her legal assistant Christine
Schlosser on
alright they've been promoted to panelists
alright thank you
good afternoon council
They're coming back in, sir.
Okay, thank you.
They're in, Chair.
I'm not sure if she's having a problem with her audio, but she's not speaking, and it's
unmuted.
Ms. Gashton?
I did not see her
Ms. Gaston in the virtual audience
Mr. Roberto
are you here for this case
maybe she's with him
you can unmute yourself
hi could you state your name please and spell for the court stenographer
Hi, this is Cheryl Gaston. I'm here.
hi this is shell guest and i'm here okay hi could miss
Okay. Hi. Ms. Gaston, could you state your name and spell, please, for the court stenographer?
Okay. I'm Cheryl Gaston. It's C-H-E-R-Y-L, Gaston. G as in George, A-S as in Sam, T-O-N.
And I...
Would you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
I will.
Could you have your videos turned on so we can see you?
AS A PANELIST NOW, CHAIR.
yes can you hear me now we hear you now we see you too ah perfect all right could you identify
your client and the relationship to this property my client is roberto espinal and he is the yeah
we'll bring him in when we have to right he's the leslie for the property all right and our vice
chair has just a few questions for you sure good afternoon counsel do you agree to weigh the reading
of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy i do have you emailed in all the required documents
and exhibits that are needed to proceed with this case thank you please proceed okay um and i need
christine to uh share screen please okay she's coming back in as a panelist chair okay thank
you thank you they have me as espinal instead of guest and i don't know why
We're going to see you. We're fine. We're fine. Okay.
All right. Are you here?
Here comes your screen. Okay. Proceed.
All right. Good afternoon, members of the board. This is an application of Lancaster Tire Center, Inc.
to use this property as a tire repair shop.
And if we can go to the next page, the table of contents, please.
What I have for you are the commercial lease,
and he also has licenses as for tire use.
He had a property at 44, I'm sorry, at 4438, I think it was, Lancaster Avenue and lost his lease.
So he's trying to move into another property nearby where he can continue to carry on his business.
there's the notice of refusal we have the application for appeal and project information
form tax clearance certificate not yet please go back please christine thank you um we have a
site and floor plan with elevations it's basically just a empty shop that had been used commercially
before. We have pictures, the zoning posters, and the site. And then we have, as you already
said, a letter of support from the Mill Creek Advisory Council. We also have four pages of
petitions in support. And we also have the support of the council person. So, okay.
Okay. Next page, please. Christine. This is the lease with the, and we can just go through this. This is the lease that Mr. Espinel has for the property.
And, as you know, we can have a deed, lease, or agreement of sale in terms of applying for a variance.
And then the notice of refusal, which is coming out, 13 pages for this lease.
These are some of the licenses that he has.
And then the notice of refusal is even though this is a CMX2.
Notice of refusal is, even though this is a CMX2 property and is on a commercial corridor, this use, which is considered personal vehicle repair and maintenance, but it's actually a tire repair shop, is not permitted as a use.
And so we are asking for a variance to allow it to use for the tire repair.
Go ahead, Christine.
We can move forward.
This is the application for appeal.
And what I will say is my client had basically done most of this.
So I was involved in some of the early stages of this, but everything was done in accord with the rules of the board.
This is the tax clearance. And then that was the earlier one.
This was continued because he needed to have an attorney to present his case here.
This is the site plan. And then we have some pictures of the actual building.
These are some of the postings. My client, in his zeal to do this, didn't ask us to put this on orange paper, the continued date, but it is still, it was posted as it should have been.
um and then this is a look at the building as you can see it kind of sits by itself the interior is
just um a commercially uh what had been a commercially used uh property at some point
there's no improvements to it so that um it's um suitable for the use that he has in mind
And as you can see, masonry.
And again, we have the, this is a picture of the area of Lancaster Avenue that we're talking about.
And again, it's a commercial corridor.
So it's not as if this is a use that would be not in keeping with the commercial character of this particular area.
Yep. This is the letter of support. And then we have like four pages of petitions in support
for this particular business
and Mr. Espinel.
And again,
and as you said,
the council person is also in favor of this
as a use.
This is some of the communications
with the RCOs
setting up the meeting,
which was in March of this year.
and uh and then these are the addresses and then uh they used um they actually did certified mail
for the receipts instead of the um certificates of mailing which are more expensive actually
but these are copies of those
and with that
I would like to have my client
be brought forward
Mr. Espinel
i'm here hi mr espino could you state your name please and spell for the court stenographer
could you spell your name for him too please
R-O-B-E-R-T-O-A-E-S-B-I-N-E-R
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Proceed, counsel.
Mr. Espinel, did you hear my presentation to the board?
Will you accept my presentation as your own testimony?
Thank you.
You're welcome.
Just to counsel, just for the record, there's a note here from Councilmember Gauthier.
Councilmember Gauthier, we have seen firsthand the business owner's commitment to being a genuine
We have seen firsthand the business owner's commitment to being
Thank you.
member of the community and readiness to address neighborhood concerns. The usually
large groundswell support from neighbors for this application is a demonstration of this.
Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
Yes, Chair.
No, Chair.
Proceed.
I have one question. I have a question.
So, where will you all be utilizing the storage of the tires on this facility?
It will be inside the building.
There is no storage on the outside of this facility?
No, we're not going to store tires outside.
No side yards or anything of that nature?
No, no.
The idea is you saw the space.
The space is very large, and it can accommodate the tire center uses.
And there's also like a driveway that's in the back so that they can use that for purposes of putting the tires on the cars.
And that's like an enclosed space, too, if you want to go back to the site plan.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
I'm Mr. Chair. I have a Raman Hagarist with a hand raised.
Sure. Hi, could you state your name, please, and spell for the court stenographer?
We see them, Jason.
Okay, they've unmuted. Okay. Hi, could you state your name and spell for the court stenographer,
please
Bachman Harkis
could you spell your name
Bachman Harkis
R-A-H-M-A-N
H-A-R-G-U-S-T
do you swear or affirm to tell the truth
nothing but the truth
are you a neighbor
no actually reaching out
or speaking on behalf
of the community of the Kuba Masjid and Kuba Day School,
which is just down from the tire location.
Okay. Please proceed.
Currently, the plan is to put the tire shop at the corner of Wyalusing
and Lancaster Avenue, which is already a very congested part of Lancaster Avenue.
So we as a community have some concern as far as the increased traffic of the tire facility, as well as the continued occupying of limited space that is available for the neighbors that are actually living on that block, actually.
And as the pictures may show that 4619 is a standalone property, to the left of it, after a lot, there are some residential housing who are already pretty constricted with their parking availability as is, along with the, again, increased traffic, trolley goes down that street.
and currently you know the location is already being utilized for car washes they do have the
tire facility you know storing tires in there currently but we have some additional concerns
about the impact on you know the neighborhood for the the families that live there as well as
the school that is right nearby and so we are not in the favor of this approval okay thank you
for your input and we appreciate you calling in uh is there anyone else in the first audience
no further hence mr chair okay um planning commission
good afternoon chair peter bernard for the planning commission
the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the cmx2 commercial mixed
use zoning at this location. The proposed personal vehicle repair and maintenance is
consistent with prior industrial use at this location. Planning Commission recommends that
the board grant the variance on the condition that all vehicles will be stored within the property.
Thank you. What I want to do with this, I want to counsel, I'm going to take this back
to my executive session next week.
We will vote for this next Tuesday at 2 p.m.
I just want to have a conversation with my executive group, okay?
Okay. Thank you. Thank you for your, your presentation.
Thank you for your...
Thank you. Is there anyone on the 2 p.m. list in the virtual audience whose case has not been called?
I do not see any answer, Mr. Chair.
Okay. We're going to take five minutes and I don't believe we have many cases left on the 330 list. So five minutes, we'll be back. Okay.
Thanks, everyone.
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
If there's any questions, please use the Q&A.
i'm going to answer a question lakisha
we have someone from the um two o'clock let's keep raising their hand i'm trying to get them
to uh write in the q a okay sorry chair thank you i am ready when you are chair thank you
Thank you. How do we look, LaKeisha? I see Tom's back. Let's see here. Jim's there. Where's Ish?
I'm here. I'm here.