Where are they doing their laundry?
All right, Colby, if you can maybe help me while I'm looking through the drawings.
Yeah, each department has their own washer and dryer in it.
Yeah, let me take a look.
By the kitchen.
all right um i went through it quickly so maybe i just yeah i'm having problems like let me just
All right.
I went through it quickly, so maybe I just.
Yeah, I'm having problems.
get through the drawing let me just going through my uh presentation materials trying to find
i think secondarily then what's the trash plan also uh so like the two things that i
maybe because we went really quickly and i was focused on a different part of the house when you
were on the plans uh both didn't necessarily see vintage trash rooms or the washer dryer so i just
wanted to be yeah there's an area specifically for for trash i pointed out on unit number three i
said quickly i said oh the trash area and i said it's also there for unit number two i didn't go
back up there but they're they're mirror images the unit three and unit two um but let me find
the washer and dryer i did not point that out um let's just see all right let's see oh here it is
let me just i'm just going to show unit two they're the same but it's all in this little
closet area right here here's the washer and dryer
are you you're sharing i don't see anything it's not oh that's me that's me sorry i was like i see
it um hold on hillary do you have any comments while we're waiting not at this time thank you
it's right here
in unit 2 and unit 3
sorry my throat is killing me today
I have a question
how are they going to access the washer
just based on that like you've got an air
handler in there you've got the trash sitting
right in front of like is the idea that you're going to move the
trash can every time you have to do
laundry
when I just looked at it
it's a very bizarre setup that i that why is that why you is that why you turned it off real quick
no i didn't he's quick on that way it's quick and then he won't be able to get back on
what's going on no no honestly i missed it when i looked at it
i'll be honest you guys don't usually ask about the washer and dryer so like i know
well i usually focus on the things like you know in terms of how far are we out of the ground and
and stuff like that i i do cover that pretty well i i well because i know that question's
going to be there but i i honestly there was no ill intent here's us like i think you got
cleaned some of the plan stuff that's right i i think so i think it's a it's a architect that's
new to philadelphia there's many of those and yeah so anyway but we'll uh we'll definitely
clean that up all right any other questions for mr knockamson
you got your partner giggling in the back too i'm just telling it right now you mean or or
soon to be new if it's right i mean he's he's been with you a long time now i mean well it's
a co-op lost law clerk but he'll be doing questions from the virtual audience chair
we have a hand up from strawberry mansion community concern okay
Good morning.
Good morning.
We share.
can you hear me i can now could you okay i was muted i'm sorry hi my name is bonita cummings
uh b-o-n-i-t-a cummings c-u-m-m-i-n-g-s all right uh sharae mansion community concern
okay all right hold on do you swear or affirm the tell the truth the whole truth and nothing
about the truth i do um please proceed hi i just um wanted to comment um as you know we held the
meeting um the community is of course not responsible for all of the nti uh you know
uh demolition that has taken place and created these conditions um but the process of trying to
be accountable to the community as it relates to these units are going up as new builds not as
apartment buildings so it was brought to us as four units and we said we would you know we weren't
as four units and we said we would,
we weren't trying to support four units because these are really just houses.
trying to
The footprint of them were pretty much single-family units.
But we just wanted to make sure that,
of course, we're not opposing,
but we wanted clearly on the record that no basement kitchen,
no basement living space and no way for this to turn into additional units later.
And the reason that's important is because you end up with four units anyway, if you're not careful in how these provisos are recorded to the record.
And also, it's a lot of moving parts here.
There's no real, you know, the changes are not on those records.
So I don't know, should they be changed first?
uh what is l and i working from in terms of these actual drawings these architectural drawings say
one thing it's said one thing here and then it's the drawing say something else i just wanted to
be clear about that thank you thank you very much for calling we appreciate is there anyone else in
the audience no hands at this time chair or any commission chair i'm sorry a hand just went up
from a justin coleman okay yeah justin's our architect um oh we're fine we're fine we're fine
planning commission thank you chair and good morning david fecto with the city planning
commission chairman and board members the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the
RSA 5 residential single-family zoning at this location. The city rezoned this neighborhood in
2014 in accord with recommendations in the comprehensive plan. This block face contains
a mix of single-family and multifamily dwelling units. The City Planning Commission recommends
the board grant a proposed use and dimensional variances. Thank you. Hillary, does the revised
plans cover the change in the basement well so the the give me one second the well the revised plans
are a site plan but they do have the section that shows the different units on the side
oh yeah it does oh well you may have to clean it yeah it's better to take that app because if you
need to make changes to the floor plans in the process you're not locked in i didn't realize
that yeah you want to have those changes made then we'll vote next week is that right or or
can we just vote and then obviously eliminate those floor it's inappropriate to have floor
plans on them right whatever section he didn't just take it up i assume the exterior changes that
um miss cummings was referring to were reflected on the plan i i saw changes but i wasn't sure
what exactly the only thing we changed was the color deciding okay that which is not a zoning
related thing but we promised obviously that right right so okay and then there was a little cut like
a a light wall that was all the way down right they may have been on the original i mean no no
not on it it was on the newest newer ones the the newer ones had the light well all the way down and
that yeah that was the other change that i noted so can i request that can request can i request
the hold okay yeah that's what you said why don't we just hold it i'll i'll provide an updated yeah
you know uh site plan just get rid of the floor floors on there and hillary can we put somewhere
on there too just a half a half bathroom in the basement i mean that would i don't know if we can
enforce that but that's more of a building code issue no i'm just saying like so that you can't
you're not going to build a whole apartment right no i understand from miss cummings you know
perspective like if we built a fourth unit we would have to come back here all right okay all
right all right so we're going to have something by next week yeah yeah we'll vote on this next
week okay okay and so and just to be clear the record is closed except for the revised revised
plans thank you yeah okay okay thank you thank you number 15 mi 2026 00315 2501 wharton street
david orphanetes is the attorney um
you know we haven't had more than three people with all the rcob
They're being promoted to panel.
You can't share.
Yes, Mr.
Orkhanides.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman. Could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer? Certainly. My name is David Orphanides. Last name is spelled O-R-P-H-A-N-I-D-E-S.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman.
Could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
Right. Do you swear or affirm that tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth? I do.
Could you identify your client in relationship to the property?
Yes. My client is Sean Ellis and Sean Ellis Elites LLC. And Sean should be on with us this morning.
there's a letter of support from the grace very coalition of neighbors and our chair our vice
chair has a few questions good morning have you submitted your documents and exhibits five days
in advance of this hearing I did and do you waive the read and other refusals and stipulate to their
accuracy I do okay thank you you can share your screen proceed with your keys sure and I just
wanted to make sure i they um the gfcn sent an updated uh letter of support uh just this morning
um it's not very different from the one the original one they had submitted the original
letter reference to support and that would we would be entering into a cba and the updated
letter indicates that we my client and um the community had entered into a cba so um and i do
have that uh right here that letter right here um the updated letter with uh with our with our
package so just wanted to make clear so um the the property in question is 2501 wharton street um i
will show you uh an aerial image uh 2501 let me get rid of this here okay and you can see here
of my exhibit b1 nereal uh 2501 and i've outlined the property uh it's an extremely large
irregularly shaped lot on south 25th street it's bordered by uh the south 25th street to the east
this is below washington avenue oakford street to the north wharton street to the south and south 26
street to the west so it takes up large part almost all of the of the block um the my client
has leased building or unit Q, which I've shown here outlined in green. The property is outlined
clouded in red. Outlined in green is the unit that my client has rented. That unit, as you can
see from the cover, fronts on Oakford Street. There's a man door, a person door, and then a
large garage door. This unit, I included zoning archives for the property. This unit has been
used in the past as woodworking for woodworking purposes which is general industrial it's been
used for warehousing and accessory business offices it was vacant for a little bit of time
when my client came along and entered into the lease for the space last july sean ellis who
i will introduce a little bit is a former phillies draft pick pitcher for the phillies
played in the majors for quite some time in the minors and has started a baseball training
facility and this will be his first permanent home other than one he has one has had one up
in Kensington a smaller location this will be a full-sized facility to accommodate the large
number of kids in in the city that come to sean and his staff for training and i'll provide you
a little more information on that the issue is is that he and then he and his wife entered nicole
who they run the business together entered into the lease for this property last july uh went to
submit for a co we're told you need a zoning permit submitted for his earning zoning permit and
And nobody had mentioned, they've never done this before.
Nobody told them that they needed a variance because the property is owned I-2 and I-2
does not allow personal services as a matter of rate.
So they've been subjected to the lease or party to the lease on the hook for the lease
since July.
It's been a little tough to keep things going since then.
um sean's been making do using other facilities um field house on spring garden street spst to
the just to the south here um and we're grateful that we finally uh have made it here to uh the
zoning board today um and as indicated uh again the property is zoned i2 uh i2 does not allow um
personal services as a matter of right um as as a training facility um we've also included in our
application and you can see it on the notice of refusal at tab d1 uh dated 12 12 2025 which i
hope is a notice of refusal that you have um there was an earlier one issue that i had to have
corrected um but we added in addition to the personal services for the baseball training
we added the retail sales of wearing apparel and accessories you know swag t-shirts
um and accessories um you know swag um t-shirts hats sweatshirts things of that nature uh possibly
some uh other types of uh of clothing related to their uh their operations and then also the retail
sales of food beverage and groceries um and that's mostly like snacks and sports drinks and water and
things of that nature um it's nothing that they're they plan to have at the present time but we don't
want to have to come back for that as those two uses also require variance. I bring that up in
part because going back to the letter from GFCN, which was designated as the coordinating RCO
by the Planning Commission and Council President Johnson's office, is that one of the things that
came out of our meeting, and I don't know how we would do this in terms of, I think the board can
do this as a proviso, but they asked that the retail sales have to be accessory or incidental
to the personal services. They don't want them to be a principal use. As applied, they were not
indicated to be accessory or incidental. And so I think the same rules apply to accessory uses in
terms of uses. You can't have a permitted use and an accessory use that's not permit as a matter of
right to be permitted by right. You would have to still go for a variance for the accessory use. So
I believe this modification is one that the zoning board can be by proviso. But that is one that we
didn't have a problem with. It was always anticipated to be that way. It wasn't worded that
way but we don't have an issue with that so i would ask the board to consider that
um again looking at the aerial um you have the viaduct that extends above south 25th street to
the east of us this neighborhood was at one time very industrial with housing located around
industrial properties and uses to house a lot of the workers that the neighborhood like many of
these industrial neighborhoods have evolved very much so in recent years, particularly in the
north of Washington Avenue, and then just south of Washington Avenue, which this property is
located just a couple blocks of south of Washington. So if we go to the zoning map,
you can see that not only is our property zoning classified I2, and let me just go here to the
background. And here's our property with building queue outline. You can see the property on the
northwest corner of Oakford and South 25th is also zoning classified I-2. That's important to know.
I believe Mr. Fecto will indicate that on the 2035 plan, I believe that property is flagged to be
converted to ICA change to ICMX or IRMX, but he can speak to that. It's really hard to see on the
2035 plan because south 25th street is the dividing line so it's hard to see when the maps change as
to see what the plan is for the properties i believe our property is still slated to remain
i2 probably because it's such a large property you can see ca1 to the south of us you can see
icmx to the east of us to the northeast of us i2 um and then across the street south um south 26
on the west side of South 26. You have CMX2, RM1, and then you have RM1 across the street from us
on both Oakford Street on the north side and on the south side of Wharton Street.
And I bring this up. First of all, the property on the northwest corner, which is 2501 Oakford,
that was granted variances very recently by the zoning board. Those variances included a number,
a very large number of uses not permitted in I2, including 54 residential units, but also
personal services and retail sales of food, beverages, and groceries. It did not include
a variance for the retail sale of wearing apparel and accessories. I also bring that up because the
CA1 property that's located across from us on the south side of Wharton Street, on the 2500 block of
Wharton Street, allows all three of the uses that we've proposed here as a matter of rate,
as do the ICMX properties that are located across the South 25th Street on the east side.