tanetta graham my vote is yes with proviso i win my vote is yes with proviso
Ishmael Shaheen, my vote is Jesper Proviso.
Mr. Toppin, could you please stay on?
So number 10, 2024-001-176-5101 Funston Street.
Mr. Toppin, could you just state your name for the record?
Yes, my name is Sherman Toppin, last name T-O-P-P-I-N.
Could you identify your client, a relationship to this property?
Yes, my client's name is Amber Berry, and Ms. Berry Real Estate, LLC is her sole member, LLC, and she should be here with us in the virtual audience.
Vice Chair has a few questions for you.
Good morning, Counselor. Do you agree to wait a reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes, I do.
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that's needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, I have.
thank you council please proceed and share you've already shared it yes and um so this property uh
Yes. And so this property, it will seem very much like a repeat of what I said. In fact, the three I have today, ironically, have the exact same arguments and the exact same situation.
it will seem very
Here, what's in front of you is 5101 Funston Street. This property was a corner property completely restored to what you see today.
um this property and i'll go through my typical exhibit package as you have already received
there there's the the refusal again the same situation two-family two-story block but we're
seeking a two-family household living in this existing structure the particular deed was this
property was also only purchased two years ago january 20 31st of 2022 so miss miss barry purchased
this property with the intention of restoring it to a condition that was livable and hired a
contractor to do so. These exhibits that I'm pushing through are basically the application
for appeal, bringing us to this point. The same part of the same issue that this particular
owner has had is that to take the property from the condition that she founded and she bought it
to market would be economically not feasible. And then there's a great demand for rental,
affordable rental in this particular area that she notes. And these are the reasons that we
feel the property's configuration as single family really doesn't satisfy my client. It
really doesn't make sense for this particular street based on how it is. We'll see some pictures
of what the street really looks like. Here's our project information sheet that I'm kind of moving
through as I'm speaking. So this property is also RSA 5, all the streets around it. Our property
sits here on the corner as we've seen just now going further down
from the top you'll see that there's just a few um in all the around the different
if you can look at from the different lots there's a lot of vacant lots in this area
you can look at them all from above and going further down this is just another street another
area in philadelphia that needs renewal that needs renovation this is the subject property here
that's been renovated and here's the two properties next to it but let's look down the block
and this is what you see so vacant lots vacant lots boarded properties you know that kind of
continues down this street of the same way so again the client purchased the property with
belief that this is a property that she could re redo and return to livable and attractive status
for rental so let's go inside and see what was done there and this is again a application to
legalize an existing two unit configuration as it's been redone this is a side view of the property
and this is the rare view of the property it's completely redone all around now this property
has two units this is a mechanical there unit one when you open the door kind of gives you
this look wide open concept straight to the back and further down you know the kitchen
new kitchen there bedroom one that's the master facing the street in the front you can see the
bay windows. Bedroom 2 needs a little fixing up. There's folks there. Bedroom 3. The one
bath surfacing the upstairs hallway. And then second bath. And then this is the rear of
the property on the first floor unit from the outside. And this is also where trash
will be stored for both units now looking here the second unit will be accessible down these steps
so it's a it's a front facing first unit for the top two floors and a rear-facing
basement unit and this was the so when you go into the basement unit here or i should say the
lower level unit this is all electric for example there's no there's no furnace in this entire
property so there's no issue carbon dioxide as far as that goes so this is a a studio small
straight through studio this is what it will what it looks like when you look at
and this is the reverse of that same view so it's one long studio as
apartment number two and this is the bathroom and as I mentioned before is
entered down through these steps so they were doing some work with this ladder
and they took the picture but so this is the rear door of unit number one but the
unit number two is accessible down these steps.
So we took, so I'm going to look at some plans and I'll make this smaller so the board can
get a closer look at exactly what was done here. So here is the plan. So again, the basement unit
get a closer look at exactly what was done here.
is accessible from the rear, concrete masonry steps coming down here. In the RCO, meaning they
wanted to be sure that there would be no issue of flooding of this unit. So there is a drain
here at the bottom and in the window well in the front, there's a drain also, and there's a sump
pump in there um and you walk in there's just a a doorway closet and in wide open space kitchen and
bath in the rear of the unit which is what we saw um the front unit is accessible through the front
door when you walk in open concept right to the back like we saw um and then for so living room
dining room kitchen is all open and with with a powder room and as you walk upstairs you have the
three bedrooms and the bath for those three bedrooms so pretty typical layout nothing nothing
no exterior construction was done and that is um and this was also our they they asked us about
whether or not there would be drainage and so there was no so in the basement area there's
there's this drain here that would create so that there's no if there was any flooding or excess
water coming that in that window well it would come it would come through that drain so this
is what we're let me push this back to the right size for the rest of the our talk so we noticed
we sent this we sent our our zba letter our notice of rcrs rco letter to the community
to the 188 affected neighbors around and these are our addresses on we're on the envelopes
certificates of mail which goes on for several pages in our exhibit package and of course notice of this hearing and was posted properly on the front door on the property and our tax cert.
And in the ZB in the in this particular meeting we had we don't have as a 14th exhibit the the letter from the RCO the 44th Ward.
But in that meeting, they were most concerned about just the ability of the lower level unit to be not subject to flooding or not subject to any carbon monoxide, again, because the units are electric and there's adequate ways to relieve any water that would go into that unit.
They were satisfied, at least in our RCO meeting.
We haven't seen their letter of support, so it's not attached to our exhibit number 14.
but at this point i would like to bring my client on so that she can
answer any further questions or adopt my testimony on her behalf
and this is amber berry she could be advanced to panelist
thank you miss burry hello how are you i could you please state your name and spell for the
stenographer. My name is Amber Berry, A-M-B-E-R-B-E-R-R-Y.
We're affirmed to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
Yes. Please proceed, counsel. Yes, and Ms. Berry, have you been listening to my
testimony on your behalf up to this point? Yes. And would you accept my testimony as
accurate and complete as representing your experience with this property? Yes.
there was a question one of the board members asked for previous property well i'll ask you
that now uh upon obtaining this property were any permits pulled to your knowledge by the
contractor for the renovation of this of this um unit no the and was there an explanation given to
you as to why not um well the property was already configured this way so we just i just uh they just
painted and like put new floors and things like that down so i when i went to get my permits
meanwhile my license that's when i was told that it was a single considered a single family
this was like maybe my second property i had ever bought so i wasn't really aware of how to go about
uh like plans and permits i kind of just left it in my contractor's hands so i didn't i wasn't
aware of it when i was going through this process okay that that's understood that's what we that's
what i had represented just wanted it to come from your mouth as well so um that being the case if
there's any questions of the board we'd love to handle answers questions at this time so so um
mr toppen what what this is is a two-story home right yes and the basement's created into a
a small apartment.
Is that right?
Yes, that is correct.
And that's the way the property was when it was purchased?
And were the utilities separated?
They're separated now. Yes, questions on the board.
They're separated now?
Questions from the board?
Yes, can you go back to the picture of the.
Of the unit okay, this is the going into the pictures exhibit 6. here's the front. No, not that 1. the 1 of the original.
the you had a picture of the building before the original building oh the original i think
that was in the plans i think that was on the plans mr johnson hold me let me scroll down
ah here so if i look at this picture the window well was put in afterwards
dug down looks like it was dug down yes so and now you don't have a picture of the side so it's
hard to see you know whether or not it was configured like that i have a concern of having
this basement as an apartment the difference between this project and the one that you
presented previously is that at least they were one was one unit was on the first floor the other
unit was on the second floor in this condition it's literally a three-bedroom house with a
basement space um and on your plan it says recreation it doesn't say apartment or anything
that's that's so that's that's an issue for your plans um but again my concern is really
um i don't think this is an appropriate location for apartment of the basement
other questions from the board you want to answer that mr top oh yeah i wasn't i wasn't sure that
was a question mr johns uh i think it wasn't it wasn't it wasn't a question that was really
but statements have been made that it was configured like this when it was a purchase
but this picture clearly shows that it doesn't it didn't have a window well right so it wasn't
quite the way that it was when it was purchased right i think yes i think it was the masonry
what what you saw was the plans for the masonry because the concern was just so you know mr johnson
this is what we this actually issue came up in the rco meeting the concern was egress out of this
particular out of this basement unit so what no no no what i'm what i'm saying is that what was
stated was that the the building was laid out as it was the only thing that was done was painting
right and the comment it was completely renovated as far as finishing if you were if you were right
and that's right well finishing right well finishing but uh and uh egress well was put in
to the front so yes yes that wasn't so it wasn't configured like it was when you bought it
it is then i don't have it then there's no picture of the rear so i don't know whether the back
stairs were there when you bought it because there's no picture of you know when you bought
it i can i can i can tell you that it was modified to have the concrete masonry steps going down
as rather than just the typical it was made nicer and the front were there were no stairs
going down to the base there were steps going down but they made that they made it nicer and wider
as would i'll go back to the picture but the reason for the front the reason for the digging
out of the front was so that for egress there would be two ways to get out of this the basement
if there was emergency that that's what they did that for so you can walk out so here this is this
would this was a high window the window now goes twice the left i understand why i understand it
was why it was done okay all i'm saying is that what was said was this was considered the way that
we see it now when it was bought and i don't know that that is true because when you show a picture
that doesn't show what is what is what is there now right and you say i bought it like it is now
i can't in my mind know that everything is is that's true yeah well this is new that this is
new masonry here right that's new masonry it's a new step clearly there's new steps that go down
to the basement and in the front i don't know whether there was a there was steps that went
down to the basement. Oh, I understand. You understand what I'm saying? Because everything
that you're showing me is new. And let me finish. And you've got an entry to this unit from an alley.
Yeah. It's not even from the street. It's from the alley. You know, so I don't know. I'm not
comfortable with supporting a basement apartment in this particular location in this configuration.
it concerns me okay okay other questions from the board I just have a quick question
what could it be a thought that the storage for the unit could take place in that basement space
storage for the unit uh could could take place in that basement space instead of a apartment
instead of
because it seems like I didn't see any lot of storage space for the units on this first and
second floor I don't believe there's access from the from the unit to the basement from the from
this from this if you go in this first floor here you can't get to the basement so if that's that
what you're asking Ms. Graham because there's no there's only rare access to the that's why I think
she said it was configured this way because there's not a there's not a way to go from this
floor into the basement i think that's i think that's the issue we have other questions from
the board yes um question uh what happened at this rco meeting was there was it well attended
was there uh did they approve this um the rco meeting they didn't have i think the the sentiment
of the board is it was somewhat the same they want most of the questions circled around the
lower level unit with the basement unit and how is it how it is safe that was the most of the
conversation and the two issues of what was egress and how one could get from the front
out here. And so one of the RCO meeting, they wanted us to put a, I guess, some cover over
this space because they liked the fact that there was an egress window that if there was a fire or
whatever, you can come out. But they didn't like the fact that it was open, that if someone from
the outside could get in, a security issue, even though there's security lights here and ring on
the front door, they were more consistent on, they wanted something to cover this space here.
And we agreed to that, that there would be a—actually, it's probably installed already now.
But that was one—that was all of the questions that they really had was about this.
And they weren't concerned about this rear access?
I'll go to it so we can talk about it.
So, yeah, this rear—this is existing.
All this was here.
So, basically—
All that fence was there?
The fence was not here.
But what was there before was steps going out, and you could go right into the basement from here.
And they just made it more, I guess, nicer, if you would.
And the masonry was done to create a wider step and a more, and let's just go to it.
Let's just go to it.
So they wanted the steps to look nicer, and I think that was the issue.
So they did this new masonry here, and they enclosed it with this security fence.
So there would be some entertaining space back here, and then there would be a fence, you know,
that's really it um that was the decision that the that the that the uh owners made i think that
the quandary was how you get to how do you make use of the bottom space because it's not usable
because there's no access from the top to this space it was always a room down there