-N
last name N-I-C-H-O-L-S
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
QA, could you please identify your client in relationship to this property?
Yes, his name is Bryant Watson, and he's the owner.
And our vice chair has just a few questions for you.
Good morning, counsel.
Do you agree to waive the reading of the refuser and stipulate to his accuracy?
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that are needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen.
Before I proceed, Chair, can I ask if there's anyone on the call besides Bryant Watson who intends to testify in this matter?
we don't see any other hands do we i don't know there was a beverly wilson stone who
identified herself earlier i don't know if there's anyone if she's still on the call or
is there anyone else i mean she's still on the call and there's at least five other hands
accompanying her okay i guess we'll get to that when we get to it um thank you can i share my
screen? You can. Thank you. Can you see that? We can. All right. So this is a petition or request.
We can. All right. So this is a petition or a request for a variance for a multifamily, two-family household in an existing structure.
Our application for appeal notes that the requirements of the zoning code cause an unnecessary hardship due to the size, shape, contours, and physical dimensions of the property.
The variance we seek represents the least modification of the code to provide relief.
No action on our part will increase congestion in the public streets or in any way endanger the public.
It will not substantially or permanently harm neighbors' use of their properties or impair light and air.
It will not increase traffic congestion in the public streets or place undue burden on the water, sewer, or other public facilities.
It will not create environmental damage, pollution, erosion, or increase the danger of flooding.
And here you will see we also have project information form.
The deed, this property was purchased from the estate of Keith McCall by Mr. Watson.
The deed was recorded on January 3rd, 2022.
here we have the certificate of tax clearance
we notified um near neighbors there were letters sent out to 97 near neighbors
and we had our community meeting on june 22nd it was very spirited
um here's the zoning notice that's posted on the door
this is a letter that was sent to the community
the refusal which we've already
agreed to so we submitted with our package comps of what we consider properties that are similar
to what Mr. Watson has now these addresses we researched show that
these properties were built in 1915. And they're all three-story properties.
So the size of the property is consistent with other properties on the block.
During the call with the RCO, the neighbors who came on insisted that the family of the houses on the block were single family.
Now, that's not the complete story, which as these comps we've researched show, there's been multifamily units on this block.
Many of them have been three family dwellings, or three family dwellings, and some of them are
two family dwellings. Mr. Watson is asking for two families in his property.
Now, what we also determined was that because this property
is on the block where it's located. Mr. Watson has a model. What he likes to do is to provide
affordable housing to residents who want to live in this area. Here is a picture of the front of
the property. This is a view looking to the left. A view looking to the right. This is a view
looking across the street. And these are the plans. I'm going to pull them up in a different
of screen so you can see them. All right. This is a 2,200 and I believe 52 square feet property.
So it's pretty big. What Mr. Watson proposes to do is to have one unit on the first floor
where there's a bedroom, living room, kitchen, bathroom. And then the second and third floors
would be a bi-level unit, which would contain a bedroom on the second floor with the kitchen and
living room, a bathroom, and then on the third floor would be a master bedroom, bedroom with a
closet. And we provided these plans during our call with the RCO. In addition, as the chair noted,
We did get signatures from near neighbors. I believe it was two, three, four, five, six.
I believe it was two, three, four, five, six near neighbors on the block.
If you look at the signatures, one of the near neighbors or two of them live at 1835 North Natrona Street, which is a multifamily property unit on that block already.
And the owner of that property has a rental license for three units, but it appears that only two people are living there.
or if there are three maybe there's not someone in the third unit. In any event what we also
discovered is that there's been a property for sale on the block 1827 North Natrona Street for
almost five months. I say that because economically Mr. Watson as I stated before wants to provide
affordable housing for residents to live in this block. And it would be economically unfeasible for