view the combined development proposals. I was told by the leadership of FNA that
it was perhaps an unprecedented number of people who came out to listen and to
perhaps an unprecedented number of people who came out to listen and to offer their input,
offer their input.
which led to these revised and updated plans that are before you. And that's why we're here today
with that support. And we did, before we came to you today, make the modifications on the setbacks.
So I recognize that I may not be able to address this neighbor's concern from around the block. We're always happy to keep in touch, but I'll rest with that.
Thank you. Is there anyone else who is in opposition to this application? Please raise your hand.
here we have someone by the name of christina you can unmute yourself and speak
can you hear me christina please uh give us your full name spell your name christina messer
m-e-s-s-e-r 1334 east oxford street philadelphia pa 19125 and do you swear and affirm to tell the
truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth i do thank you please proceed okay my concerns are
for the property on Oxford Street.
I did attend the FNA meeting,
and I did reach out to FNA in March
regarding a petition for the surrounding neighbors
to have them sign if they were
for the property being built or not.
I did not hear anything from them.
They actually, they did get back with me
and then coronavirus happened
and i didn't hear anything from them after that um at the fna meeting the vote for was overall in
favor but the surrounding neighbors was unfavorable um i do believe that there was a packed house for
that meeting because the developer is from the 19125 area and that's possibly why it was
favorable for developer but my concerns are for the apartment building and the density of our
neighborhood and the parking and all that stuff thank you anyone else who is in opposition
to this application or these applications i should say please raise your hand
we have a david johns you can unmute yourself and testify
hi my name is emily hinchman i'm david johns's wife um my last name is spelled h-i-n-c-h-m-a-n
my property is located at 1414 east columbia avenue and directly abuts the project on belgrade
do you swear and affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
i do please proceed thank you i um would just like to reiterate everything that miss brewing
said we have reached out to the developer and the um attorney mr laver and
And were promised, I guess, communication and did not receive communication regarding
any new meetings.
And furthermore, I would just like to reiterate and agree with everything that Ms. Brewing
She said it much more eloquently than I am.
Did you attend the community meeting?
I did.
Thank you.
anyone else who is in opposition please raise your hand for these applications
no one else chair you can proceed all right i understand mr labor you have a few people who
are in support in the interest of time uh could you recognize one or two of them and
we do appreciate they're taking the time to be with us this morning but again in the interest
of time, we would like to narrow it down to one or two folks. Certainly. I would ask those people
with whom we've spoken. Eric, would you please raise your hand, Eric? Eric, please raise your
hand virtually so that the chairman... You can now unmute yourself and speak, Eric.
Hi, can you hear me?
Please identify yourself, sir.
Eric Borma, E-R-I-K, Borma, B-O-E-R-M-A.
I live at 1409 Marlboro Street.
I'm directly behind the apartment complex that's going to be built.
And you swear to the firm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
And you swear to the firm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Please proceed.
Please proceed.
I just, you know, I understand the objections, but I think Dorr and his team have done,
they've gone well above and beyond trying to accommodate everything.
They've made multiple changes to the building.
They've worked directly with us because our parking lot is going to be directly impacted by this building.
So, you know, there's two other buildings that went up around us where we got no, you know, no contact from the builders.
So, you know, we're definitely in support of it just because they have, you know, just they've taken that extra effort, which we haven't seen from any other builders, at least since we've been here for the past almost five years now.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
There are a couple others out of the group who have been identified by Dwar and Devere.
if that applies to you
please raise your hand virtually
for the chairman
I know we're eager to move forward
with the lengthy list today
no hands are up
you can proceed
thank you Mr. Laver
any questions from the board?
Planning Commission so both properties are indicated for residential use on the city
plan regarding the 1408 East Oxford we have no objection to the grand unit
variance providing that a lower unit count be considered 14 are allowed by
right we believe it could be actually less dense and also compliance full
compliance with the parking landscape that's required on that particular site
regarding the Belgrade property to 325 Belgrade again in this case the property
is indicated for residential use on the city plan and giving the site
constraints we have no objection for granting of that parents thank you calendar number 39413
1408 east oxford street my vote is yes with the proviso two pages uh revised plan two pages
approved today and my vote is yes on calendar number 39418 325 belgrade street my vote is yes
to both my vote is yes to both with provisors my vote is yes for both with proviso with proviso
with provisors thank you let the record also reflect that vice chair carol team carol
tenere is thank you thank you thank you mr chairman and members of the board thank
everyone for participating appreciate your time yes are we is this number five no number three
calendar number 39824 2101 east westmoreland
before mr um klein comes on can i mention that he has the next two cases
this case Westmoreland and after that calendar 39058 theory 18 East Durham
Street that case was originally heard on July 21st continued to allow further
dialogue with the RCO and neighbors and mr. Klein will speak to that before you
vote thank you thank you mr. Klein do you agree to waive the reading of the
refusal and stipulate to its accuracy oh wait I'm sorry can everybody hear me
okay we can now do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate
to its accuracy yes I do you put your name and address on the record and spell
your name with a stenographer absolutely good morning mr chair members of the board jared klein
it's j-a-r-e-d last name k-l-e-i-n from blank rome llp 130 north 18th street uh here on behalf of
dgpm1 llc the owner of 2101 east westmoreland street uh i'm joined uh today on the zoom uh by
my client david goldstein and our i'm sorry i'm sorry did we get did he get sworn in
no the chairman swears him in now all right uh mr klein do you swear and affirm to tell
Mr. Klein, do you swear and affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth i do
Thank you.
As I was saying, I'm joined here by David Goldstein, the representative of the ownership group of the property and our architecture team from Harmon-Deutsch and Oller.
I'm going to share my screen and go through.
So 2101 East West Moreland Street, as with the application that you just heard, is a former industrial site.
It's zoned ICMX. The property is located here. It's about a half a block off of Frankfurt Avenue, which is here, and is bordered by Amber Street, where you can see my mouse cursor.
This is the front of the property.
The last zoned use for the property was as a music recording studio office.
Prior to that, it had a variety of warehouse uses, but has been vacant for some time.
And as you can see, the property is not in active use right now and has fallen into a state of disrepair.
that can be best shown with this photo. As you can see, the rear of the property,
the roof has come off, and it is not a viable structure for continued use.
As I said, the property is zoned ICMX, but it is surrounded by a variety of residential uses.
And I will go to the zoning map here. You can see that the area surrounding the property is a mix
of ICMX, RM1, RSA5, and so there's a lot of residential that surrounds the subject property.
So we approached the development scheme with an eye towards doing something that was not an
industrial commercial mixed use because the surrounding area of the subject property didn't
really support that, you know, some of the uses that would be allowed by right in the ICMX district.
There are two structures that are existing at the parcel right now.
There's this building here in the front and what we're calling building one, which is this structure back here, which is further up along Amber Street.
So part of the proposal is to adjust lot lines to create three lots from 12 that exist at the site now.
Those lots run up Amber Street and include the Westmoreland property.
So we'd be consolidating them into three lots to be used as one site.
The proposal is to keep this structure that you can see on your screen now and retrofit the interior to use it as 11 units.
We're then going to demolish the structure that's fallen into disrepair and erect a new structure that would be used as 48 residential units.
So it's a total of 59 between the two buildings.
With that is going to come 18 off-street parking spaces.
The parking is going to be accessed through a drive aisle that you can see on the screen here.
So parking will be along this side of the building.
The entrance, entry and exit to that will be off of Westmoreland Street and the Amber Street side.
Mr. Klein, we're not able, all we see is the existing building.
Do you have a plan that you want to share with us?
I do, Mr. Chair, and I will adjust my screen share to enable that. Bear with me just one second.
Is that showing now?
I don't see anything.
bear with me for just one moment i apologize mr chairman
are you home i am yeah i can run across the street and go get the plans then i'll wait there
i'll be right over my screen my screen is telling me it is sharing something with you but
or you're not seeing it all it says is jared klein has started screen sharing
aha does anyone any other board member have anything but a blank screen
i'll see the same thing to you frank
Bear with me for just a moment.
I'll give it one more shot and then I will move on.
Thank you.
i just wanted to share again are you still not seeing that yeah nothing so i want to continue
with your testimony we'll maybe it'll come up somehow okay so the the plans and maybe if if
the architecture team is on zoom maybe they can be given access to share their screen they may have
it but the the the sorry the plan that I was going to show would show you a curb cut off of
Westmoreland Street that would allow 18 cars to be parked along the rear of the property with the
Amber Street frontage maintaining its traditional residential look. We met with the Harrogate Civic
Association and I had their letter that was included within the exhibits that I had previously
provided to the board though again I'm not sure if the board can see that or not. But the Harrogate
Civic Association sent a letter that was dated March 5th after we had met with them and noted
that they found the applicant presented all the necessary information and that they were in
support of the application. There was also a letter from Councilman Squilla's office indicating he was
in non-opposition to the application. Given the board's hectic schedule this morning and my
inability to share my screen, I will pause for a moment to see if there's any questions and perhaps
Ms. Sunkit could recognize either Rustin Ohler or Eric Quick, who may be able to share their
screen more effectively than I can. Rustin, you've been promoted to panelists. You can share a screen
as necessary and unmute yourself to speak. Thank you. Rustin, let's see if your screen share
works better than mine. It does. Very good. Rustin, would you
identify yourself? Yeah, Rustin Oler, Harmon Deutsch Oler Architecture, 1225 North 7th Street,
Philadelphia, PA. And do you swear and affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but
the truth? I do. Thank you. Please proceed. Rustin, since your tech is working better than mine,
would you mind briefly walking the board through the plans and have a brief conversation about the
styles of unit types that we're going to have in in the proposed building yeah so i'll make it brief
for you um as jared had mentioned um the building to the north which is the existing four-story
structure we're going to remain um there's 11 units to go in that building that's identified
here as building one um the remainder of the structure um without the roof that has been
dilapidated will be demolished um there is a common shared drive aisle between our property
and the neighboring property at 3310 Collins Street through one curb cut, which will access
18 off-street parking stalls, which are tucked underneath the building. We have our residential
lobby entrance tier off of Westmoreland Street, along with interior trash storage and mailrooms.
We have an elevator, a fully accessible building, six units at the ground floor, and then the upper
floors are identical in nature two through four it's a four-story structure mixture of ones and
two bedrooms and studio units for a total of 48 units in this building 11 in the existing building
we have 20 interior bicycle stalls these are just some typical unit types
new elevations of the building you can see the existing building here to the left of the page
and then the newer structure which is the four story portion here which we're
building up to Westmoreland Street and then I have an artist rendering of what
the building will look like at the corner of Westmoreland here okay thank
you Ross any questions from the board so far no no
Mr. Klein. Mr. Chair, I will briefly just touch on the specific refusals that we have.
There are three. The first one we've discussed, and that's for the residential use in the ICMX
district. The second refusal was for the amount of parking. There are 30 required parking spaces
based on our unit count. We're providing 18. Given the constraints and the way that the site
constraints and the way that the site is currently configured 18 was the maximum number of spaces
is currently configured. 18 was the maximum number of spaces.
that we could fit we do believe that providing the 20 bicycle storage spaces in the proximity