Okay, thank you. That's Mr. Holloman. All right. Could you walk us through Mr. Jones briefly?
Yes, Chairman. We currently is, we have three apartments in the property. And of course, when I purchased the home, it was a multifamily home as well.
And we just want to, I guess, get it legalized that it is a three-apartment residence.
Sorry about this noise.
I'm going to ask, is there anyone else who has any questions?
I'm sorry, does the board have any questions?
No, it's pretty hard. Some of the drawings are hard to read.
No, Mr. Chairman.
Anyone else would like to testify in this case? Please raise your hand.
I see no hands, Chair.
Thank you. Planning Commission.
Good morning. David Fecto, City Planning Commission.
Mr. Chairman, members of the board, the comprehensive plan recommends this property for residential single family use.
L&I's zoning archive shows a permit issued in 1987 to convert a two-unit building into a single-family home.
Existing multiple units appear to have been built without benefit of permit.
We recommend that the board deny the requested variance.
Thank you.
Mr. Jones.
Yes, sir.
When did you purchase this property? When was that?
five and it was presented to me as you know as the uh uh holy family home you know every every
every floor had bathrooms kitchen or one it was just we went forward with the same situation
which we purchased excuse me do you have separate meters yes
yes and it looks like it's been renovated into three units yes it was
and it looks like it's been
three units when we first when we bought the home it was in bad shape of course
so it had to be renovated thank you yes you're welcome okay
MI 2020-000336-3128 West Montgomery Avenue. My vote is yes.
Confessor Plaza, my vote is yes. Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
i still don't have exhibits okay well we got three uh majority so thank you
mi 2021 that's 001487 540 west moreland avenue
attorney uh vernon astasios for the applicant and attorney darren steinberg for the neighborhood
who opposed his proposal.
Chestnut Hill Community Association
sent a letter of opposition.
Mr. Anastasio, you're still under oath.
Please identify yourself and proceed.
Chair, before you begin,
we also received a letter in opposition
from Councilwoman Best.
Thank you.
Vern Anastasio, A-N-A-S-T-A-S-I-O,
1315 Walnut Street, Suite 1006 Philadelphia, 19107. May I share my screen? Mr. Anastasi,
you agree to waive the region of its refusal and stipulate to its accuracy? I do. And have you
emailed an exhibit packet with the required document, proof of ownership, proof of tax
compliance, copy of the refusal or referral, photos and plans five days prior to this hearing?
I have. And have you met with the RCO and have a letter?
i do please proceed thank i we actually met with the rco four separate occasions uh before they
rendered a decision but uh nevertheless i'm going to share my screen
mr chairman members of the board this is uh this is pretty straightforward uh and
uncontroversial as far as i can tell this is a 25 000 square foot lot right here as you can see
my cursor is encircling it. It's over 25,000 square feet. All we want to do is relocate some
lot lines. I mean, we're not proposing anything else but that. In order to relocate the lot lines,
we are proposing a subdivision, this lot here, and then this lot back here. In order to access
this lot, however, we need to have some frontage that takes the property back in this way.
This is why we've been refused. I'll show you the refusal. That 15-foot driveway
needs to be 75 feet. Now, that doesn't sound like a bad idea. It's 25,000 square feet.
We can easily just take the lot and cut it in half, right?
Just cut the whole property right in half.
We could do that as a matter of right.
We wouldn't need to be before the RCO.
We wouldn't need to be before the zoning board.
However, there's a unique condition on this lot that prevents us from doing this as a matter of right.
And that condition is this structure here has been designated by the Historic Commission for Historic Protection.
As a result, the unique condition exists.
It causes a hardship.
We cannot tear it down.
The only way to subdivide now is to present it as we have here on the right.
Now, the hardship, you're going to say, well, your client bought a property and it's historically protected, and, you know, that's on him.
But the fact of the matter is, this hardship was not created by my client.
The hardship was actually created by the RCO because they decided to play a few games.
My client went under contract on the 13th of February, 2019.
They closed on the property the 12th of March, 2019. Then the RCO submitted on the 21st for historic protection. So the hardship, the unique condition exists not by the hand of my.
The hardship, the unique condition exists not by the hand of my client, but by the RCO.
So the only way we can now subdivide is by preserving the property and having this flag
lot again, but for the RCO submitting after purchase to protect this property, we could
have cut this right down the middle as a matter of right, no questions asked, we would not
need a variance at all.
So that's where we are with this currently. We met with the RCO on four separate occasions, and it's relocation of lot lines. I mean, there's nothing fancy or sophisticated about it.
So I think their letter of opposition really leaned on the fact that they want to know what is going to go on this other lot.
Well, we don't have a plan for that yet.
And my client didn't want to invest in coming up with plans until he could actually get the subdivision.
Now, by the way, unless it's a single family home that meets all the requirements, the RCO is going to be involved in that process anyway.
So I'm not quite sure why they're relying on the fact that we haven't have don't have a development plan and they're using that to oppose what would otherwise be a pretty perfunctory sort of application.
And with that, I'm going to ask my client, David, to raise his hand to be recognized.
Mr. Jacobs, you can unmute yourself and please wait for the chair.
Please identify yourself, spell your full name, and I'll swear you in.
David Jacobs, D-A-V-I-D, J-A-C-O-V-S.
You swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Mr. Anastasio, please.
Thank you.
Mr. Jacobs, did you hear my presentation to the board this morning?
And would you, was it true and accurate to the best of your knowledge?
And would you adopt it as your own testimony if need be?
Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, relocating these lot lines won't cause congestion in the neighborhood.
It won't impact light or air for neighbors.
It will not burden the infrastructure.
it won't um otherwise have any impact at all zero impact on this community um by relocating
lot lines and again the only reason why we're here is because 15 feet uh should be 75 feet
but we can't get to 75 feet because we are prohibited from taking down this property
and correct me if i'm wrong the historical certification happened after your client
purchased the property that's right the ink on the deed was hardly dry and they ran in to
they ran in to get it historically designated happened on the 21st of march full two weeks
after purchase and my clients were dumbfounded they were they wanted to they thought they had
a lot that they could subdivide as a matter of right the portion of the property that you're
showing on the right uh that the rco was concerned about what might get developed there is zone
what is the zoning classification there rsd1 so anything beyond that would require variance
that's right and by the way mr chairman this new lot here is almost 14 000 square feet
it's massive but so unless they he unless they build a single family they're going to have to
come back for of course and even if they do build a single family they'll have to do it
in accordance with historic commission understood thank you thank you uh questions from the board
no no anyone else would like to testify in this case if so please raise your hand
um excuse me was mr steinberg um was he promoted to he's representing a party his hand up
mr steinberg yes can you hear me yes please spell your first and last name i'll swear you in
Yes. Good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board. My name is Darren Steinberg, D-A-R-I-N-S-T-E-I-N-B-E-R-G, 16 North Franklin Street, Suite 300A, Doylestown, Pennsylvania, 1-8-9-0-1.
I'm here on behalf of three of the near neighbors in opposition to this application, Walt and Robin Summers, who live at 7709 Cherokee.
Walt and Robin Summers, who live at 7709 Cherokee Street, Don Ratchford and Nancy Dickinson, who live at 545 West Mermaid Lane.
Mr. Steinberg, do you, sorry to interrupt, do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
I do, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. Please proceed. Didn't mean to interrupt you.
Before I do, Mr. Chair, I know there are two RCOs who wish to speak, and I'm curious if you'd rather hear from them first or from me.
it's fine with me either way. I just wanted to give them deference if you would like to hear
from them. Since you're wrong, we'll hear from you and then we'll go. Okay. Before I get into
my remarks, just a couple points of clarification from Mr. Anastasio's testimony. First and
foremost, based on the record before the Philadelphia Historical Commission, Mr. Anastasio
participated on behalf of his client during the historical commission process, had every
opportunity to oppose the designation, chose not to, and did not object to it. So the casting of
this as something that was done in the middle of the night with no one knowing about it is
completely false. And the Chestnut Hill Conservancy, as the protectors of historical
properties in chestnut hill has every right to do what they did here and everything was above board
and it was legal uh and again mr anastasio participated in that process that's not relevant
i object i object it's completely relevant because you said it was done in the dark of night
uh it was to you and but in any event please do not talk over each other my apologies
second i just want to point out that it's not just the structure here that was designated
historic it's the entire property that was designated historic along with my client's
properties this was all part of one estate and then the third thing i want to point out is
there's actually two letters of opposition from the two rcos the chestnut hill community association
and the Chestnut Hill Conservancy.
So hopefully you have both of those in your possession.
I only have two exhibits, which I submitted to the board.
I'll just share my screen quickly for those.
Varen, could you take your exhibit down?
Yes, sir.
Mr. Steinberg, we can get his exhibits up.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Just wanna...
So hopefully you can see my screen here.
The first is a petition of the near neighbors within 250 feet of the property.
It was audited by a certified public accounting company and it was unanimous 33 neighbors in opposition to this application.
It's a little difficult to read, which is why he had it, my client had it audited.
Second exhibit is a letter that was submitted to the RCOs as part of the RCO process by
Ellen Goodwin, who I believe is here to testify, so I won't talk too much about it, but this goes
to the point of a couple things. One, even though this is a Hertzberg case and a dimensional case,
There's absolutely no financial hardship here because despite what Mr. Anastasio and his client would like to do, there's actually no need for a subdivision at all for this property to have significant value and for this applicant to recoup its investment and then some as a single family home on a single family lot.
So I'm just going to stop sharing my screen there. And again, I believe that Ms. Goodwin is here to testify so she can testify on her own behalf.
A few points I want to point out. And the first is, as I just mentioned, there's no financial hardship here.
the applicant purchased this property for just over $400,000 and from what I understand again
from the letter we saw from the testimony we had at the RCO meetings if this property is rehabbed
as is and sold as is it could solve for over 1.5 million dollars so there's there's no economic
detriment to the applicant if the variance is denied because it has tremendous value as a
single-family home on one lot. There's also no financial burden to bring the building into strict
compliance with the zoning requirements because it already complies as it is. There's also no
because it already complies as it is. There's also no financial burden to meet the characteristics
financial
of the surrounding neighborhood because it fits perfectly as it is. This is just a situation
where the applicant is on a quest to maximize profitability, which is not a grounds for a
hardship. He could recoup his investment by rehabbing the existing home and reselling it
as a newly renovated historic property on one lot. So this case does not meet the Hertzberg
standard for dimensional variance. Furthermore, it doesn't meet the minimum variance required
because number one, there's no subdivision needed to make this property appropriate and fit for
purpose. So no subdivision, let alone a subdivision that requires a variance, is the minimum relief
needed. In fact, contrary to what the applicant believes, this property could be subdivided as
of right, even with the historic property in its place without being torn down. And there
was significant testimony to that effect at the RCO meetings? Again, I have to object to that.
The Planning Commission has gone on record as saying that it cannot be done.
Well, again, that's the Planning Commission, perhaps. I have not heard that. I had heard
testimony at the RCO meetings that it could, in fact, be subdivided as of right, but be that as
it may, there was no movement whatsoever on the 15 feet to extend that by any stretch at all.
So 15 feet doesn't necessarily meet the minimum variance requested. It could have been anywhere
between 15 feet and 75 feet, but the applicant chose not to do anything in response to those
concerns. You submitted alternative plans, Darren. They were denied. You never submitted. I never saw
any alternative plans the only thing i saw was before i got on i heard that there was a
a nine unit um like condo proposed or something like that no but but even if there was it would
still require another hearing in front of the board that's correct i'm trying to stick to the
application at hand i know there's a lot of concern about what could be i'm just testifying
that this application mr chairman do you know that i don't want to i don't want to belabor the
record on what could be there because it's all speculation exactly i'm just focusing on
why this application doesn't meet the the standards for a variance for a lot line change
the financial burden to rehabilitate this now historic structure in accordance with the historic
designation that was triggered by his client is enormous it's not my client or your your rco
um i'm just i'm just i don't own any rc okay i mean the so to say that the herzburg uh level
has hasn't been met is silly they've put this financial burden on him he's willing to fix it
up he needs to subdivide this lot we're talking literally about relocating lot lines here