Thank you.
okay we are at 40 attendees you can begin anytime you wish good morning everyone my name is bill
bergman and i will be chairing this morning zba hearings with me is ismail shaheed our board
Secretary. Here, Mr. Chair. Thomas Holliman, our board member. Present, Mr. Chairman. And James
Snell, our board member. Present, Mr. Chairman. Also here, our Executive Director, Tanya Sunkett,
and our board attorney, Sharon Saleta. Before we begin, here is our virtual format. Be advised,
these proceedings are being recorded. By participating, you acknowledge your agreement
to be recorded. A video will be available by contacting the Executive Director,
TanyaSunkett, at phila.gov. For the benefit of our court sonographer, we ask attorneys and
witnesses to identify themselves before testifying. If you are participating by phone,
and if you wish to testify, please press star nine to raise your hand and star six to unmute.
To enter an appearance statement, call 267-270-5548. Leave your email and the address
of the property in question. And lastly, please note the question answer box on the screen is
not for testimony or comments. Any comments should be referred to the Executive Director,
Tanya Sunkett. So let's look at our continuances for the day. Number two, MI 2021-005158109 Green
Lane. And number five, MI 2021-003-722-1901 Westmoreland Street. That's the request of the
City Planning Commission for design review. Anyone have any comments or statements on those two cases?
no hands chair thank you um anyone else have a continuance to request
no hands chair thank you we also have a withdrawal mi 2021 0 0 5 0 7 2 10 14 north 64 street that's
withdrawn by the applicant. Is there anyone has any comments
relative to with withdrawal?
No handshare. Any other requests for withdrawal?
No handshare. Thank you. Our first case of the day is number
three, MI 2021-005-163-1322 North Hancock Street, RCO letter in support, South Kensington Community
Partners, Rachel Pritzker, the attorney. And Brandon is coming in now as the panelist.
Good morning, Brandon. Good morning. State your name and spell for the court reporter, please.
Sure. It's Brandon Saverin, spelled B-R-A-N-D-O-N, S as in Sam, A, V as in Victor, R-A-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Mr. Holloman has a few questions.
Good morning, Counselor. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to his accuracy?
Yes, I do.
according to our records you have submitted all of the required documents is that correct
yes please proceed thank you okay may i share my screen mr chair yes thank you excuse me this is
Excuse me, this is Sharon. Mr. Saverin, have you identified who your client is and what their relationship to the property is?
Sharon, Mr. Saverin, have you identified who your client is?
Sure. Ms. Saleta, my client is Elizabeth Otero, who is the property owner, as well as Cameron Johnson, who is her son.
um only miss otero's name is on the deed they live at the property together uh mr johnson
is here to adopt my testimony because miss otero was uh unable to make the zoom today
thank you you're welcome so the property in question is 1322 north hancock street which
is outlined in blue here. This is a through lot between Hancock and Pailthorpe Street in South
Kensington and is among the largest lots on this block currently. The proposal is to draw essentially
a line to subdivide this lot into two rectangular lots, one of which will continue to be a through
lot, and one of which will be a rectangular lot that fronts only Pale Thorpe Street.
The through lot currently contains Ms. Otero and Mr. Johnson's residence, which I will show you
in a moment, and that residence will remain in place, and there is no construction proposed for
the new lot. So this is purely a subdivision request along with the legalization of an existing
fence, which I'll show in a moment. There is no proposed construction and the intent is for
Miss Otero to sell the newly created smaller lot as a vacant parcel in order to raise money
to fund her living as she ages.
This would basically create a setup
where someone who purchases that lot
and wishes to build on it
would have to comply with the zoning code
or would have to seek their own variances
with regard to whatever they want to build.
Just to give you one more illustration,
that subdivision again
would essentially be extending this line
so it goes back to Pailthorpe.
so you'd have two lots one here one here uh this is the the uh family's house uh miss otero has
owned this home since 2001 as you can see it has seen a lot of change since then so she has some
larger neighbors um so she's right here this is the front on on hancock this is the pale fork side
where the lot is wider in the back this is the rear of the home this is uh her rear fence and
essentially i don't know if you can see my cursor but to the right this would become its own lot
this is our zoning refusal we were refused for two reasons one is because the
proposed new lot is just shy of what was at the time the required 1440 square foot
area requirement in the RSA 5 district. The lot would be 1344 square feet. In addition, that fence
I just showed you is two feet too high per code. There's a four-foot limitation on such fences in
this district. This is a six-foot fence as opposed to a four-foot fence. The community association,
The registered, sorry, the coordinating RCO took no issue with that fence.
And I'll briefly show you their letter here.
So this is a letter of support with regard to both the subdivision and the legalization of the fence.
And then this is the meeting summary, which shows a unanimous vote of support with 14 attendees in favor of the subdivision and the legalization of the fence.
Back to that fence for one moment. So there are other fences of the same height.
It actually sort of fits a uniform pattern. So the community did not have a problem with that fence remaining in place.
With regard to the subdivision, just want to make a few quick comments.
One is that at 1344 square feet, if I go back to Atlas for a moment, the resulting rear, sorry, the resulting new lot right here would actually be the largest lot on its block that is not a through lot.
So it would be quite large and larger than most others that front Pailthorpe, certainly no smaller than most others that front Pailthorpe.
certainly no smaller than most others that front Pail Thorpe and the eventual construction of a
and the
home here would assist in sort of building out what has become a nice residential block
on this block of Pail Thorpe where you would have new construction fronting flush to the street much
like these homes do as opposed to you know sort of where there's been less development up the block
it's a more sort of staggered situation so this would promote sort of a uniformity of the form of
a block finally just to point out there was a recent code change and actually in the rsa5
district the area lot area minimum has since been reduced to 960 square feet i apologize
it's a little small might be better so we believe that if this zoning application was filed today
that we would not have been refused for uh the lot area just defense let's see um that is my
presentation i'm happy to take any questions and i'm also happy to bring on uh miss otero's son
uh mr johnson to adopt my testimony why don't you bring your client on and adopt the testimony
thank you um is cameron johnson available
mr johnson could you state your name is spelled for the court reporter please
sure thing uh cameron johnson that is spelled c-a-m-e-r-o-n last name is johnson j-o-h-n-s-o-n
you swear a firm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
i do thank you proceed counsel uh mr johnson did you hear the full extent of my testimony this
morning yes i did and was it true and accurate yes it was and would you adopt it as your own
i would and one further question is it true that you are the son of miss otero the property owner
and that you live on this property yes that is correct okay thank you what questions from the
board? No, Mr. Chair. No, Mr. Chair. Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
The no hands, Chair. Planning Commission. Good morning, Chair Bergman and Ian Higert for the
Philadelphia City Planning Commission. That's spelled H-E-G-A-R-T-Y. Do you swear or affirm to
tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? Yes, sir. Proceed. Thank you,
members of the board in 2017 the zoning map was amended at this location from rm1 to rsa5
in accord with recommendations from the comprehensive plan this proposed lot size
variance is minimal and does not conflict with the purpose and spirit of the zoning code
and the proposed fence variance recognizes an existing non-conforming condition city planning
Commission recommends that the Board grant these variances. Thank you very much. MI 2021-005163-1322
North Hancock Street, I vote yes. Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes. James Snell, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is here.
Thank you, Mr. Shabrin.
Thank you.
MI 2021-005-022-1726 Memorial Avenue, RCO Centennial Park, letter of support.
Fern Anastasio.
morning mr chairman morning could you state your name and spell for the court reporter
sure verne anastasio a-n-a-s-t-a-s-i-o 1315 walnut street suite 317 philadelphia 19107
you swear a firm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth
I do. Before we start, can you identify your client and who what relationship they have to
the property? Sure. My client is Mr. Paramir Singh and he is the owner. Thank you very much.
Mr. Holloman has a few questions for you. Good morning, counselor. Do you agree? Do you agree
to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to this accuracy? I do. According to our records,
you have submitted all of the required documents is that correct that's correct please proceed
thank you so this is the property in question uh the one with the green front
Thank you. So this is the property in question, the one with the green front.
It is on a block.
You have to burn. You have to open it up. It's not open.
It's not open. Yeah. It says I'm sharing. OK, hold on.
So, Vern, you're sharing, but you were in your files.
So you need to open the document and then share. Thank you kindly.
Thank you.
There we go.
Everybody see it now?
Yep, we got it.
All right, great.
So this is the property in question, the one with the teal front.
The application is for use as a four-family dwelling in an existing structure.
It is zoned RSA 5. Let me walk you through the plans.
There are no single-family homes to speak of on the block that are occupied and in good shape.
Here is the first floor plan, as you can see.
nice ample size one bedroom apartment with a rear yard the yard by the way has out every
tenant will have access to the rear yard through a shared door with gate and each unit will have
its own trash bin on wheels that can be easily taken out to the sidewalk
here's the next level again a nice large ample bedroom up ample apartment with several bedrooms
and then we've got the next level here with two one bedroom apartments at the top
The block itself, as I said, is full of multi-families and or abandoned properties that are currently being renovated.
The block is in transition. There's another four-family. There's another three-family.
So this is where our property lie. Again, all of these are multi-family homes on this side of the block.
behind it there are some vacancies some vacant locks but it is up and coming in the area and
my client would like to be able to breathe new life into it and otherwise
ignored property for quite some time the last use was in fact multifamily
we have evidence of that in various meters
and there's a center stair that runs through the property that would make um it would
in order for us to have one apartment on the third floor we would have to tear out that center
stair. It's an original staircase to the property. It's actually, it's pretty, you know,
in good shape, despite the rest of the property's condition. And we would like to be able to
maintain that original stair. As a result, we went before the community organization.
Here's our flyer. Our community meeting was 15th of February. We presented all the facts and the
evidence. And as a result, Centennial Parkside has given us support of our variance for the
appeal. And here's our proof of mailing. 90 individual pieces went out to the immediate
neighbors. And of course, we have our tax certification. This property has a long history
of multifamily household living. It is literally surrounded by other properties in the same
condition, three, four, five-bedroom homes. As a result, we respectfully request that this
appeal be granted so my client can continue the repopulation of a long neglected block
in Philadelphia. Thank you. Is your client here, Vern? Yes, may I call him up? Can you have
your testimony adopted, please? Thank you. Mr. Singh, can you please raise your hand and be
recognized mr singh you may unmute yourself hello hi could you state your name and spell for the
court reporter yes this is parambir singh first name parambir p-a-r-a-m like michael v like victor
a m like michael v like victor i r and then my last name is singh s-i-n-g-h right do you swear
i-r and then
for him to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth yes proceed sir thank you
mr singh did you hear my presentation to the board this morning yes i did is it accurate to
the best of your knowledge yes and do you adopt it as your own testimony certainly yes thank you
very much mr chairman questions from the board no mr chairman no mr chairman
questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands chair planning commission thank you chair bergman ian hegarty for the philadelphia
city planning commission members of the board in 2014 the zoning map was amended from rm1 to rsa5
in this area and a quarter of the recommendations from the comprehensive plan however the proposed
use is consistent with multi-family use on several other similar houses on this block face
as Mr. Anastasio described and with the size of the existing structure city planning commission
recommends that the board grant this variance thank you MI 2021-005-022-1726 Memorial Avenue
I vote yes. Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes. James Snell, my vote is yes.
Ismail Shaheed, my vote is yes. Thank you. Thank you.
MI 2021-004-969-2401 Aramingo Avenue. Melanie Lacey is the attorney, RCO, Old Richmond Civic Association, letter of non-opposition.
Ms. Lacey is coming back in as a panelist.
Thank you.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the board, Melanie Lacey, M-E-L-A-N-I-E, last name L-A-C-E-Y.
I'm with Claire Harrison Harvey in Brandsburg, 1835 Market Street, Suite 1400, Philadelphia, PA.
all right do you swear a firm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
i do could you before we start could you state who your your client is and what's the relationship
to the property yes i represent um gsrh wings pa llc which is the applicant and tenant of the
property thank you mr holliman has a few questions for you good morning counselor do you agree to
waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to his accuracy I do according to our records
you have submitted all of the required documents is that correct that is correct please proceed
can you see my screen yes wonderful could you make it just a little larger please sure
perfect perfect okay great so
Thank you once again. I am accompanied by Hansraj Agrawal, who is a representative of the tenant
that I just named. And we're here because Wingstop seeks special exception relief to open a new
location. So the property is located at 2401-259 Aramingo Avenue. And Wingstop received a refusal
letter or a referral letter rather on September 29th, 2021 due to the fact that ZBA approval is
required for all restaurant uses in the North Delaware Avenue overlay district. We met with