I'll knock himself.
No, okay.
He pushed you to the side there.
I noticed that.
Alex Goldberg is the attorney.
Mr. Goldberg, could you please state and spell your name for this stenographer?
Alex Goldberg, A-L-E-X-G-O-L-D-B-E-R-G.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
There's a letter of support from the Mount Airy RCO.
and our vice chair has a few questions for you.
Good afternoon.
Have you submitted your documents and exhibits
14 days in advance of this hearing?
I did. I have.
And do you weigh the reading of your refusal
and stipulate to its accuracy?
All right. Thank you.
You can see your screen again.
My clients are Spencer Broadus-Mobs
and Janet Swinton.
They're in the virtual audience.
the conclusion of my presentation i will ask most likely spencer brought us to sure to adopt
my testimony this property is located in the east mountain area neighborhood of philadelphia
right near germantown ave and we have cmx2 zoning sort of as an overflow from that commercial
corridor this is entirely a residential block however the property has an interesting history
of having two residential units above a furniture manufacturing studio a long long time ago
and at some point prior to my client's ownership the prior owner converted the front half of this
first floor into a residential unit so you'll see in the photos we are and and in the you know the
plans we're asking essentially to legalize what's on the ground floor which is a artist studio on
the back half and a residential unit on the front half and the two up top are already approved
correct they're they're existing the the prior so my clients bought this property last year
the individual before his name was samuel lovitz he actually began the variance process in 2008 and
we have documentation showing this to do what what we're here to do today sure he didn't end up i
don't even think taking the case to the zba um but you know the that my clients bought this property
understanding that and knowing they would have to go through this process. Broadus is an art
school in North Carolina right now. His family lives around the corner from this property. So
they're managing the tenants that they have currently in the building. And then when Broadus
completes his program, he's actually going to be using this back workshop for his art studio. So
that's the artisan industrial use you can see. The property is zoned CMX2. It allows three units.
The reason why we're here is because our commercial unit, which I wouldn't even call an artist studio commercial, is not along 100% of the ground floor frontage to the back of the property.
The community agreed it wouldn't make any sense to have a commercial storefront on this block.
It's a residential block, and it has been that way for a long time.
and it has been that way for a long time. This is the correspondence from the RCO. It was a
This is the correspondence.
positive meeting. There were neighbors there that have interacted with my clients very positively
since they bought the property, and it was unanimous support with a couple of abstentions.
Here is some property history. So this is under the prior owner. You can see, and I'll zoom in here,
convert the existing unoccupied commercial space first floor of the building into an apartment
um so that's that's what was happening you can see at that time the current use was commercial
uh office on that ground floor
and his explanation at the time was that they've been unable to obtain a tenant for the commercial
space despite it being advertised for for one year so it's it has long been converted from a
commercial space but that should give you an idea of what happened before my client purchased the
property it was advertised very recently right they bought this property in a year ago almost
exactly as having three spacious two-bedroom apartments you'll see in the photos they're
very nice apartments all three are occupied two of the original tenants that were there when my
client purchased the property are still there and there's one new tenant no work needs to be done
because again as you'll see it's it's very they're very nice units so this is our property again off
of germantown ave google maps perspective as well and here's some photographs so this is the front
of the property here's another angle here's the notice posting to the right
and to the left interior photos so here are the residential units there are three two bed one bath
units they are all about 950 square feet you'll see the plans momentarily um and and again they
are they are occupied here's a photo of the workshop this is from the listing photo so all
this sort of junk has been cleared out of there it's just an empty hollow space and again
brought us my client he he's an artist no and he'll be on to answer your questions but no
chemicals no live flame or anything most of his stuff is wood or like bending of metals and things
like that so it's a pretty low uh impact artist studio use that's going on back there or that
will be going on back there and then here's the plans and drawings i'll zoom in right here so you
can see this is the unit that technically we're legalizing right there's two bedrooms at the
front of the house there's also an entry point at the front technically through this bedroom but I
would say the primary entrance is on the side here in this easement area that runs along the
side of the building structure there's also entry to the units upstairs here's that workshop there's
a half bath in there but otherwise it's just an open space and then upstairs you can see through
the shading here again it's two bed one bath trash is all stored outside in the side yard
same thing on the third floor very basic build out and you can see that the building extends
up three floors only in the front half so there's no the roof above the workshop is
that's a single-story portion at the rear of the building structure proof of
mailing that we met with the RCO on October 6th we mailed out to 130
Dirty neighbors, proof of mailing, application for appeal,
deed to the property, and tax clearance.
So with that, I'd like to ask my client, Spencer Broadus-Mobs,
to raise his vertical hand.
There he is.
So three units under Artist Law, right?
Artist Studio, yep.
three units at artist studio on the first floor that's right okay
spencer has been promoted hi could you please state and spell your name for the stenographer
hi my name is spencer broadest mobs s-p-e-n-c-e-r-b-r-o-a-d-u-s-m-o-b-b-s
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Counsel.
Spencer, did you hear my testimony today?
Yes, I did.
Was it true and correct?
Yes, it was.
And do you adopt it as your own?
Yes, I do.
Yes, I do.
And can you just briefly explain to the board the kind of artwork that you'll be doing in the studio in the back?
And can you just briefly explain to the board the kind of art?
Mostly, I've been making small wooden castles.
I'll be working anything with large tools at Next Fab, a community makerspace in Philadelphia.
The studio at Springer will be mostly drafting, drawing, and final finishing, putting together.
Questions from the board?
I'm sorry.
Can we go back to the first floor plan there?
Floor plan, I'm assuming?
I'm sorry.
It's okay.
So how does one enter this artisan space, if you will?
Sorry if I didn't clearly explain that.
There's a door that goes directly in there along this side.
And so is that in one of the pictures, too, that you had?
I don't have an image of the doorway.
I have an image of the side of the property.
I believe I can get something for you here.
Let's see what I got.
So it's down this walkway right here.
So I know that that's not amazing,
but you can see there's trash storage back here
there's a residential entry door
and then behind that is an entry point
to the studio
so there's a separation between
the unit there in the front
and the workspace
and then what is it that
I'm sorry
what kind of art does he do
sounds like some woodworking
but nothing using like large
mechanical like instruments
and some finishing work
and drafting right
brought us yes yeah i i went to school for sculpture and i have and i'm currently at a
craft school in north carolina where uh i have done a lot of woodworking and some metal working
okay so this isn't gonna okay so i guess my question is this is like a low impact these
sort of use even though it's artisan industrial so very low impact and it's not like retail in
any way it's it's his it's his art studio i imagine most of the time brought us it's probably
just going to be you in there right maybe your mom yeah yeah making like animals out of clay
yeah all right yeah thank you is the artist space separately metered from
the rest of the units it's a good question it is
he said it is right he said it is yes sorry any other questions questions from our attorney
no questions at this time questions comments from the brooks audience
there are no hands planning commission michael gall with the philadelphia city planning commission
comprehensive plan recommends no change to the current cmx2 commercial mixed use zoning at this
location however this property would be the only storefront on that block face and the configuration
of the current building is not conducive to an active use therefore the city planning commission
recommends the board grant the request of variance for active ground floor use
mi-2026-001-137-16 east springer street i vote yes michael johns my vote is yes
cheryl gaston my vote is yes tenetta graham my vote is yes taiwan my vote is yes
Laila Beebe, my vote is yes.
Thank you.
39th Street, who's that?
Oh, okay.
Nockamson, could you please state and spell your name for the stenographer?
Alan Nockamson, A-L-A-N, last name Nockamson, N-O-C-H-U-M-S-O-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Mr. Nackamson, are you aware that it's going to be a hearing hold?
All right.
Let's see here.
Our vice chair has a few questions.
Good afternoon.
Have you submitted your documents and exhibits 14 days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, we have.
And do you wait to read and know your refusals and stipulate to its accuracy?
All right.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Share your screen.
Proceed with your case.
To my left is Ghazi Ada Seven, the representative for Ultimate Real Estate Investment LLC,
the owner of the property.
At the conclusion of my presentation, I'll ask him to be sworn in and I have a few questions
for him.
So you're seeing 1110 North 39th Street.
So you're seeing 1110 North 39.
You'll see in our presentation materials that we have 14 exhibits.
Mr. Honest Evans to my left.
Christopher Johnson, the architect's representative, is in the virtual audience if there's any questions that need to be asked from an architect's standpoint.
So we're asking the board to hold this because I believe we need an updated.
uh oh no we need uh to have community input um in that we have a uh we're meeting with the
community this week okay this was originally a three-family dwelling um project where we
through community input we believe two units is more appropriate so we want to show what we're
showing the board today and hopefully they'll be in equal in support of this we have two refusals
that were generated originally we did not have a porch even here so we've always had this as a