existing brick as close as possible. Here's the plans. Again, we're not shrinking the rear yard
at all. The footprint of the house remains the same. Front of the house, rear of the house,
and this is the side view. So this is why one of the refusals concerns the open space because there
is a cantilever of the second and third floor. And again, the code looks at that as an infringement
on the rear yard. But again, not to be redundant, but we're really not affecting the rear yard at
all. We're coming out three feet, four feet on the rear and putting a third floor on.
This is the existing condition of the house, the basement. It's not a finished basement.
The utilities are in the basement. First floor, as you enter the front of the home,
There's a living room with the kitchen in the rear, and then the second floor, which is existing, two bedrooms and the bath.
So the plan is to add a third floor, add two bedrooms.
This is a four-family household.
Add two bedrooms with one bath, and then also have a rooftop deck.
And in deference to the neighbors, to the rear, we are setting back the roof deck five feet to the rear, as well as five feet on the front.
We have no refusals for that.
The rest of the documents are the pro forma documents you would see in an application like this.
And this is our tax clearance. The taxes are due the end of March. The mortgage company pays the taxes.
So I advise the client, let the mortgage company pay the taxes, but all taxes in the past are up to date and paid for.
And they'll be paid by March 31st by the mortgage company.
Zoning map indicating that we're about seven homes off Bigler Street, just north of Bigler.
There's an alley in the rear, so the contractor will have access to the rear of the house to do the renovation work.
This is one of the questions raised at the community group.
We're not going to have to close off the street for any underground utilities because it's an existing two-story house.
And there's ample parking on Bigler Street for any of the contractors that we need to work on the property.
This is the deed indicating Mr. Nellie has owned the property since 2008.
this is our notice of mailing
we mailed out 176
letters to the surrounding community
advising them of the community meetings
and that's the
presentation Vice Chairman
just in conclusion I'd like to just point out a few things
one is
that this is a unique situation
it's a narrow home
14 feet wide the lot is 50 feet
untypical lot in Philadelphia
but not one of the larger lots
We are not impacting anyone's light or air.
We're not impacting the development of either adjacent neighbor's property.
It's not detrimental to the public welfare.
It's in harmony with what the community group would like to see.
And it's in harmony with the neighbors on either side of Miss Janelli's property.
And I think we'll see more and more of these requests as Philadelphia continues to be a
city of destination and really a nice place to reside and to live with your family so with that
I would ask my client to unmute herself. Henry one question so what about the deck on the property
about the what the deck I see you have something in for a direction of a rooftop deck right yes
that's that's part of the application that's going to be on top of the third floor that's going to be
I said so is that going to be added on as well. Yes. Yeah, it's going to be a third floor and a rooftop deck.
All right. Let's get your client on this. Can you unmute yourself?
Mr. Clinton, what is your client's name? Francis Janelli, J-A-N-N-E-L-L-I.
Frances Janelli, J-A-N-N-E-L-L-I.
Frances Janelli, if you're in the virtual audience, please unmute yourself.
Frances Janelli, please raise your virtual hand.
I'm texting her too. She was on the call.
Vice Chair, she's been unmuted and allowed to speak.
Hi, yes. Sorry.
Good morning. Can you please state your name and spell it for the court reporter?
My name is Francis Janelli, F-R-A-N-C-E-S, Janelli, J-A-N-N-E-L-L-I.
Do you swear to sell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
And, Ms. Janelli, were you on the call, the Zoom call, when I presented your project for
your home to add a third story and a rooftop deck?
Yes, I was.
And if you had the opportunity to testify, would you adopt my testimony as your own
and as true and correct?
Yes, I would.
Thank you, Mr. Noe. Thank you.
Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Vice Chairman.
No, Vice Chair.
Questions from our attorney, Hillary Emerson.
Mr. Clinton, we didn't get the I see you put it up on the screen,
but we didn't get the tax documents.
So if you could just please resend that to us, that would be great.
Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Emerson.
That's all you had, Hillary?
Yes, thank you.
Any questions from the virtual audience?
Vice Chair, I see no hands at this time.
All right, thank you.
Planning Commission.
Thank you, Vice Chair, and good morning.
David Fechta with the City Planning Commission.
Vice Chairman and Board Members, the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the residential single-family zoning at this location.
the proposed dimensional variance for occupied area is minor and in keeping with the purpose
and spirit of the zoning code the small 729 square foot lot and shallow depth are typical
for this block and would warrant relief from the third story setback requirement so the city
planning commission recommends that the board grant the proposed dimensional variance for
occupied area and third floor setback provision in the zoning code thank you uh mi-2023-005627
2856 south sydenham street my vote is yes thomas holloman my vote is yes
james now my vote is yes have a good day council thank you mr vice chair
Number 13, MI-2023-002760, 4720 Richmond Street, Allen-Nockamson.
Vice Chair Allen-Nockamson is coming back in as a panelist now.
All right.
Good morning, Mr. Nockamson.
Good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board, Alan Nockamson.
Alan, please state your name and spell it for the court reporter.
Yes, Alan Nockamson, A-L-A-N, last name is Nockamson, N-O-C-H-U-M-S-O-N.
do you swear to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
i do uh can you please tell us your relationship to
create one lot premises c from two existants
4720 and 4722 Richmond Street and an access easement for 4721, 2325 Salmon Street for the
erection of an attached structure with roof deck and two roof deck access structures for use of
multifamily household living for dwellings and initially you was it was nine units and now you
brought it down to four units correct that's correct Mr. Chair all right and our board member
Mr. Holliman has a few questions to ask good morning counsel do you agree to waive the reading
of the refusal and stipulate
to its accuracy?
Did you email all of the exhibits
All of the exhibits and documents as required five days in advance to this hearing.
and documents as required five days
in advance to this hearing?
Yes, we did.
Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen.
Hi. I'm here to present 4720 Richmond Street. As the Chair stated, these are two properties
in the Bridesburg section of Philadelphia. Originally, we were looking to put a nine-unit
apartment building here. After much community input, we've reduced the amount of units
to four condominium units. And there's off-street parking here, as the chair stated.
There's a total of nine parking spots, three inside the building for the occupants of the
building, as well as six additional spots outside of the building, one of which will also be for
the occupants of the building. And there's also accessory parking for the benefit of 4721, 23 and
25 Salmon Street, which is the street behind us, which my clients also own. So for all intents and
purposes, this is part of like almost like a greater plan community where there's single
Family Homes at 4721 Salmon, 4723 Salmon, and 4725 Salmon Street.
So during my presentation, we'll quickly review the first refusal and then go to the operative refusal, which is before us today, the revised refusal.
We just received the correspondence from Bridesburg Community Action Alliance.
We just slipped it into our presentation material, so we resubmitted it this morning.
as soon as we received the letter uh we'll review the letter um from our vantage point the actual
board itself of the community organization supports our project while the greater uh
community that attended that the meeting is not in support of our project but with that being
said we did generate um you know letters uh that we distributed to uh members of the community uh
who are supportive of this project uh exhibit four deals with the revised plans that we have to
reduce the unit count even greater to four units and having multi-family on richmond street is
not out of character uh there there are two instances and we'll review that but 4726
richmond street is also a quadplex which we're seeking to do and 4444 richmond street is also
a quadplex. So what we're offering is not out of character to the greater Bridesburg community on
Richmond Street, which is, you know, has a mix between residential units on the block, which are
single family and multifamily, as well as there is a little bit of a commercial corridor there.
And then we'll address, you know, through this other exhibit, nearby properties with non-conforming
lot coverage and rear yard depth. Those are two refusals that we're dealing with today, although
I think they're more technical in nature and because we have essentially a planned community from Salmon Street to Richmond Street, three single family homes, and the parking itself is considered occupied area, even though it's open to the entire world and even within this planned community.
But, you know, I still want to show that if there was actually a building structure there, we wouldn't, you know, it's not out of character to have other properties that run afoul of the Philadelphia Zoning Code from a lot coverage and rear yard perspective.
And then, as I stated earlier in my presentation, we do have letters of support from nearby neighbors. We'll review maps of the area, including Google Maps, which will show that, you know, again, what I was stating about, that there is a commercial corridor of some sort, or at least an intermixing between residential units and commercial units on Richmond Street.
So having multifamily is not out of character and actually helps support a commercial quarter in a lot of respects.
And again, we're trying to put four units here on a very, very large, very, very large combined lot.
And those four units are going to be sold as condominiums.
And hopefully that will support the commercial quarter that does exist there.
Then we'll review photographs of the property and the surrounding area.
Then you'll see like what our plans originally looked like.
I'm just going to focus more on the rendering. You'll see how we dealt with the height variance
that we requested and still requesting, and then we'll review in detail our current plans and
drawings. We have our RCO meeting notices. We met with the community twice. First time we met with
them, we went down. We had originally nine units. Then we went down to six, and now we're down to
four. And I think at that meeting, we even discussed, you know, that we would go down to four.
And I think at that meeting, we even discussed, you know, that we would go down to four as well.
And then our application for appeal that we filed, the ZVA, again, we filed it on behalf of 477 Properties, LLC, the deed to the property showing that they own the property and the certificates of tax clearance showing that, again, they're in good standing with respect to their real estate taxes.
And then at the conclusion of my presentation, I will ask Irvin to virtually raise his hand, be sworn in, and I'll have a few questions that I'll pose to him about what I stated about this project.
So the original notice of refusal, as the chairman stated, originally was for nine new units in essentially this plant community.
There are three single-family homes on Salmon Street, and what we're looking to do is there's this rather large portion of the lot at 4720 and 4722 Richmond Street with a combined size of over 3,000 square feet.
And what we're looking to do is, you know, we were originally looking to put nine units.
We thought, you know, fit well within this lot, but, you know, again, we went down to four units.
But the original notice of refusal, there's a height variance, which we still have, but we addressed it and we'll show you how we addressed it.
There is a, what's it called, an occupied area variance.
And again, I think that's more technical in nature because we're providing parking in the rear of the building where that's considered occupied area.
The amount of units, because we're an RSA 5 property, multifamily.
Again, we reduced the variance request from nine to four units for two lots, rather large size lots.
And, again, not out of character because there are two other instances on Richmond Street, which also have four dwelling units in them.
The next one had to deal with the rear yard depth.
And, again, just like the occupied area, there's really not a variance there other than the fact that we have parking in the rear, which I think is a benefit to the community.
Because right now the Salmon Street properties technically don't have that parking in the rear.
And we're hoping to legalize that type of use by way of this proposal.
So you'll have, you know, you'll have seven units with a total of nine parking spaces.
So it's not even one to one. It's more than one to one.
Originally, we went for nine units plus the three on Salmon Street with 12 for nine parking spaces.
Then we went down from six, went down to six residential units where it would have been a one to one ratio.
And now we have more than a one-to-one ratio from units to parking, which you don't really see nowadays.
And then the last refusal has to do with the fact that, you know, we're required to have a van, accessible van as parking.
And again, even though we have a very large lot, you know, we're trying to get as much parking in here as possible in terms of the amount of parking spaces.
And, you know, we just, you know, feel that it would, I think the community would appreciate more instead of having an accessible van, they would rather have two parking spaces than one parking space for an accessible van.
But I would leave it at the discretion of the board as to that refusal.
And then again, then, you know, the revised refusal was based on an authorization letter.
Basically the same refusals I discussed, just to a lesser degree in terms of the unit count.
and our letter requesting authorization to revise our plans and then our correspondence from you
know the the bridesburg group um as you can see the letter that just came in um you know the two
at least it states here that the two board members of the coordinating rco are in support of our
project so while you know the board while the the group itself you know held to you know submitting
a letter in opposition to this project because the greater community that attended that meeting
opposed it it looks like from the letter itself the board members are in support of this project
but they wrote a letter just to take account of the amount of people who were there and how they
voted and then nearby multi-family project properties again according to public records
It's 4726 Richmond Street.
It's four units and has been since 2008.
And 4444 Richmond Street has been a quadplex as well since 2007.
And then, again, not that I think we've run afoul of this from an actual standpoint, physical nature standpoint,
but we wanted to show you nearby properties with nonconforming lot covered to rearview or depth.