Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
we're ready to start
thank you good morning everyone my name is bill bergman i would be chairing this zoning board
hearing this morning with me is our board member cheryl l gaston president mr chairman
board member tennessee graham president mr chairman or board member michael johns
Michael's there, I think.
michael's there i think so michael
Michael Johns.
Well, I'm positive he's here.
And Ty Wynn's in the other room.
And also here is our board member, Ryan McAdams.
President, Mr. Chairman.
Also present is Hillary Emerson, our attorney,
and our board administrator, Lakeisha Dandy.
Also, this morning, we have with us...
Actually, for the last time at the zoning board, Jessica Larson, who's in the back.
Jessica has been our internal summer, and she only came a short distance from the University of Utah.
Stand up, Jessica.
She only came from a short distance from Utah, and today is our last zoning board hearing, and we do thank you.
And everybody loved your energy, and I understand you did a great report, so we really appreciate everything you've done.
A recording of this hearing will be posted on the ZBA website.
By participating, you consent to be recorded.
This is an in-person meeting with remote capabilities.
Whether remote or in person, if you're called to speak, you must state and spell your name and then wait to be sworn in.
Once you've been sworn in, please state your name each time beginning of your testimony.
Any person may enter their appearance to become an interested party in the case.
There's three ways.
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Leave a message that includes your email address and the address of the property of the appeal case.
Following guidance is for our remote attendees.
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The webinar Q&A is for questions about the hearing.
Do not comment on the cases in the Q&A.
And finally, if you're participating by phone, press star 9 to raise your hand and star 6 to unmute.
For our in-person attendees, please refrain from talking, eating, or drinking during the hearings.
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When speaking on the record, you must speak directly into the microphone
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The main exit is through the double doors at the rear.
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In case of an evacuation, our rally point is Love Point.
across from Arch Street.
Please remain there so we can account for you.
So let's look at our schedule for this morning.
Number three.
Number three.
MI 2024-006-072-518-E Thelma Street.
Mohamed Alatrani is the owner applicant.
Is he in the audience?
Mohamed, if you're in a virtual audience, please raise your virtual hand.
I see no hands.
Okay, so we're missing several documents on that case.
This case, MI 2024-006-072-518 East Delma Street, will be continued to 325-26 at 9.30 a.m.
number nine
this is Henry Clinton's case
am I correct Hillary
No? Okay. All right. Number 10, MI-2025-001-287-1627 South A Street. We need documents
to proceed on this. Kevin Valentine is the attorney for the owner, Aaron Hong.
Kevin Valentine, if you're in a virtual audience, please raise.
He's here. Kevin's here.
Kevin, we believe we're missing several documents, proof of posting, exterior photos, tax compliance, I saw it's there, and a proof of standing.
Kevin, we believe we're missing several documents.
we're not ready to start we i'm calling this because we believe there's enough documents
that we may not be able to go on am i correct hillary yeah that that is correct we need the
documents in advance and we did um we did request we did request them when you the documents that
you did upload in response you would have received an email that indicated what was missing
can you please speak into that mic
alright first of all
could you please state your name and spell
Kevin L
Valentine
attorney for the
applicant ER builders
you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth
nothing but the truth
we don't believe we can go on this morning
we're going to continue the case
is there a
continuance date
I do have a date
Yep. 325-26 at 9.30 a.m.
Is there any way that can be expected?
I think what you'd have to do is you'd have to call the office and explain the situation, what happened, and see what they can do.
All right.
Okay. Thank you, sir.
number 13 mi 2025 2704-06 allegheny avenue this case is continued to 325-26
and number 14 mi 2025 001 318 6247 to 49 dix avenue this case is continued to 325 26.
are there any other requests for continuances
return chair are you an attorney yes come on
good morning sir could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer
sure frank turner f-r-a-n-k-t-u-r-n-e-r right do you swear or firm to tell the truth the whole
truth nothing but the truth i do what case are you here for sir um i am here for 1014 fanshaw street
with you in one minute
Okay. So that's MI 2025, 001-309-1014 Fanshawe Street. We have no exhibits as of yet, and I was getting ready to call that. But you want a continuance, sir?
Yeah, we were requesting a continuance. We've yet to be able to schedule with the RCO.
Okay, sure. So, that case will be continued to 325-26 at 9.30 a.m. Thank you very much for coming in and talking.
We have one more. 814 Brighton Street.
okay it's 20 24 0 0 8 1 8 0
we have that help right don't say what what number is that i mean now what was the address
Mr. Chair, I'm sorry.
814 Brighton, B-R-I-G-H-T-O-N.
I don't see anything.
Oh, wait, hold on.
That is number five on the 330 list.
So, yeah.
Can we take the containers now?
We can't continue it now.
We have to wait until the 330 list.
All right.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
any other requests for continuance
chair we have somebody in a virtual audience with your hand raise Lou Dorio
and they will be promoted to panelists Lou Dorio please accept the panelists for motion
good morning
I could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer.
Could you please state your name? It's Belford Sonographer.
Yeah, my name is...
Sir, we're having a hard time hearing you.
I believe you may have another computer or phone going at the same time.
Could you say your name one more time?
can you hear me okay can you hear me that's better yeah could you please spell your name
for this phonographer that's lewis l-o-u-i-s d-i-i-r-r-r-r you swear or firm to tell the
truth told truth and nothing but the truth yes i do what case are you interested in
I'm interested in, you went through it already, it was number 10-2025-001-287.
What's the address?
The address was, I believe it's 1629, 1627 South 8th Street.
It was number 10.
That's the case that was just continued, 1627 South 8th Street.
We're not taking any testimony.
Sir, it was continued.
We're not taking any testimony or comments about that.
We will do that when the case is actually heard.
I just have a question.
Mr. DiUriano, sir, sir, listen.
What I want you to do is to call the office and I'll answer your questions, okay,
because we're really getting a lot of feedback with you, okay?
Thank you.
Number two, MI 2024-006-063-2137 North A Street.
Masa Zura Raymond is the listed owner.
We have no exhibits.
This is the second listing.
and mr chair we were supposed to have um an uzbek interpreter here um we have not seen
someone check in um i don't know is there someone here who um who's here as a interpreter
I see no hands
again this is 2137
North 8th Street
Mastafizur
we have a
handout by the name of Muhammad
Rizal Kareem
I will allow them to speak
okay hi i'm mohammed bengali bengali interpreter idn as in november o as in oscar
819 okay could you spell your name please it's mohammed m o h for horse a double m a d d for doll
All right.
And Hillary, what language is this?
Bengali.
The language is Bengali.
Do you solely swear?
What is it?
I'm sorry, so you said it's Bengali?
All right.
Do you solemnly swear or affirm that you will interpret accurately completely from English
to Bengali and from Bengali to English to the best of your ability?
All right.
So can you please call for me, 2137 North A Street, Mr. Mastafas Raymond.
I have to call.
Yeah, what I mean, I want you to, we're trying to find him.
Could you mention those names for me so that he'll know that we're trying to call him?
sorry this is the interpreter i i actually didn't get it uh should i say it or just i have i have
to call them hold on one minute two
okay uh
Thank you.
Raymond, please.
We can spell it for you
if it would be helpful.
I know.
Mustafizur Rahman, right?
Mustafizur Rahman,
Mr. Mustafizur Rahman,
Mr. Mustafizur Rahman,
so interpreter i'm going to continue this case um so
mi 2024 006 063
2137 north a street
cases continued to 325 26 at 9 30
Interpreter, thank you very much for your work.
You're welcome.
Thank you very much for doing your service.
Thank you.
Number four, MI 2024.
zero zero six zero nine four forty six twenty six north penn street no exhibits second listing
andrew pierre saint is the listed owner applicant
andrew pierre saint if you're in a virtual audience please raise your virtual hand
I see no hands.
Okay, so MI 2024, 006094, 4626 North Penn Street.
Cases continue to 325-26.
number eight mi 2025 001 281 94 18 frankfort avenue abu fatah abdul is the listed owner
no exhibits first listing please come up sir good morning could you turn on the mic
and pull it back real close to you.
Could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
My name is Abdul Fattah Abdullah.
A-B-D-U-L-F-A-W-T-H.
Your mic going?
Why don't you stay a little closer to the mic?
Start over again.
A-B-D-U-L-F-A-W-T-H.
Abdullah.
A-B-D-U-L-L-A-H.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Sir, we don't have your exhibits.
So I emailed you.
I emailed them a couple times and called them a couple times,
so they never responded to me.
Last time I called to the office, and they asked me to send an email,
and then they sent an email to the community to schedule an appointment,
but they never responded even to them or to me.
Right.
Um, since we, we received, um, we did receive an email from you with documents at, after
11 o'clock last night.
And unfortunately we need to receive them further in advance.
So we have time to review them and make sure they are complete.
So, um, fortunately we can't move, move forward today.
Um, but I suggest that, that you call, call the office for assistance and making sure
that you're able to to upload them and and get all of what you need in um within five days for
your next hearing date okay okay i should i think i upload them last night date yes yeah and we need
we needed them before um yeah so that we could review them and make sure they were complete so
i'm sorry we're not able to move forward today okay i'm here for first time yeah i do understand
any questions you have call the office we'll try to okay okay thank you so mi2025 001 281
Okay, thank you. So MI 2025, 001-281, 9418 Frankfurt Avenue. Cases continue 325-26 at 9.30 a.m.
Thank you.
All right. Thank you, sir.
Number 11, MI 2025, 001-308, 5252 Saul Street.
Felix Pimentel is the listed owner.
E.B. Reyes is the listed applicant third-party professional.
This is the first listed.
felix pimento if you're in a virtual audience please raise your virtual hand
i see no hands so mi 2025 001 308 5252 soul street cases continued to 325 26 at 9 30 a.m
And number 12, MI-2025-001-309-1014 Fanshawe Street.
Did we do that?
All right, we're ready to start here.
We're going to go with number one, MI 2024-002-622-10916, Nandina Lane, Serhiti and Savantlana Reva are the applicant and owners.
Sir Haley and Syveta Reva, if you're in a virtual audience, please raise your virtual
Mr. Chair, we're trying to secure an interpreter for this applicant, so if we could just move
on to another case, and we'll come back and see if we can get this done today.
Thank you.
number five mi-2025-001-246-4024 ridge avenue eric bottson is the attorney
good morning good morning sponsor could you please state your name and spell for the sonographer
Yes, Eric Bodzin, B-O-D-E-R-I-C, B-O-D-Z-I-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
So this is a resumptive hearing, Mr. Bodzin.
Here's what we have scheduled.
There will be an update from you, including discussion of revised plans, questions from the board, public testimony related to it, planning commission recommendation, and then we'll vote.
So why don't you start, sir?
Wonderful. Well, good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board. Eric Bods in a blank Rome on behalf of Radix Property Group. My client in the virtual audience is Anthony Massiri. With him is architect Ben Estepani.
and I understand that Ms. Rosalie Cooper of RAH Civic Association is also in attendance in the
virtual audience. Thank you for the opportunity to promptly resume this hearing to address the
two discrete matters raised at the prior hearing. That is, first, so that the owners could meet with
the existing resident to ensure that the lease is fully honored with no construction during the
tenancy. And second, while doing so, taking the opportunity to submit revised proviso plans
here on your screen that incorporate the very specific and helpful feedback of this board.
First, ground floor lobby space exclusive to residents with wall-mounted mailboxes and both
interior and exterior package drop off second in the rear now a ventilated fire rated trash room
with 65 gallon commercial trash containers for each and every unit directly accessible to all
units via the rear stairwell and also accessible directly to a rear alleyway to keep the regular
three times a day, I'm sorry, three times a week trash service off the primary frontage.
The upstairs units have been, thirdly, the upstairs units have been substantially
enlarged, reduced from nine to six units, so as to eliminate the three smallest units, all one and two bedrooms, no studios, the smallest of the units is 712 square feet, and each unit now equipped with its own trash room, as well as access via the rear stairwell to the trash rooms, I'm sorry, to the trash storage that I mentioned.
enlarged, reduced from nine to six units so as to eliminate.
No changes to the roof.
The first screen you can see here is the first, second, and third floor plan.
The second screen has the fourth floor as well as the roof layout.
No changes proposed there.
No changes to the design.
And no changes to the footprint, which is summarized here with what's new in white and what's existing in pink.
The first floor rear should also be in pink.
And you can see here the scale of the pink building to the rear, which is 15 feet taller.
It's the self-storage facility that was recently approved and the 415-unit Dobbs apartments across the street.
To refresh very briefly, the refusal itself is quite simple.
the request of relief is to continue the existing multifamily non-parking condition
of this property that exists throughout this block. You may recall this is the wedge of
1920s-era row homes between Roosevelt Boulevard and the start of Fairmount Park.
um and um all of those row homes have ground existing ground floor commercial with multi-family
above um like the rest of the neighborhood um you can see multi-family development in the
neighborhood including the dobson and and um sherman apartments which are the other two
industrial zone parcels in the neighborhood um we mentioned at the last hearing that this area of
the North District and the comprehensive plan circled in purple with the letter D is actually
encouraged for restorative development of this type of mixed family use. There is major transit
access along this arterial. You have, of course, Roosevelt Boulevard, the Schuylkill Expressway,
bus routes 1 and 60, which connect to Center City, as well as nearby regional rail.
And as mentioned at the last hearing, the existing condition of the units on the street
are between two and seven units.
The revised proviso plan brings this proposal within that scale.
Just for context, there are some aerials that show the adjacent self-storage facility.
as well as the across-the-street
DOBS apartments, both about 15 feet
higher than the proposed addition here.
And we are pleased, as I mentioned,
to be joined by, I understand,
Ms. Rosalie Cooper of RAH Civic Association.
This is the letter of unanimous community support
after extensive community engagement
by the applicant.
Again, Mr. Chair, members of the board,
we really appreciate the opportunity
for this prompt resumption hearing just to summarize briefly the requested relief is in
alignment and in fact in furtherance with the spirit and harmony of the city's code and its
comprehensive plan as i mentioned based on the physical layout and surroundings of a long
landlocked mixed-use building that has never and cannot strictly conform with the icmx zoning
district having said that with the minimal modifications we presented today we submit
that this proposal will maximally benefit without adverse impact, the character congestion,
health and safety, adjacent properties, public facilities, and environment of the neighborhood,
all in accordance with the code and underscored by the community support for this proposal.
Okay. So why don't you bring your client in?
Yes. My client, if he can raise his hand, is Mr. Anthony Massiri.
Anthony Massiri, please accept the promotion to panelists.
anthony right anthony anthony yes good morning could you please state your name and spell for
the stenographer sure anthony masserie a-n-t-h-o-n-y m-a-s-c-i-e-r-i right do you swear
C-I-E-R-I.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but
Counsel?
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good morning, Anthony. Have you heard the entirety of my testimony this morning?
And the information I presented, is it correct and accurate to the best of your knowledge?
And would you now adopt and affirm my testimony as your own?
I do, yes.
Thank you, Mr. Messiri.
So, Eric, I'm going to open up to the board.
If we need the architect, we'll bring him on.
And just real quick, so you went from nine units.
Nine units to six.
You took out the three suites, incorporated them into the other six, right?
Exactly.
So now you have six.
Yes, Mr. Chair.
Questions from the board?
Definitely appreciate the changes that you made based on the comments that were raised by our group.
So I definitely appreciate those changes.
I think it's a much better plan.
I have a question about the structural issues that the tenant raised about the cracks or something in the wall and seeing if they were addressed yet or still pending.
So my understanding is that the ownership, including Mr. Maceres, on this hearing has met on several occasions with the tenant, as I mentioned, to make sure that to clearly communicate that the lease will be honored at all times and to address any issues with the unit itself, including the structural issues.
And, of course, the purpose of this project, and one of the reasons that RAH has been so supportive through the process, is that this is an older building in need of some restoration.
We appreciate your consideration.
Thank you.
Questions or comments from our attorney?
I just wanted to note, for the revised plans, there are two pages that we can stamp.
And I'm sorry, I didn't write.
I want to say it's the Z100 and Z101.
one. I might have it wrong because we can't stamp the floor plans.
We have to match what L&I has reviewed. So there's two pages
that we can stamp if the board approves. And I will be in touch
with you because we have to, some of the changes listed on the proviso form aren't
shown on those plans. We just will need to adjust the proviso form so that it
matches. But I'll send you a separate email about that. Thank you so much. You're welcome.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
i see no hands okay questions uh comments from uh planning thank you chairman and good morning
david vecto f-e-c-t-e-a-u with the city planning commission you swear or affirm to tell the truth
the whole truth and nothing but the truth yes sir i do please proceed thank you sir chairman
and board members the comprehensive plan recommends a change in zoning at this location from icmx
industrial and commercial mixed use to cmx2 commercial mixed use the zoning for this
neighborhood dates to 1971 under the proposed zoning four dwelling units would be allowed
so six is not the minimum needed to afford the appellant relief the city planning commission
recommends the board grant the requested variants for not providing accessory off-street parking
and the use variants for multi-family living but with a maximum of four dwelling units thank you
um mi2025-001-246-4024 ridge avenue
i vote yes with proviso revised plans two pages stamped by zba august 13 2025 maximum six dwelling
michael johns my vote is yes with proviso cheryl gaston my vote is yes with provisos
tenetta graham my vote is yes with provisos ryan mcadams my vote is yes with provisos
iowen my vote is yes with provisos thank you council thank you all for hosting thank you very
much number six mi 2025 001 252 18 18 west montgomery avenue isaac slepner is the attorney
There's a support from Beach Community Services, RCO, and a letter of non-opposition from Council Member Young.
Good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board.
Good morning, Council.
Isaac Slefner here.
Isaac could you spell your name for this yes yeah good morning Isaac Slepner is a AC leg
Yeah. Good morning. Isaac Slepner, I-S-A-A-C, last name Slepner, S-L-E-P-N-E-R.
Hold on, hold on. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Could you identify your client, the relationship to this property?
Yes. My client is 1818 Montgomery MDM LLC, and the principal member of that LLC, Dan McVeigh, is here today. That LLC is the owner of the property.
Okay. Our board member, Kineta Graham, has a few questions for you.
Good morning. Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, I did.
And do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
yes I do okay thank you you can share your screen and proceed with your case
all right bear with me here technology we're going to share we're gonna start
here so all right can everybody see my screen here wait there we go now can
everybody see my screen here okay great so what is proposed right now currently
the property is a flat empty lot and what is proposed to be built here is a
duplex a two-unit with the basement and first floor being one-bedroom unit and
the second and third floor being a two-bedroom unit these are the plans
right here for the property. And I'm going to do a little zooming in over here. So you can see here
is the basement with egress, just a large living space, utility closet and bath. At the ground
floor, you've got a kitchen, bedroom and another bath. Then you've got your second floor. You've
got the living area, bedroom on the second floor, and on the third floor, you've got the primary
bedroom with ensuite, another bath, the hall and the stairs, and a sort of undefined office space.
This is an elevation from street level and a cross section. So that's what we are planning
for the property. This is a deed in favor of my client, 1818 Montgomery MDM LLC. It was recorded
in October of 2018 with the recorder of deeds. This is the letter that we sent out to the neighbors
on May 27th of 2025, informing them of the RCO meeting with Beach Companies.
We sent it via first-class mail with certificates of mailing to a number of addresses,
to this list of addresses, which is about 100 or so, 120, I believe.
And we sent to, oops, sorry, going a little fast there.
these are all the addresses that we sent out to as you can see there's a number
of pages of addresses um this is my client got caught up on the property
tax on Friday the 8th and this is a receipt of payment with the City
Department of Revenue. This is the letter of, this is the letter of support from the RCO,
from Beach Companies. I'm opening that up right here. Beach Companies expresses support for the
variance. And I reached out to Councilman Young's office. I understand that Mr. Chair, you reported
that you had received a letter from the councilman's office. We have a letter of non-opposition
from the council member. Okay, great. And so we have the letter of support from the RCO and also
So the meeting summary, which is right here, meeting summary was unanimous, three in support, zero against.
I'm going to show you some photos of the zoning poster and really the property itself.
If I actually, I'm going to need to do a different screen share, bear with me.
I'm going to need to do a different screen share. Bear with me.
Okay, here we go.
Here we go.
This is kind of a front-on shot of the zoning poster,
and that's more or less the entire property from the front.
As you can see, it's an empty lot right now.
This is a second close-up of the poster.
just posted you know at the very front sidewalk edge of the property another
close-up of the zoning poster a little bit wider shot again kind of showing the
whole property and that's a wide shot from across the street you can see
that's the full extent of the property and I would open it to questions from
the board so council before i'll have you bring your client on but could you tell us what the
rest of the block looks like relative to multiple family well i can have um i can have my client
testify more to that um why don't you bring your client on all right and if you would if you would
as your client comes on why don't you go back to the drawing that you have plans okay sure sure
sure sure okay what's your client's name all right uh my client is daniel mcveigh um he's
the principal of can everybody see that uh set of plans there no mr mcveigh okay sorry mr mcveigh
daniel mcveigh if you're in a virtual audience please raise your virtual
again and accept the promotion
to panelists.
Sorry,
bear with me. I'm going to
get my client
in on this.
Hello?
Hi, Mr. McVeigh,
could you please state your name as Bell for the
sonographer? Yes, it's Daniel McVeigh,
D-A-N-I-E-L.
McVeigh, M-C-V-E-Y
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth
the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Would you please turn your video on?
I'm actually not too good with this.
Sorry about this.
All right, counsel, start your conversation.
Dan, are you
Are you the principal member of 1818 Montgomery MDM LLC?
Yes, I am.
And that LLC is the owner of 1818 West Montgomery?
Yes, it is.
And did you hear all of the testimony that I offered to the board?
Yes, I did.
And would you adopt that testimony as though you gave it yourself?
And was it true and correct to the best of your knowledge?
Thank you.
What's the depth of the basement below grade?
It's hard to tell from your drawing.
I don't know if you can zoom in and mention.
And what's the ceiling height of the basement?
Dan, do you have specifics on that?
Yes, I believe the ceiling height was 7 foot 11 and a half inches.
And what was the other question? I'm sorry, the depth?
The depth below grade. So I guess if you zoom into that front elevation, there's a dimension at least to the, looks like, I guess, to the height of the first floor.
It kind of seems like it's 13 foot something to the.
Yeah, it's actually hard to see that.
Yeah, it's just hard to read it.
I can't tell whether that's a four or a three to the first floor.
I'll zoom in.
And how are you dealing with the trash?
How is trash being dealt with?
There is going to be a cutout, I believe, underneath the steps there for the trash cans.
so for both for both for both tenants for both units correct
uh it doesn't look like from your um from your section that there's room to put anything under
the stair will there be room and i don't know how they're going to do it in the rear yard
Will both tenants have access to the rear yard?
No, it only looks like the first floor just has access.
No, it only looks like the first floor just has access to the rear yard.
And there's no trash storage within the unit, no trash storage closet or anything.
No, just going to be, you know, the big 65-gallon trash cans.
I was hoping to store them, like, underneath the steps, the front entry steps.
I don't think 65-gallon trash cans.
Or not 65.
Yeah, it's the way that your plan is presented.
There's no real room under the steps the way that it's drawn.
So I don't know that that wouldn't work.
All right, those are my...
And so did you zoom in and see so we could see what that height of,
at least see what the height of the first...
It's four feet, Mike.
It's four feet.
okay four feet above grade so four feet above grade so that gives you three feet that gives
you another four feet okay all right thank you all the questions
questions or comments from attorney hillary emerson not at this time mr chair questions
or comments from the virtual audience i see no hands planning commission
thank you chairman and good morning david effecta with the city planning commission
chairman and board members the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the rm1 residential
multi-family zoning at this location the city rezoned this neighborhood in 2014 in accord with
recommendations in the comprehensive plan absent the zoning overlay the appellant would be allowed
two dwelling units by right the majority of homes on this block face are single family but several
other multi-family dwellings are present the city planning commission recommends the board grant
their proposed use variance for two dwelling units mi-2025-001-252-1818 montgomery avenue i vote yes
with proviso maximum two units can i add an additional proviso that uh trash storage be
for the for the second floor unit within the unit
would be in the unit Michael you for the second floor unit yeah for this for this let me do it
again MI 2025 001 252 1818 West Montgomery Avenue I vote yes proviso
trash stored on second floor in unit and maximum two units Michael Johns my vote is yes with
proviso. Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes, with provisos.
Tanetta Graham, my vote is yes, with proviso. Ryan McAdams, my vote
is yes, with provisos. Hi, Owen, my vote is yes, with provisos. Thank you,
counsel. All right, thank you, members of the board. I have nothing further. I'm
going to log off. Okay. MI 2025,
this is number seven. MI 2025, 001
277, 5285
jefferson street nakia hurdle is the attorney there's a recommendation of
unanimous support from parkside association um seven votes total
nakia good good morning good morning hi could you please turn on your video thank you yes hi
could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer yes good morning may it please
the board. My name is Nakia Hurdle, and as in Nancy, A-K-E-A, last name Hurdle, H-U-R-D as in
David, L-E, and I represent GUP LLC. All right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth,
the whole truth, nothing but the truth? I do. And your client, what is the relationship to
the property the client is the record owner of the property has been since march 18 2016.
our board member tenetta graham has a few questions for you good morning um have you submitted your
documents five days in advance of this hearing i did and great did you do you waive the reading
of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy i do okay thank you you may share your screen
Okay. Thank you. You may share your screen and proceed with your case.
and proceed with your case.
So, good morning, everyone. I apologize for that. Good morning, everyone. Let me start with just
giving a little background information. According to the records of the Philadelphia Department of
License and Inspection, as well as other information provided by the Department of
License and Inspection. The Jefferson Street property in question had a zoning permit to be
utilized as a two-family household dwelling, which is currently showing on my screen,
from July 19, 1965 to September 26, 2019. The permit elapsed September 26, 2019. It is my
understanding due to, it lapsed due to inactivity. It was a procedural lapse.
It was a procedural lapse. So just to clarify, the purpose of this appeal is just to reestablish the permitted use as a two-family dwelling for the property located at 5285 Jefferson Street.
need. On February 3rd, 2025, Gump LLC submitted a zoning application to be considered by the
Philadelphia Department of License and Inspection, as I mentioned, to request to have the permitted
use reestablished. It was refused February 20, 2025. And of course, we're here today
because Gump LLC on the same day of the refusal filed an appeal, a request for an appeal.
As I've already stipulated to this, the refusal of the Philadelphia Department of License and Inspections
to grant Gump LLC's request to permit the property in question to be used as a two-family dwelling
was predicated on the fact that the proposed use was expressly prohibited by the residential
single-family, quote-unquote, RSA-5 zoning district, which is...
Counselor, we have all those documents.
What may be helpful is, as you're speaking, if you showed photos of the property.
I will also do that.
Thank you.
So in light of what I was just indicating with respect to the zoning district, I also wanted to indicate in light of that prohibition, there are other properties that are currently permitted to be used in that same neighborhood for uses that are expressly prohibited.
One property, for instance, is 5235 Jefferson Street, and I will put these pictures back up momentarily.
And I just, I have a permit from that property just showing so you can see the use for that property since 2004 is for assembly and entertainment.
That property is located exactly on the same block as this property.
You know, so the argument is this, the same privilege that has been extended to other properties that are also thriving in this neighborhood that bring forth a benefit versus a detriment to the community should also be extended to 5285 Jefferson Street.
And I just want to, before I bring back the photos, just elaborate on the benefits that could be the benefits that this property, if zoned, or if the use is permitted, the benefits it could bring, which is similar to the benefits that have been brought from other properties.
So the benefits that this property could bring for, for instance, right now, this property is an abandoned property.
It is an eyesore for this neighborhood, having it zoned as a two family household would not only allow the work to resume on this property and take it from being an abandoned property,
but it would also bring families into the community and bring families together.
uh families into the community and bring families together so council why don't you show us the
So, Council, why don't you show us?
plans for the property yes i was going to get to that sure so with respect to the plans of the
property there will be no changes to the basement or the foundation um you know uh the most of the
work just to generalize everything. Most of the work will be done to the first and second floor.
On the first floor, there will be a two-bedroom family living space with a porch. The second
floor would have um a similar layout uh to family living space uh no porch uh and
excuse me courts indulgence and as i mentioned uh no changes to the basement foundation
no changes to the windows or exterior door size or placement um the stairs are going to exist
as shown on the first floor the kitchen cabinets and everything or I don't will
be installed as shown so so basically with respect to the interior that is
going to be the bulk of the work done with respect to the property. The exterior of the
property will remain the same. And I will bring up, if you could excuse me, another
my apologies um i just lost one of the photos
court's indulgence my apologies
And I also have some interior photos of the property as well, did not mean to click on
the same exact photo. Here it is. So this right here is a photo of the side of the property. You can
also see the posting, but this is a picture of the side of the photo. Nothing to the structure
of the outside will be changed. Of course, the debris and stuff will be cleaned up.
The initial photo that I showed you was a photo of the front of the property, and again, nothing on the exterior portion of the property will be changed at all.
could you go back to that last photo you had a couple minutes ago about
is that a side entrance or what was that in the rear so the rear that is a side entrance yes sir
so where does that take you the first floor or the second that takes you so that doesn't take
you inside the property that takes you to the backyard of the property the back of the property
thank you you're welcome
so uh the interior will only show um work that was started uh i believe during covet um that
obviously was stopped because of permit and zoning issues. So here it just shows just
framing framework being done within the property. This is on the second floor and this is additional
framework on the second floor of the property.
So why don't you, why don't you bring your client on?
Mr. David Seltzer, Virtus Perkins.
Please raise your hand if you're in the virtual room.
i see no hands
um so counsel you're an officer of the court we will uh we will accept your testimony
questions from the board
yes um can we look at the floor plans again yes
so there'll be you're not going to have any household living in the basement
right no that the basement will not be utilized for living space okay um and then uh
where how are we okay that's the basement so first floor second floor so it's one unit
per floor correct yes yes exactly it's a little small we could make it a little bigger
that would be helpful hold up i'm trying i i made it too big so is that is that enough
and you need me to go up or down okay porch living room kitchen
Okay. And then I'm sure that one of the, one of my fellow board members will ask about access to the rear yard. Is there access through that? And how do you get to that? I can't, I can't, you got to pull it up a little bit.
yes i think to piggyback on that it does look like from atlas that there is no rear yard
and that the property actually goes to the to the property line well i was i i didn't mean
i apologize and sorry for interrupting not into the property or the yard but
there is an entrance another entrance to get to the property it doesn't lead inside the property
though so what does it go to because there's a one story structure or one story it looks like
an addition at the rear of the property that has six doors that has access to it you've only shown
one in your testimony and I think we're just trying to figure out because they're not reflected
on the plans? Yes, understood. Let me just pull it up for you again. This would be, it
would explode today. No, we don't want that one. My apologies. That was the question I
initially had about, you said there was just one door, which was an entrance into the yard,
right? Yes. Well, I, I, I misspoke. I should not have said to the yard. Um, but what I was trying
to, um, discern is that it was definitely not an entrance into the interior of the property.
Right. But what, what, what's an entrance to? Uh, it is, it, it is my understanding
that it just leads it just leads to the side of the property um i can um i don't have any way
thank you i think your client's on i was about to say i don't have any way to get verification but
thank you mr seltzer is that you it's mr perkins mr perkins uh mr perkins is uh an agent of llc
Thank you for joining us, Mr. Perkins.
Hi, sir.
Could you please state your name and spell it for the stenographer?
Mr. Perkins?
Hello?
Hi, could you please state your name and spell it for the stenographer?
Yes, Bertis Villasen, Victor, E-R-T-I-S, last name Perkins, P-E-R-K-I-N-S.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Could you turn your video on?
Let me see how to do that.
I'm driving, so I'm trying to.
There should be a symbol that looks like a camera.
it should have a red line through it if you click on it it will allow your video to play
It should have a red line through it.
If you click on it, it will.
there you go can y'all see me we should yeah okay all right because i don't see anything but okay
all right could you counsel could you have him number one adopt your testimony
yes uh good good morning mr perkins uh have you heard the entirety of my testimony
this morning? Yes. And would you adopt and affirm my testimony as your own?
Yes. All right. Mr. Perkins, we're struggling to understand what's in the rear of the property.
Okay. Yeah. So let me kind of rewind just a little bit. So our attorney is correct. There
are two families, one on each floor. There's a two bedroom, one bathroom apartment on the first
floor, two bedroom, one bathroom on the second floor. The rear of the property actually is
garages. So the tenants actually have access to the side yard, which you can see in the picture.
There's actually no rear yard. There's only a side yard to the property.
so the front door gives access to the first floor and the second floor the uh the door that you see
on the on the side of the building in this picture it's kind of hard to see it but on the side of the
building gives access to the first floor only questions for the board can you go back to the
floor plans why is the garage not shown on the floor plan or the or the side yard i'm i'm also
confused as to how the side yard works because are you saying that the the right wall of the
building is not on the property line it is there's no side there's no side
the left the left hand side of the building has a side yard to the building
the right hand side is just attached to another building yeah but where where is
the side yard in this drawing yeah i think i think when in respect with
respect to the property line is the question here's there's a side yard there's side there's
a side yard because there's grass there but i guess the question is it just weeds well it's
a green it's a green oh yeah it's a green space so it's a it's a side yard with a fence i say
because i'm looking at google but is that is it technically not on your property is the question
because that's I guess the yeah that's the well technically it it it is um for whatever reason I
don't know why it's not in the plans but technically it is it's just um it's just a little small yard
it's probably uh if I had to say three to four feet wide by the length of the uh the building
that you see on plans.
And what are you going to do about trash storage?
Use that side yard for trash storage.
And you're going to use
regular trash pickup from the city?
Is that what you're planning on?
Or are you going to do trash pickup?
No, we'll probably do regular trash. Just pay the, you know, the, I think it's $300, $600 a year that they charge us extra when we have a duplex.
All right. And then in between pickups, where will the trash be stored?
it will be stored in the uh bin so that little side yard will pave that off
and actually put uh trash bins uh right there in the side yard
yeah it's actually fenced in already uh some somebody ran into the fence so we'll um
um actually take care of that as well where we'll put um so they can't park on a curve or
god forbid somebody flies around that corner won't be able to run into the building uh ever again
and so since it's not on the plan how would the garage is going to work or the
to a garage is that uh not at this not at this point so the garage would probably just be extra
So the garage would probably just be extra storage for whatever, you know, needs that needs to be for the building, you know, yeah, for now.
storage for uh whatever you know
And is there one garage, two garages?
There's three garages there.
And curb cuts?
Are there curb cuts?
Yes, it is.
All right.
years ago it used to be a shop or something that they used to do um uh there but right now it's
just going to be storage and actually um because there are curve cuts um it would be actually
extra parking for the tenants uh if they actually needed parking
mr perkins just out of curiosity is there room in the kitchen to sit down and eat yes
i just want to also point out that the tenants cannot park in the in the driveways because the
driveways are actually in the public right-of-way like they no no no they can park on the street
but there's no public the public can't park there because there's no parking sign so
tenants will be able to park on the street in front of the garage
i have a question about the uh the front porch
can we bring that back up real quick
a view of the front of the house
oh yes my apologies
no it's okay
why does it keep bringing up this
same picture
maybe I'm clicking on
could you show the plans
to show the front porch
is there plans
you said it was mentioned
there would be no exterior work
is there plans to put a fence up
on that porch
per se
it would be a wrought iron railing
wrapped around
and coming down the steps
do you know how many
of the other homes on this block are duplexes?
So actually, and it's weird because
5279 is a duplex. There's actually about four properties
on that particular block that are actually
duplexed. They've been that way for years.
5279 is a duplex.
5285 is a duplex.
I think 52, oh my goodness, that's going down the other way.
I think 77 is also a duplex.
There's actually quite a few on the block.
And just to be candid with the board, 52-85 hasn't been zoned as a duplex per se.
I don't know if they're going to appeal it, but it is definitely zoned for use, to be used for assembly and entertainment purposes.
So that's also a prohibited use under the RSA 5 zoning district, which is being allowed.
So on this plan that we're looking at, there's no door separating this first floor unit to the basement.
what's the what's the it looks like the first floor has complete use of the basement and
without a doorway so what's the yes so it's actually uh let me see i'm trying to pull this
thing up myself i can't see um so literally where the basement is at it's just really going to be
utility purposes uh we'll probably give them you know extra storage just because they're there on
the first floor but ideally what we were going to do is um eventually just uh come back later
and see if we can pull a um get a uh egress put in so that way we can just make weight to have
uh use for the basement just for extra storage for us
well there's no door on your plane yes so that is an unfinished basement yes so there's just
unfinished basement. So the way that it appears, it appears as if
it's going to be used for household living. That's the concern.
So it won't.
It won't at this point, no.
And I know dealing with
as we submit the plans, I know we're going to have to
as we submit the plans i know we're going to have to revise some things when we tried to do this i
revise some things when we try to
think back in 20 2020 or 2019 i can't really remember um but i know covet was going on and
just ran into a roadblock so we just had to stop and um kind of wait until we got this
hearing so that way we could straighten out to see exactly what we needed to do to get everything
right. Any other questions? Questions for our attorney. I'm a little unclear what's being
proposed for the parking because you can't like we can't park on the sidewalk and if the street
parking is no parking um so then the the your tenants couldn't park there either well the
tenants could park there uh you know because if if if so there's no parking for the public but
you know just let's just say you live there you can put a no parking sign in front of your you
know property and you still could park there because it's your you know it's your house right
um there's a you can't you can't that's not true i mean i parked i got no parking uh well i can't
send pictures of my stuff but uh i have a huge driveway at my house and i live in it uh at a
dead end street and for whatever reason people try to park park there for whatever reason and i put a
no parking sign and you know sometimes i gotta call the cops because it might be the neighbors
or something or i'll just park one of my cars there just to make sure they don't park there
so you can't you can't yeah you can't block a driveway and there's things that you can do like
put a xbox you know get get an application from the street department to put an xbox to
so people don't park there but if you have that there and people aren't supposed to park there
and your tenants are parking there
they could end up with tickets is what I'm saying
okay yeah so I guess
we're seeing two different things
we have the little
Lou Blum no parking signs
in front of the garages just to
I guess deter
people from parking
you know parking there we wouldn't get it
X'd off where I guess you
legally could never park
there so I guess
yeah that's what I'm actually saying
okay so it
Yeah. So technically just be, because the garage is there, normally when people see a garage and
you put no parking signs on your garage, people don't park in front of your garage just in case
you got to get in, right? So because we have the garages there, you know, and it's enough for two
cars to park, that space will always be there where technically the tenants could park there.
i think that's what we're trying to explain to you because there's a curb cut
they could get ticketed by the city because the curb cut would not allow a car to park there it's
not the street is not public you don't you don't own the the your driveway you only own the garage
the driveway is in the public right-of-way so they cannot block the curb cut
so you're saying even though i own the garages
if you don't own the driveway that leads up to the garage that is in the public right-of-way
that's in the sidewalk and you can't legally block the sidewalk and you can't legally
park block the driveway so your tenants could only park inside one of the three garages that you have
well that that presents a another issue too because the lot is only 14 something what is it
14 foot 10 wide which doesn't allow for parking space so that's a that's a whole maybe baby the
garage is just for storage i think that's probably yeah i mean yeah so yeah it's not big enough to
fit a car in it's only it's actually a car in the garage now but um you know the theory is the
The tenants won't use the garages at all.
You know, the garage is only for stores.
So if they need the parts.
Go ahead.
Sir, let me what we're going to do with this.
We're going to hold the vote on this and we're going to hold the vote on this for two weeks.
And what I would like to see is the drawings with the garage attached just to see what it looks like.
I mean, it's kind of hard to see what's what's even there.
so if you would
So if you would, I'm going to give you a couple of weeks, come back.
I'm going to give you
a couple weeks
come back
Everything's going to be closed on this other than the vote from the public and planning.
everything's going to be closed
But we'd like to see a drawing that has the garage too.
Yeah, we can do that.
And then also where you would put trash and things like that.
I just want to note this is because this is a change of use application.
If there is any contemplation of parking on the property, that that would have to be done via a separate zoning permit application and perhaps a separate variance if the code standards weren't met.
Yeah, we're not really worried about parking.
I just thought it would be convenient if, you know, because the space is there and nobody can park there, if the tenants need to park there, we would not object for them to park there.
That's all I'm saying.
but okay you know so so here's here's where we are we're going to continue this for two weeks
everything's closed on us other than public testimony and planning and we would like to see
a drawing that has a garage attached so mr chair are you suggesting a resumption hearing if you're
not taking public testimony or do a resumptive hearing yes if you're not taking public testimony
or the planning commission recommendation today we will need to do a resumption here we just got
get a better picture okay well then i we i think we have a resumption date i don't i don't have
a resumption date we will cancel we will notify you when that date is okay yes thank you and thank
you and thank you very much that concludes my business may i be okay thank you thank you
mi-2025-001-284-1012 west colonna street henry clinton is the attorney
there's a recommendation of uh support non-opposition from north central east rco
and non-opposition from council member yong
Henry Clinton, please accept the promotion to panelists.
I see you here.
I got you.
Morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the board.
Good morning, Henry.
Could you please state your name and spell for this photographer?
Henry, H-E-N-R-Y, Clinton, C-L-I-N-T-O-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Did you identify your client and the relationship to the property?
Sure. The property is owned by an LLC. My client is Mike Salamone, and he is a principal of that LLC, and he is on the call, and that's S-A-L-O-M-O-N-E.
Our board member Tenetta Graham has a few questions.
Good morning. Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of the hearing, of this hearing?
The bulk of them we did.
My client just got proof that he paid his taxes, and we have a proviso for him, too.
And do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
I do, Ms. Graham.
Thank you.
You may share your screen and begin your case.
Thank you.
Is that visible, Mr. Chairman?
It is, sir.
Good morning again, Mr. Chairman.
members of the board. I'm here on behalf of Mike Salamone, who's the principal of the LLC.
And this is a request for a two-family dwelling in an I-2 zone that was previously approved
three years ago. The zoning permit ran out, so we have to come back in front of the board.
And also the adjacent property, 1010 Kelowna, was the same issue as we're facing today, I-2.
We asked for a two-family dwelling, and the board approved that within the year.
So I'll show you those zoning records at the back end, but that's the introduction.
Table of contents, A1 through A10, including zoning records of partial A, which is 1010,
and then previously 1012, which is a subject property, partial B.
That was approved back in 2020.
Refusal, again, I2 zoning district.
We have two issues. One is proposed use. Two-family household living is not permitted in I-2 industrial.
And if the two-family dwelling is in an I-2 zone, we would need a parking spot, which we do not have.
As Mr. Chairman referenced, we do have a letter of support from North Central East RCO.
These are photographs. So the background, and I'll show you the subdivision plan. There were
two lots on 1D. The width was 30 feet wide. We subdivided into two lots, 1010.
The width was 30 feet wide.
We subdivided into two lots.
1010, West Kelowna, already approved.
That's partial A.
And the subject property is 1012, West Kelowna.
And that's parcel B, which is what we're talking about today.
Just some more context photographs.
Both vacant lots right now.
1010, we have a building permit, but building has not started.
Postings.
plans. This is the proviso, and I'll explain what that is. If Mr. Johns recalls months ago,
I know you've seen hundreds of cases, but the windows were not properly situated in the front
of the house. So we revised these plans as we did for 10-10 and moved the windows up so they're
partially out of grade. So this is the current elevation with the revised plans,
mainly a brick front, the casement windows, entrance through the front door. This is the
rear elevation, hardy siding on the rear, and again the window is pulled out of the basement.
Floor plans, I don't know if they're large enough to see, but I'll start in the basement.
In the basement, when we were before the board previously, we had bedrooms in the basement and they were approved.
the architect has changed that description of both areas in the
basement but you know granted there is a closet and there is a also a full
bathroom in the basement so we may have a bit of a misnomer there but I'm not
here to hide anything from the board obviously the the first floor where the
entrance is we have a bedroom kitchen and living room the trash will be taken
out to the rear yard for the first floor. And on the second floor, we have one bedroom, kind of a
repeat of the first floor. On the second floor, a kitchen, living, one bedroom. And my client has
indicated that he will be putting a trash closet in the kitchen, probably on this wall, because
there's no place to put the trash, as Mr. Johns mentioned in a prior presentation today.
And then we have two bedrooms on the second floor with access to a rooftop deck.
Side elevation, this was the original plan where the basement window was not out of great.
Now on the revised plans, it does depict it correctly.
A cross view of the property.
These are the two properties side by side.
1010 is A, 1012 is B.
They're both, as I said, the subdivision plan, which I'll show you, was 30 feet.
We cut that in half, it's 15, and then the depth is 76 feet,
so we don't have any issues with open space or rear yard or height.
Some more photographs, the superviso form, project information.
My client did owe a small balance, and then he paid it off recently, which resulted in us getting the tax information to you within or beyond that five-day period.
Zoning map, again, all I-2 in this area.
Deed indicating ownership, Manns and Lizardo Investments, LLC.
Mike Salamone is the principal.
You can see he purchased both properties, 10-10 and 10-12, back in 2019, got both approved in 2020.
10-10's zoning permit ran out, came back to the board, got approved, and we're here today for 10-12.
This is our notice letter advising the community of the community meeting as well as the GBA hearing today.
Proof of bulk mailing, 81 pieces were mailed out.
These are all the addresses.
And then I'll touch on the zoning records again, just to give the board the full background.
So this is the zoning permit issued in 2020 of a lot line relocation.
This is what is pre-existing before we subdivide it, 30 foot wide, 76 feet deep.
And then this is the approved subdivision plan.
Partial A, 1010. Partial B, 1012.
There's the stamps from the survey district.
There's the stamps from the survey district, as well as zoning approval.
And this was the refusal for the lot line relocation.
Here's the zoning permit that I mentioned that was issued for partial A back in 2020.
We've come before the board and had that renewed.
and now we are in a position to have a residential building permit for 2010
excuse me that expire and we we're in the process of renewing that so I stand corrected on that
these are the plans from the other from 1010 where we had to revise plans and raise the
windows out above grade somewhat.
And this is the approved proviso for, again, 10-10.
It will be the same proviso today,
basement egress windows reconfigured,
windows now partially above grade,
and it's the same plan, A200.
This is the zoning permit that we did,
were issued in 2020 for Parcel B.
After three years, as the board knows,
it runs out or expires.
This was the original submission of the site plan, showing the rear yard.
And this is the residential building permit for 10-12, which also has run out.
And if we get approval today, we will have to go through those steps again.
So that is the presentation for today.
We're not really impacting any adjacent development, not impacting light or air.
The project is in harmony with the code.
It's in harmony with the adjacent property of 1010, and certainly in harmony with what the community group would like to see there.
So with that, I would rest and bring my client on, Mr. Chairman, to adopt my testimony.
Why don't you bring your client on, please?
Mr. Salamone, can you unmute yourself so you can be heard by the board?
I'll go back to the floor plans.
Mr. Solomon, if you're in a virtual audience, please raise your virtual hand.
Michael Solomon, please accept the promotion to panelists.
Mr. Solomon.
Michael, can you...
Can you hear us?
It'll take him a couple of minutes to get on.
Michael.
Do we see Mr. Solomon?
Mr. Solomon, did you raise your hand?
Yes, I did.
good morning how are you doing good morning hi mr solomon could you please state your name
and spell for the stenographer uh michael salamone m-i-c-h-a-e-l salamone s-a-l-o-m-o-n-e
you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth
i do please proceed counsel thank you mr chairman mr salamone were you on the zoom
call when i presented your project at 10 12 west colonna yes i was if you had the chance to testify
would you adopt my testimony as your own
and as true and correct?
Yes, I do.
And is it true that you will be installing
a trash closet on the second floor
for the second floor unit to store their trash in?
That is correct.
I have no further questions.
Questions from the board.
Can I just clarify,
this application today is only for 10-12
and you said 10-10 was already approved
or will also need a separate approval,
but it's the same essential layout.
Yeah, I don't think I was clear then yet.
1010 has already been approved
with the same floor plan
and the same proviso sheet.
I think sort of one,
just comments,
looking at the basement,
you guys mentioned that
there would be no living in the basement,
but the space that you have listed as a den
is just really,
it's a bedroom, like legally.
It's got a full bathroom.
it has an egress well and a closet
you could label it whatever you want on the plan
but it is going to be considered
a legal bedroom
and so I do think
that right now
this plan is misleading
because there's two bedrooms in the basement
which makes these three
bedroom two baths
uh i i hear you miss when that's why i pointed that out at the outset uh i i did not put the
I hear you S. Wynn
that's why I pointed that out at the outset
word then then in there obviously um mr salamone would you uh yeah that's no problem we can remove
the walls and um you know just make it a storage space in in the entire basement that is correct
With the mechanicals?
The closets would stay
for mechanicals.
So we would have that as a
proviso then.
And then what's the depth
of the basement below grade?
Do you know?
Nine feet.
Technically eight feet.
It's five below grade.
I'm sorry.
I misunderstood what you said
I thought you meant ceiling height
right so the basement has
9 foot ceilings and it's 5
feet below grade
that is correct
how tall
is the Philabundance
building across the street
it's not
do you know
I'm not 100% sure
my concern is that
this is really tall
Like, for there to be mostly two-story buildings in this neighborhood and even the Philabundance building is, like, it's a high-ceiling one-story building.
Like, this with the pilot house is 43 feet above the sidewalk.
It's a big building.
There is quite a few other projects that are across the street from the Philabundance building that are new construction with three stories and roof decks as well.
On Kelowna Street or on the main thoroughfare?
On, I guess that's 10th.
Directly across the street.
Yeah, I mean, I think that makes sense because 10th, it's varied.
There's some three stories already on 10th.
There are no three stories on Kelowna Street.
There's no houses really on Kelowna Street.
well there's the other side of the of the infrastructure i mean colonna street goes
down for another three blocks and it's all two story right and yeah i do not know the height i
mean in deference to the project 1010 was approved i realized not just because one project was
approved doesn't necessarily require a second one but it is across from phil abundance there's no
residential across the street and then immediately behind on 10th street there's a three-story
property there so i but i understand your comment yeah i mean i didn't approve 1010 i would have
asked the same questions of 1010 no i agree that's when was 1010 approved in january i want to say
well that was really a result i don't think i was yeah that was a resumptive hearing
because what happened is, this board did approve 1010, I believe.
Let me go back to the permits.
But what happened is when we originally presented the project,
Mr. Johns pointed out that the windows weren't properly above grade.
And by the time the architect redid the plans and we got them back to you,
we had a hearing.
That hearing was in January.
But the original ZBA hearing, I think, no, I stand corrected.
Michael is correct because I just pulled up my presentation from 1010 West Kelowna.
That was January 22nd, 2025.
That's when we had any other questions for the board.
question to our attorney hillary emerson um excuse me uh just briefly mr clinton um so for
i i saw the revised plans and what was submitted to lni originally the application was a site plan
and what is being submitted as a for a proviso plan is an elevation um and i talked to lni about
it because with the 1010 colonna street there was confusion when the elevation plan was stamped but
there was no site plan um and ellen i will accept if this is assuming the board grants will accept
the elevation plan but there also needs to be a site plan um stamped with it as well even if it's
not there's no changes to it there needs a site plan needs to be attached um so if the board grants
today it would grant with two pages of revised plans and a site plan would need to be submitted
in an updated proviso form if there were any changes to the site plan
an updated proviso form if there were any changes to the site plan as a result of the changes made
to the elevation understood questions or comments from the virtual audience
i say no hands planning commission
thank you chairman and board members david effecto with the city planning commission
chairman and board members, the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the I-2 medium
industrial zoning at this location. The zoning in this neighborhood dates to 1933. This is a
mostly residential section of North Philadelphia across the street from Philabundance's community
kitchen. While this block face is mostly vacant, adjacent block faces are primarily residential.
Most of the buildings on adjacent block faces are single-family dwellings,
with two- and three-unit buildings well-represented.
The City Planning Commission recommends the Board grant a proposed use variance
for two-dwelling units and the proposed variance for not providing accessory off-street parking.
MI 2025-001-284-1012 West Kelowna Street.
I vote yes.
Revised plans, two pages, stamped by ZBA, August 13, 2025,
and no household living in basement.
Michael Johns, my vote is yes with proviso.
Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes with proviso.
Tenetta Graham, my vote is yes with proviso.
Ryan McAdams, my vote is yes with proviso.
Kiowin, my vote is yes with proviso.
Thank you, Councilman.
Thank you very much. Have a great day, everybody.
Hillary?
Yes, Mr. Chair, we're going to go back to number one.
We've been unable to secure an interpreter.
However, the applicant has indicated that he would like to try to proceed with his case.
If we are not able to complete the case, we can, we will move it to August 27th at 930.
But we would like to try.
Come on up.
Good morning.
Please sit down.
Pull the mic very close to you.
Thank you.
Could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
Amin, A-M-I-N.
Hold it.
A-M-I-N.
Last name is Safaev, S-A-F-A-E-V.
Right.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Our board member, Tanetta Graham, has a few questions.
Excuse me, sir.
Are you the owner of the property?
okay because the the i have sir sir hi and so that lana riva as the listed owners who
sir hi and so that lana riva okay do you have a copy of your deed yes oh it's up on the screen
okay all right thank you janetta sure yes good good morning my question is have you submitted
your documents five days in advance of the hearing?
Say again?
Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of the hearing, in advance of today?
Okay. All right. Thank you. You're going to proceed with your case.
No, no, no. Relax. Everything's... We got it up on the screen here. We're all good.
So why don't you start off by saying what is it you're trying to do?
I just do
for my son
the garage room
so you put
in the garage
you did away
with the garage
and your son
is now living
in the garage
because he's
I make
an extra room
so you made
an extra room
in the garage
do you have
photos of it
and Mr. Church
it probably would be
helpful if we read
the refusal
into the record
would you like me
to do that
or would you like to do that this application is for the elimination of interior garage parking
space and for the creation of one service parking space on existing semi-detached single family
dwelling whereas surface parking spaces in the required front yard are prohibited in the rsa3
zoning district there's a letter of support from somerton neighbors and also a letter non-opposition
from Council Member O'Neill.
So tell us in your own words what you've done
and it's already done, you're saying.
You've already created a room for your son.
And you closed the garage up.
And now you want to park the car in front of the garage.
Could you show us some photos?
I think we have the photos in the back.
and you speak into the mic we're pulling the photos up here we we have the photos are up here
We're pulling the photos up here.
We have the photos up here.
yeah all right so
All right.
So could you tell us which one's yours right here?
10916?
And you walled off the garage.
How about next door?
What do they have next door?
They have a garage?
The next one?
The people who live next door to you, what do they have?
Nobody.
Nobody.
Well, it's a twin property, right?
So there's got to be somebody attached to you, right?
The people that are attached to you, have they closed their garage off?
No, they have a garage.
All right.
But you don't have a garage.
I don't have a garage.
All right.
That's the room you built in the garage?
Posting.
And you went to the RCO meeting.
You went to the neighbors and you presented what you were doing.
Yeah, somebody asked me.
Right, and they agreed with you.
On the block you live on, how many other garages are closed?
Did I say it again, please?
Sorry.
Where you live, on that block, how many other garages are closed?
How many other people have put up walls for the garage?
I think it's in front of me, like across my street.
Right across the street?
They have a door.
Okay, they put a door up.
Like a door.
Okay, questions from the board.
is there anything else other than a room like there's no bathroom that you added to that room
it's just a plain regular room no thank you questions or comments from our attorney hillary
emerson not at this time mr chair questions or comments from the virtual audience excuse me
i see no hands planning commission
thank you chairman and good morning David Fecto with the city planning commission
chairman and board members the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the rsa3 residential
single-family zoning at this location the city rezoned this neighborhood in 1978.
the appellant eliminated the interior parking space without the benefit of permits this condition
parking in the front yard is a common condition on this block face the city planning commission
recommends the board grants requested variants for surface parking in the required front yard
mi 2024 002 622 10916 named dina lane i vote yes michael johns my vote is yes
cheryl gaston my vote is yes tenetta graham my vote is yes mcadams my vote is yes
Tywin, my vote is yes. Thank you.
Thank you.
Is there anyone in the virtual audience whose case has not been heard?
You too. Okay.
I say no hands. See everybody at 2 p.m.
Yeah, I totally wasted my broadcast journal, it was great school, but you know,
and now we're going to be quiet in the room.
Now we are about to start.
Oh, I'm kind of a prank.
You know, you got something.
I think that's great.
Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Bill Bergman, and I will be chairing this afternoon's
EBA meeting. With me is our board member, Cheryl L. Gaston.
With me is our board member, Cheryl L. Gaston.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Present, Mr. Chair.
Our board member, Tanetta Graham.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Board member, Michael Johns.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Board member, Ty O'Wynn.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
And our board member, Ryan McAdams.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Also here is Hillary Emerson, our board attorney, and also our board administrator, Lakeisha Dandy.
Recording of this hearing will be posted on the ZBA website.
By participating, you consent to be recorded.
This is an in-person meeting with remote capabilities, whether remote or in-person.
If you're called to speak, you must state and spell your name and then wait to be sworn in.
Once you're sworn in, please state your name each time before you begin testimony.
Any person may enter their appearance to become an interested party.
There are three ways.
You can identify the case property address on your Zoom webinar registration.
You can see a staff member or you can call the DBA appearance line by the close of business tomorrow.
call 267-270-5548. Leave a message that includes your email address and the address of the property
of the appeal. The following guidance is for our remote attendees. When directed, you may raise
your hand, your virtual hand, in order to be recognized to speak. If you're called to testify,
you'll be prompted to join as a panelist. Please accept the request and return on your camera.
Third, the webinar Q&A is for questions about the hearing.
Do not comment on cases in the Q&A.
And fourth, if you're participating by phone,
press star 9 to raise your hand and star 6 to unmute.
For our in-person attendees,
please refrain from talking, eating, drinking during the hearings.
Verbal and physical aggression will not be tolerated.
Restrooms are across from the elevators.
A water fountain is just outside the room to the right.
When speaking on the record,
you must speak directly into the microphone in order to be heard by all attendees and the court
reporter the event of emergency please follow the directions given over the public address system
or this or by the staff the main exit is through the double doors at the rear of the room the
nearest stairwell is to the left outside the doors case of evacuation the rally point is love park
directly across from r street please remain there so we can account for you
let's look at our schedule for this afternoon
Number one, MI 2025, 000460, 752 South 6th Street.
This case is continued to 1-13-26 at 9.30 a.m.
Mr. Chair, sorry, just the address is 762 South 6th Street,
and the request was for a continuance attorney moving party.
So 762 South 6th Street, request for attorney moving party.
Number 7.
MI-2025-001-894-6424, Rising Sun Avenue.
There's no exhibits to first listing.
Vern Anastasio is the attorney.
There's a request for a contingent from the Long Crest Community Association.
Mr. Anastasio.
Good afternoon, Chair.
This is Yvette Benton.
I'll be your co-host for today.
Mr. Anastasio has been allowed to speak.
Good morning, Mr.
Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and members of the board.
Could you just for the record state your name and spell for the stenographer?
Yes, sir.
It's Vern Anastasio, A-N-A-S-T-A-S-I-O.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Mr. Anastasio, could you give us an update on 6424 Rising Sun?
Yeah, we just haven't had an opportunity to meet with the RCO, I believe,
and that's the reason why the RCO requested the continuance
and we don't object.
Okay, thank you very much.
Thank you.
MI 2025-001894-6424-Rising Sun.
This case is continued to 113.26 at 9.30 a.m.
Thank you.
Any other requests for continuance?
Chair, I see no hands at this time.
Okay, and I also have number two, MI 2025, 000, 600, 6801 to 17 North 16th Street.
This case has been withdrawn.
We're going to go to our add-on list.
Number one, MI 2024, 00.
Number one, MI 2024, 006-823-5329 North 3rd T Street, I vote no.
Michael Johns, my vote is no.
Cheryl Gaston, my vote is no.
Tanetta Graham, my vote is no.
Tywin, my vote is no.
Ryan McAdams, my vote is no.
Thank you.
number two
10-5-20-24-003-143
2838 Cancel Street, I vote yes
Michael Johns, my vote is yes
Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes
Tannetta Graham, my vote is no
Taya Nguyen, my vote is no
okay, number
number three, MI 2024
002 432 739
Tyson Street.
At the request of the applicant, the vote in this matter has been rescheduled
to Wednesday, September 10th at 2 p.m.
Case number.
We're going to go to move to case number 11. MI 2025 00911716 Strale Street. William Kilrain
and Elizabeth and Elaine Phillips are the listed owner applicants. This is a pro se.
William Kilrain is coming back in as a panelist now, Chair.
Thank you.
Hello, can you hear me?
I can, sir.
Okay, thank you.
Sorry about that.
Could you please turn your video on?
So I have two computers right now.
My PC does not have a video, but my laptop does.
I will log in on my laptop for video.
I will put my last name is hyphen video so they can identify it.
Okay, sure.
So let me just log in here real quick.
Thank you.
it's just you've been invited as a panelist I don't know there might be
some might have to login is might have to put a different name in because it
look like it was uh i might have to put some different information in i'll put bill kilrain
as opposed to william and a different phone number i'll put william in i'll put a different email
bill you have any suggestions yeah i'm i'm i think i got i'm talking to
i have the bill here too okay sorry about that
Mr. Kilrain, why don't I do this?
Why don't I come back to you and figure out where we stand and I'll come back
in maybe about 20 minutes to you. Okay. But I will keep,
I will let you sit there the whole day. I'll come back to you. Okay.
Just give me, I think I have it right here.
If you just give me two seconds.
Go ahead.
Let's see what happens.
It says it's joining the webinar.
And it's, the one that has my video is williamkilrain-video.
And it's, the one that has my video is William Kilrain hyphen video.
If you want to take, if you want to enable that one as well.
There you go.
I'll start my video only since I have audio.
Oh, for crying out loud.
okay hello well we we see you but i i don't is your video up my video is up okay it's showing
i can see myself um can anyone else see me i'm under william kilrain i think you have two again
my screen share is going to be under bill kilrain uh so there's that one is blank and it will only
show my exhibits and then you can see william kilrain hyphen video and that is who that's my
picture of me, if that makes sense. I guess, could you please state your name
and spell for the stenographer? Sure, it's William Kilrain, W-I-L-I-A-M-K-I-L-R-A-I-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
I do. Our board member Tenetta Graham has a few
questions. Mr. Chair, before that, would you like to read the refusal into the
record okay all right thank you good afternoon um have you required all the documents five uh
necessary for the case five days in advance yes okay okay so just this application is for the
erection of a five foot high 100 opaque fence between the property line and the front building
line of existing detached structure. Use a single family dwelling. The required front yard fence
height is four foot, whereas a fence height of five foot is proposed. Required fence opacity
is 50%, whereas 100% is imposed. Please start your presentation. Sure. Well, let me give you a
little bit of background before I bring in the exhibits. So, and everything I say will be backed
up with the exhibits. We bought this property in February of 2022. The fence had already been
installed. It had been installed at least since October of 18. That is verified via Google Maps
and Philly Atlas video, basically. So the fence pre-existed our ownership by at least five years.
It had been there for five years. Nobody had a problem with it. And then for whatever reason,
someone decided to notify L&I for a violation. I don't know why, won't comment on that.
So I had also, when we purchased the property, there were no violations on the house at all
at the time. And also the city provided me with a certificate of occupancy, which stated as such.
So we thought we were buying a property that was fully zoned correctly and without violation.
um okay so uh we have the full backing of councilman brian o'neill he has provided a
letter and uh let's see here if i can bring that first up yeah fox chase civic association right
so fox jakes we did have the meeting with the fox chase civic association all near near neighbors
were notified all 13 near neighbors were were fully in support um everyone was pretty disgusted
at the situation, you know, were all good friends and they couldn't understand why this was
happening. So not only did I get all 13 members of the near neighbors who were notified at the
meeting to agree that the fence should remain without any, with a, with a variance, but all
members, including all board members of the Fox Chase Civic Association also agreed that the fence
should be able to remain with variance. We have their letter. Okay. So you don't need me to bring
that up then nope we're good okay um i don't want to waste anybody's time i mean what there are
certain exhibits i have i have um you know google maps why don't you show us some photos of the
property. Sure.
Okay, back here, let me share, tab, which tab is this, no, here we go, right here.
Okay, back here.
there you go it's coming out okay so this is the exterior of the property
just from both sides and then kind of from kind of a rear perspective I do have an interior shot
I can also show you if you need it it is set back about four feet already it's under some trees as
you can see there is greenage there um you know it provides one it was actually one of the reasons
we purchased the property was because we have three three kids three small children and it
provides the privacy and security that we were looking for it has a nice big yard so we don't
have to worry about them you know being out um and you know again because the city provided us
with a certificate of occupancy without any violations,
we assume that this offense was part of the property without issue.
So if you'd like, I can show...
Show me one photo from inside.
All right. All right. Questions from the board.
So your your near neighbors, are they supportive or what?
Yes. Again, all of the near neighbors were invited. 13 showed up and all voted unanimously to agree for the variance.
And again, most of them were disgusted at as to the situation.
They were kind of aghast. Why is this happening? This fence has been here for a year.
I mean, it's eight years now, really. It's been there for eight. We were notified at five, and they just couldn't understand why this was happening.
Everyone actually likes the fence. They find that it's aesthetic. You know, it provides a little character to the neighborhood as well.
So all your neighbors, even, you know, my two direct next door neighbors, both were at the meeting and both were in support of the variance.
questions from our attorney billiard emerson not at this time mr chair questions or comments
from the virtual audience
planning commission
good afternoon chair members of the board michael gall with the philadelphia city planning
commission m-i-c-h-a-e-l-g-a-l-l you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth
nothing but the truth i so affirm please proceed the comprehensive plan recommends no change to
the existing rsd3 residential single family detached zoning at this location there is no
unique physical circumstance or condition of this property that would prevent the property from
being used in conformance with the zoning code therefore the city planning commission recommends
the board denied the proposed variances for front fence height and opacity. Thank you. MI-2025-002-911-716
Strale Street, I vote yes. My vote is on. My vote is yes. Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes.
Tenetta Graham, my vote is yes. Ryan McAdams, my vote is yes. Iowyn, my vote is yes. Thank you,
sir you have your votes great thank you what's the next steps then I guess you'll
you'll you'll hear from us right you will hear from us you'll see you'll
receive a notice of decision via email with instructions okay great thank you
I do. Sure. Sure. Number 9, MI-2025-002-370-2301 North A Street.
Recommendation of unanimous support from 37th Ward, RCO.
Letter of non-opposition from Council Member Young.
Good afternoon, members of the board. Alan Nockamson.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client in relationship to the property?
My client is 2301N8LLC, the owner of the property, and I have two of its members in the virtual audience, Igor Gitterman and Nathan Ward.
igor gitterman and nathan ward one of them will raise their hand um teneta graham our board
One of them will raise their hand.
member has a few questions thank you good afternoon um have you submitted your documents
five days in advance of this hearing yes we have and do you waive the reading of the refusal to
stipulate to its accuracy i do okay so thank you you can see your screen and start your case
thank you can i just be promoted to a panelist please sure thank you
He's been promoted to panelists here. Thank you.
So I'm here to present 2301 North H Street.
As the chairman stated, we did have some positive feedback by the community or from the community.
We had unanimous support for this project.
This is not the first time this board has seen this property by way of variance, and
we'll go through the materials, but the board granted a proposal for 39-unit apartment building
that was granted by the board by way of variance.
Unfortunately, given the market conditions, cost of construction, just not feasible to
build 39 units.
That's why we're back here today for 31 units, similar to last time the community supported
the project.
They supported it again.
So we have 10 exhibits. We notified 125 addresses of the community meeting. Our community meeting was June 18th. And again, at the conclusion of my presentation, I would ask that either Igor or Nathan virtually raise their hands and to adopt their testimony as their own.
I also have Rustin Oler from Harman Deutsch Architects who can answer any architectural related questions.
So the first thing we're going to review is the notice of refusal.
It seems worse than it is.
I mean, this is what happens when you have mixed zoning.
We have I2 and CMX2 zoning.
More appropriate, honestly, to do a residential zoning here, and you'll see why.
But, you know, as part of the, you know, of refusal, we essentially have 10 building structures.
Nine triplexes that are facing North 8th Street, which we'll review, and then one quadplex facing Germantown on a regular-shaped lot, which borders 8th Street, Dauphin Street, and Germantown.
And here are the refusals.
The first one is the fact that we're in an I-2 district and residential use is not allowed.
That's the first one.
Where if this was just pure CMX2, we would, not maybe on the ground floor, but on the upper floors.
The second refusal has to do with the fact that we don't have a commercial component in our project.
But again, not out of character, because if you look at North H Street, there is really no commercial there.
The third refusal has to do, again, in terms of applying the CMX2 zoning.
We do run a little bit short of the allowable residential units, but not by a lot.
That's a de minimis refusal.
The fourth refusal has to do with the parking.
That's an I-2 requirement, not a CMX-2 requirement.
Again, it would be kind of out of character in the neighborhood to provide such parking.
The next refusal has to do with the fact that we go street to street and that there should
be some type of offloading, again, parking, which would be out of character.
And then the final refusal has to do with bicycle parking.
While my client cannot comply with this refusal, they are looking at U-bike racks to be placed in front of the properties themselves, and I think that would add that value for that refusal.
All right, so as the chairman stated, we have unanimous support.
It's a well-attended meeting.
We have 13 in favor and zero in opposition.
I think they're really excited, hopefully, now to get back on track to put some residential use at this property.
And then as we don't have the letter, but my understanding through the chairman is that there's a letter of non-opposition from the district council member.
So if you look at, you know, this aerial view, it's in a regular shape lot.
Again, here's Germantown, here's Dauphin Street, here's North H Street.
This is where the quadplex is going to be, and we'll look at that.
And then we have 10 triplexes all facing, excuse me, nine triplexes all facing North H Street.
and then this is just an aerial view just you know we got from atlas kind of see where we are
in the neighborhood and then zoning map again you have the split zoning so you have the cmx2 zoning
on germantown it looks like a little bit of cmx2 around here and then there's i2 right in the
middle so it's interesting there is some i2 is here there is cmx2 here this looks like
There is CMX2 here. This looks like it's just straight residential here, and there's really not much going on at all, you'll see from the photos, on Germantown.
it's just straight residential here and
And then these are the photographs from 8th Street, from the front of the property on 8th, and then because we had three public, we were facing three public streets, we have a zoning hearing poster for each of those public streets.
and then this property has been vacant for some time or vacant land for some time and this you
know goes as far back as 2016 according to uh google street view and then this is uh or the
side of the property from dolphin street and then the rear of the property from germantown
and then here are plans and drawings um according to my notes uh these properties the height of the
buildings are 38 feet high, which fall within the CMX2 zoning. And again, you know, flat building
facades, brick facades as well, trying to change up the roof lines to make it a little bit more
architecturally interesting. And again, Rustin from Harman Deutsch can talk a little bit about
that. Just a different way of looking at the renderings. And then this is Germantown, the
quadplex right here. This is the front. This is the side. And then this is from North 8th Street.
Again, nine triplexes. And then this is just some contextual drawings that were prepared by Harman
Deutsch from a site perspective, similar to our photos. And then this is just a site plan here
again here is the quadplex on germantown here are the nine triplexes on north 8th street
and that this is the elevations um you know we we go let me just make sure i'm accurately stating
this we we are three feet out of the ground from the basement and then we're six feet in the ground
from the from the street downward so it's nine feet you know the basement's nine feet
And then these are the floor plans for the triplex. So you would walk in into the first floor and you would eventually come into unit number one, which is a bi-level, which is a three-bedroom, three-bath.
a little bit different than what you saw for the 39-unit building that was previously approved.
I think the community really appreciated that we had three bedrooms there
because to account for families and such. Also, I know it's not something that's enforceable,
but our rental rates are in line with 60% AMI, just so the board knows that as well.
But, you know, you go into unit number one, you see it's an open floor plan, there's a kitchen, there's a living room, there's a few bedrooms, there's a bathroom, you go down the flight of steps, and there is, I think, one more bedroom, living area, and more like an office area.
something that we did focus on because we know that the board really cares about how the base
how the basement use is being used from an egress perspective there is a separate set of stairs
going down you know out you know so steps not like an egress well so that was very important to the
to the community and i also obviously being in front of the board so much i know that that's
been something that's been the focus of the boards specifically the last few months instead
of going unit number one, which is a bi-level, you go up a flight of steps, which is unit number
two, which is a two-bedroom, one-bath. Again, open floor plan. You have a living room, you have a
kitchen, you have a bathroom, and you have two bedrooms. And then unit number three as well
is also a bedroom, one-bath. And then instead of the triplex, we have the quadplex.
and here you it's a little bit different there's two sets of bi-levels but you have
you know coming in unit number one which is a bi-level all these are one bedrooms these are
all one bedrooms but we need that density in this quadplex to make the project work
so again while 39 units didn't work 30 units don't work either so it's like we're trying to
balance that off but this is a you know a you know two by levels first floor and lower level
and then you have going up to the second story and third stories you have a unit here as a by
level and the unit here is a by level and there is a set of steps for the rear unit to get directly
out you know from a set of steps here's our rco meeting notice for june 18th proof of email of
Proof of email of that notice a few weeks beforehand to the relevant parties, such as the coordinating RCO, the district council members, only aid and such.
that notice a few weeks beforehand to the relevant parties such as
Again, we mail that notice to 125 addresses.
Here are the addresses we mailed it to.
Proof of mailing to those addresses.
Our application for appeal that we filed on behalf of the property owner.
The deed to the property showing that my client owns the property.
and then finally, the certificate of tax
clearance, showing that we don't
owe any money. With that being
said, I'm going to unshare my screen, and I
would ask that either Igor or Nathan
virtually raise their hands, and then
again, we have Rustin, if you have
any architectural-related questions.
We see the hands.
Chair, I see no hands at this time.
Just a minute, Chair. Igor just put his hand
up. I'm going to promote them to panelists. Thank you.
Mr. Gitterman, please accept the request to be promoted to panelists.
Thank you.
sir could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer yes sir my name is igor
igor last name is gitterman g-i-t-e-r-m-a-n you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole
truth nothing but the truth yes i do please proceed counsel uh yes igor you heard everything
i had to state today about your zoning matter yes is it true and correct yes and do you adopt
this your own testimony yes i do thank you questions from the board can you go back to
the section i kind of you kind of went through it pretty quickly so you're you're three feet
above grade to the first floor and then the ceiling guy in the basement is nine feet is that
what i heard it's six feet below grade i'll i'll expand that out a little bit let me
you know i saw somewhere here
oh here it is i think these are for the triplexes right here so as you can see we are this says six
feet like above here but we're halfway there so we're three feet above grade and then i know i
saw somewhere where it said six feet below i was looking at this let me see
and maybe if rustin who's on line can kind of confirm that as well i know oh and by the way
here's the quadplex too kind of showing above grade so this indicator is six feet and halfway
way there is three feet to show above grade i know there was another spot where it showed six
feet below i'm just trying to find out hi board how are you good good uh rustin oler harman
architecture you do me if you ever state your name again spell for the stenographer sure rustin
oler uh first name r-u-s-t-i-n last name oler o-h-l-e-r of harman deutsch oler architecture
do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth i do
alan do you want him to start yeah yeah uh rustin you know i know i saw it before the hearing
where i heard the question um yeah so we don't actually dimension that on the zoning drawing
because zoning deals with above grade not below grade uh the six foot dimension you see in the
rear that Alan was pointing to in the section is for the fence height. So the first floor is about
three feet to three foot six out of grade. We will have, depending on geotech soil conditions,
we try to have nine foot in the basement as clear ceiling heights. It'll be eight to nine feet of
basement ceiling height at a minimum. And then as Alan mentioned, we do have a code compliant
walk out stairs from each building's basement as well in the rear to the rear yard yeah in the
rear so that i like that in the rear that's good it'd be good if you were just below grade
five feet as opposed to six to seven feet
we also have to balance the streets department approval so we try to raise the buildings out of
great as much as we can in compliance with the streets so as part of our technical approvals
for the psd checklist too we will attempt to do that but we have to balance the what how many
how many stairs the streets department will allow to raise the building out as well.
stairs the streets department will allow to raise the building out as well so
So we will try to minimize that. Yeah. So reduce it to five. You're good.
All right. We will work. We will work on that throughout the construction document process.
I think that's I think that's the answer. And then on your floor plan, you that I don't know what it's not the not the quadplexes,
But I guess the triplexes, you've got that room in the back and you've got the egress out.
Is that a door there or what is that?
At the moment, so window, we've gone back and forth about whether it becomes a door or window.
There's no issue with putting a second door there.
If that's something the board wants to see, we can definitely commit to doing that.
Yeah, that would be preferable because other than that, you're forcing folks to go out of a bedroom into the yard, which is a big concern.
That's not a problem. We can commit to doing that.
Okay. All right. Those are my comments.
My question is about just trash.
Well, because this is 31 units, even though they're separate, we're required to have commercial trash pickup.
Where's the trash going to be stored there? Well, the trash on the first unit on the first floor for the first floor in the lower level, it'll be stored in the rear yard.
And then for the upper floors, I believe there are trash closets there.
Yes, it is. There's a dedicated trash closet. It'll be vented and conditioned in each of the upper units.
Thank you.
One other question is you said something about the bikes that you're going to try to address that.
so we've agreed with the community group to provide u racks on the street um so we'll work
with the streets department to get as many as we can approved around the site so that they're
secure bike locking outside of each building um other questions questions from our attorney
hillary emerson not at this time mr chair questions or comments from the virtual audience
hi could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer yes can you hear me i can
okay hi board and uh and board members my name is ahmed a-h-m-e-d apologize my device does not
have a camera all right do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but
the truth? Yes. Are you a neighbor? I am here as a Protestant and a grieved party, and I'm also the
most affected by this development. Okay. Chair, pardon me. This is the court reporter. Could I
have the witnesses' full name? Yes. A-L-M-A-S-H-H-A-D-A-N-I. So as I was saying, I have the
most vested interest due to proximity and special use classification. I barely made it to this
hearing today uh basically to start from the beginning this original plan was submitted
during the pandemic it was rushed through no one was paying attention okay um from my own rco they
tell me this is the property from hell uh what happened was uh i originally was objecting to the
size of the property and i thanked the board that you were able to stop that due to the height which
would have caused a lot of problems for me uh but the main issue was that uh when these notices were
quote-unquote sent out our post office here locally has some of the worst service in the city
they use overtime mailmen and a lot of the mail does not get delivered uh so i barely get any
notices and all of these quote-unquote 160 parties that were alerted barely are noticed and i never
even knew due to no frontage signage that there was a change in the main building plan to the
next one now that's just to start uh basically uh there was a building here originally that was
attached to my property and that building collapsed and since that time happened my wall
has been exposed my brick facade wall has been exposed damaged with the sprinkler line severed
now the previous owner was supposed to settle this matter with me and instead at the last minute
during the pandemic he sold it to this party without telling them the liability involved
In addition to that, the properties, if you look at the plan, it's directly adjacent to mine.
I mean there's no room for my sprinklers or anything.
There's a door there.
There's a garage there.
There's no gap.
So at least one of these triplexes can't even be built.
And in addition, there's also a tree on that back lot that faces Germantown that has poison oak that is so strong with the branches.
It's been grabbing my wall, destroying it, destroying the corner of the structure.
causing temporary repairs and at no point have I been able to contact them to deal with any of
these issues. So besides the wall damage and the structural damage and the...
So besides the wall damage and the structural damage and the connection for the sprinkler that has never been restored, there's also issues with the parking, which as far as I know has not been changed or resolved.
Now, this attorney recently just mentioned that there was no commercial on this street, which is unbelievable because to the casual eye it would look like that.
I mean there's a reason why the street is commercial. The whole street on one side is a complete demolition yard who actually just rented half of his to another demolition yard. And this company during the day in addition to the mechanic shop on the other side of me, they have tow trucks and semis and all these big trucks that come at all times. And they're towing and trailing other semis that take up the whole street.
So one side of the street is not even available for parking.
And the neighbor also just put up no parking signs everywhere on that side.
And so if you actually calculate the real – I mean I went to architecture school in the city.
So I can tell you that the only amount of parking available is directly in front of the property on both sides.
And that's it.
I mean maybe half or 10 to 15 spaces max.
And yet they're jamming as much as they can into the street when it's not even a residential street.
So they're going to completely change the zoning code, and it's going to adversely affect the neighborhood. It's completely inconsistent. So this prior denial for the parking density and compatibility, as far as I know, is still unchanged and now worsened by another construction tenant.
So I'm trying to just go through all the issues here because there's so much, but ultimately, I have procedural concerns about the RCO approval process being improper.
The notices that they sent out that they showed you on the live stream, it was clipped in the actual mailings, cutting off the link.
I had to barely find the link at the last second to attend this meeting.
When I have the most vested interest, I have not received proper service at all.
um and uh the the biggest glaring issue that i think nobody understands including the rco
is that there the city has something called like a master plan or something and there's a district
in the north that i'm a part of and in that district there's only two properties that has
an amusement classification the property used to actually be a famous african-american club
that started the breakfast club and a host of other things and by allowing this to continue
it's going to negatively impact my use and the economic value of that amusement classification.
There's only two properties in the whole ward that has that classification and the other one
is owned by Temple. So, you know, my specific interests with that and are at risk and in a
materially unique way. And I'm just asking the board to postpone and or deny this to allow for
proper legal representation and a chance for the applicant to maybe even settle these matters
directly and hopefully outside his court because I'm interested in a swift resolution. I want my
wall repaired. You know, I want all these things reconnected. And this seems to be a common issue
with new construction in the city. Okay. Thank you. And Ms. Nockms, do you have any questions?
No, but I just want to respond to some of the assertions. So first of all, this is the first
we've heard of any issues regarding the next door neighbor. As the board saw, we had unanimous
support with the community um there is a building permit for 39 units uh for an apartment building
um so what we're trying to do is have an effective project with 31 units um as far as you know the
notices and the issues with notices being mailed to parties all i can tell you is our office sends
notices out we tried to do it two weeks beforehand we know there's an issue with the post office not
about not getting delivered just taking a while but we thought that we think that two weeks is
more than enough time before a community meeting to make sure everyone gets their notices i can't
tell you the condition and notices when they when they reach the party so i apologize if they were
ripped up in any way um but our information's on there so someone can always contact us too
even if if they miss the community meeting and especially before the zba um none of the issues
he mentioned are zoning related issues um the party wall that there's utility meters on the
party wall that's not allowed but we'll work through with the next door neighbor to responsibly
coordinate their repositioning of those utility meters so they would be allowed um he was
mentioning about like like trucks and things like that those that's not commercial nature that's
industrial nature and there's the north 8th street side there is some i2 use that's why we
have the mixed zoning um i think it's more appropriate to have that residential use
with the cmx too which is a majority of our lot um and then the thing with the poison ivy as well
like obviously we're going to be responsible um as well thank you is there anyone else in the
Is there anyone else in the virtual audience?
virtual audience chair I see no
Chair, I see no hands at this time.
Planning Commission.
Good afternoon, Chair.
Michael Gall with the Philadelphia City Planning Commission.
The comprehensive plan recommends no change to the existing split I-2 medium industrial
and CMX-2 commercial mixed-use zoning at this location.
The proposed multifamily residential use at this scale is consistent with similar uses
in the immediate vicinity.
Therefore, the City Planning Commission recommends the board grant the requested variances for multifamily residential use, lack of commercial ground floor use, minimum lot area, parking, and off-street loading, but recommends the board deny the requested variance for lack of bicycle parking.
All right. Thank you.
Alan, I'm going to hold this until next Wednesday.
We'll vote at 2 p.m.
All right.
We'll take it to the executive session and just go over a couple issues, okay?
All right. Thank you.
All right. Thank you.
Hold on one minute.
So now we're going to go back to our regular list and we're going to go to number three, and it's Mr. Nockamson.
So, MI-2025-001-867-1615 West Tioga Street.
Alan Nockamson is the attorney.
There's a letter of support from Allegheny West Civic Association, and the applicant provided zoning history documents.
Mr. Nockamson, could you just state your name for the record?
Yes, Alan Nockamson.
Could you identify your client and relationship to the property?
My client is the property owner, W. Tioga Holdings, LLC.
And in the virtual audience is one of his representatives, Brian Wise.
And our genetic ram has a few questions for you.
Good afternoon again.
Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of this hearing?
And thank you.
And do you weigh the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Thank you.
You can share your screen and proceed with your case.
All right.
Thank you.
all right so we're here to present 1615 west tioga street corner is at the corner of tioga
and smedley uh you'll see in the packet of materials we have 12 exhibits we notified 86
neighbors or properties of the community meeting which took place on june 17th and we received a
letter of non-opposition from the community group. So the first things we'll review is the notice of
refusal. This is an RSA 5 property and you'll see later in the packet the planning commission is
recommended as part of the 2035 plan to make this as an RM1 property. The lot size is 2,557 square
feet and if this was an RM1 property this would be allowed as a right. What you'll also see during
the presentation, after I show you the letter of support, it's actually a letter of support,
not non-opposition, but a letter of support is they were overwhelmingly in support of this project.
My client focuses on affordable housing. He's been in front of this board before, Brian Wise.
So not only is he a developer, he's also a general contractor. He can answer any questions you have
that's related to that. But they embrace the fact that he does embrace affordable
housing as part of his projects and then you can see the vote count and i believe that mr richardson
was also present during the community meeting so if he's online he will you know reaffirm like what
they stated and hopefully we'll have their non-opposition to this project so this property
has a long history of multi-family use as you can see here it goes as far back as 1965 so it's not
out of character to have multifamily use, even though this is an RSA 5 property. Again, the North
District Plan recommends that this become an RM1 property, which would allow this use as a matter
of rights. Aerial views of the property. It's a vacant lot currently. There's many vacant lots
next door. It's also not out of character to have multifamily here. There's a seven unit,
according to the city records at 1605-07 West Tioga Street.
1601-03 was approved as a 13 unit.
And 1610 West Tioga Street is also multifamily as well.
And then maps of the area.
Again, it's a quintessential corner property.
You would expect it to have multi-units in here,
especially given its size of almost 2,600 square feet.
This is the property from West Tioga Street.
It's been vacant, you know, as far back as Google Street View goes, 2008.
It's almost a generation.
This is the property from Smedley Street.
This is the property from Smedley Street, and then this is as far back as it goes on Google Street View on Smedley Street since 2012 as a vacant lot.
And then this is...
Because we face two public streets, obviously we put a notice poster on each public street for today's hearing.
This is West Tioga Street to the right of the property, to the left of the property.
Smedley Street to the right of the property, to the left of the property.
Our plans and drawings, and this project was drawn up by Mass Architecture Studio, so Master Pascua should be in the virtual audience.
He can answer any architecturally related questions.
This is, I believe, two and a half feet out of the ground and six and a half feet in the ground in the lower level.
this is looking at it from Smedley Street and this is looking at it elevation wise from Tioga
Street so the floor plans are pretty basic you have unit number one you come into the front door
you make a left this is a bi-level unit in the lower level which is this again it's a corner
property there's a storage area and just an open area what we've seen is a lot of people
working from home. And so it's not intended to be a bedroom down there. It's just meant to be a
separate living area, like maybe an office, maybe a secondary living area, like a living room of
some sort. And so that's unit number one. Unit number two is the rear unit over here. And it's
a similar type of floor plan. We have a first floor and then a lower level. We would agree to
a couple provisos commercial trash pickup and trash stored outside because we can leverage the
fact there's a rear yard accessible to everyone instead of the first two units we go to um up to
up a flight of steps to units uh you know to a common hallway where you make a left or a right
and those are also one bedroom apartments all on one level and then you just go to up another flight
to the third floor and again it's the same thing they're one bedroom apartments
we met with the community again june 17th we sent out notice to 86 addresses proof of mailing to
those addresses list of addresses our application for appeal that we followed on w tioga holdings
behalf one of the notice of refusal in the project information form the deed to the property showing
that they own the property and then finally uh the tax clearance certificate showing that this
entity owes no money as this
property. I would ask
that Mr. Wise virtually raise his hand
and be sworn in.
He's coming back in as a panelist now,
Chair. Thank you.
Mr. Wise, please accept the invite
to be promoted to panelists.
he should be popping in shortly chair sure thank you
good afternoon everyone hi mr wise how are you sir could you please state your name and spell
for the stenographer?
Brian Wise, B-R-I-A-N-W-I-S-E.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth,
the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Counsel?
Yes, Mr. Wise, you heard everything
I had to state about your zoning matter.
Is it true and correct?
Correct.
And do you adopt this as your own testimony?
Thank you.
Questions from the board.
So so can you go back over your your your basement depth below grade and the use of the basement?
Yeah, I can enlarge your screen.
I think this is. Oops, not going.
I'm trying to get to let me unshare for a second get back into sharing let me just
all right let's try to get to the previous page
are there trash rooms in each of the units uh yes there are there's ventilated trash closets
uh so you can see here it the whole basement's nine feet right it says it here and then it talks
about above grade it's two and a half feet right here so you're you're over six feet below grade
So you're, you're over six feet below grade. I'd recommend raising that up as much as possible. And it looks like you'd still be able to be under the 38 feet, which would be, which would work.
I'd recommend raising that up.
um but other than that the fact that the basement is not being used for a bedroom
um and you do have looks to be pretty adequate maybe living space on the on the first floor
um that's not such a a bad thing yeah let me try to get to the floor plans but yeah i i think my
client purposefully selected these floor plans in a way that made sense try to have any of the heavy
duty living on the first floor of these units and then have low dent lower density living and
storage down there on in the lower levels all right and you have direct access to the backyard
from the first floor from a uh living is that a living area is that a rear this is a the one the
one unit owner
in the
unit on the first floor in the lower level
has exclusive access to that
rear yard but it will be
compartmentalized to be able to store the trash
for everyone
Alan do you have the floor plan that shows
the separation in the trash area
in the rear yard area for the first floor
tenant yeah I thought I did
maybe it's on a different let me
see where it is I saw it
when I was prepping I don't know
let's see oh here it is right here
So the first floor center has their own rear yard access for their trash, and then the other tenants have their separate area for rear charge rear trash inside.
So it's not on the street. So they bring it out before trash day.
They have access from that because it's a corner corner building. Yes. Yeah, they have access from that that door right there. Thank you.
Other questions from the board.
Questions or comments from our attorney Hillary Emerson.
Not at this time, Mr. Chair. Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
Chair, we have Daniel Trubman with his hand up. I'll allow him to speak.
Daniel Trubman, please unmute yourself.
i'm not sure why the button hit sir could you please state your name and spell for the sonographer
i didn't mean to raise my hand i'm sorry my bad okay thank you any other questions or comments
from the virtual audience chair we have charles richardson he has been unmuted and allowed to
speak good afternoon mr richardson good afternoon mr chair please just state your name and spell
for the stenographer please certainly charles richardson r-i-c-h-a-r-d-s-o-n office of
councilwoman cindy bassford 508 city hall you swear or firm to tell the truth the whole truth
and nothing but the truth i do please proceed uh the councilman has no opposition to granting
the variance thank you for taking the time to calls we appreciate it anyone else in the virtual
audience i see no hands here planning commission good afternoon chair members of the board michael
gall with the philadelphia city planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends
no change to the residential single family attached zoning at this location there are a
number of multi multi-family dwelling units on the block and the appellant has demonstrated that
there are unlikely to be many detrimental impacts on the immediate community what beyond what might
be expected therefore the city planning commission recommends the board grant the requested variance
for multifamily use.
MI 2025-001-867-1615
with Tioga Street.
I vote yes with proviso.
Commercial trash pickup,
trash stored inside.
Thank you.
Michael Jones,
my vote is yes with proviso.
Cheryl Gaston,
my vote is yes with proviso.
Tanetta Graham,
my vote is yes with proviso.
Ryan McAdams,
my vote is yes with proviso.
Tywin,
my vote is yes with proviso.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I think Mr. Goldberg
is going to handle the rest.
Oh, thank you. I don't want to say we appreciate that. Thank you. Mr. Goldberg, MI 2025-001-879-2044 North Hancock Street. Alex Goldberg is the attorney.
um there's a letter of support from nara square action network
the lot with lot sizes the applicant is proposing are out of character are even slightly larger than
the average lot size facing hancock and peltrop street the proposed use
The average lot size facing Hancock and Paltrow Street.
The proposed use are in conformance with the code.
The proposed four-inch setback on Paltrow Street is required due to the streets department required for front steps.
Mr. Goldberg, could you please state your name and spell it for the 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?
Could you identify your client in relationship to the property?
My client is Hector Vincente, and he's the owner of the property, and he's in the virtual audience.
Tanetta has a few questions for you. I'm sorry.
Good afternoon. Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of this hearing?
And do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
I do, yes.
Okay, thank you. You may share your screen and proceed with your case.
Thank you.
Okay. So we're asking for several variances here. In my opinion, they're all relatively,
you know, sort of common sense variances that are in conformance with the code. All of the uses that
we're asking for here are as of right. We're dealing with a property that is street to street
with front to John Hancock and Pailthorpe, and it's got split zoning. It's currently one large
lot. It's had a long history of an automotive use and has been in Hector's family for a very long
time you know he's chosen this time to basically cut it back into contextual pieces and do
subdivisions so that we no longer have a mixed zoning parcel so we have a parcel that's rm1 on
an rm1 block and then which is the hancock side and then we have three single family rsa5 parcels
which are proposed to be single family on the palethorpe side you can see the renderings on
screen the architect for the project is core designs and its representative mark wallace is
on the call if there's any questions about the architectural materials here's the notice of
refusal um so we're we are as it says in red relocating lot lines to create four lots from
one lot lots one two and three are the pale thorpe side those are the single family homes
and lots lot four is the duplex which is uh you know as far as use goes as of right
and that's on the hancock street side um so you can see uh on the refusal that the first one
is kind of an interesting one we were getting refusal for having a four inch setback
on the rsa five side the reason for that and mark can explain this better than i can at the end of
the presentation is because of the steps at the front of the property um they were encroaching
into the sidewalk um if the property was built you know with no setback and in order to obviously
have an adequate staircase leading from the front of the property we needed to create four more
inches of front four inches of front setback in order to accommodate those front steps it's almost
unrecognizable um you know four inches less than half a foot the next refusal is for lot area
um there are there is a lot of refusal for one of the rsa rsa 5 parcels um we're required to
have 960 square feet we only have 704 the next three refusals that you see are all having to
do with lot width of course we need 16 feet of lot width we have less than that um we have another
refusal for lot size for rsa 5 uh and then a third one down below once we get to the presentation
or the architectural materials i'll sort of give you a sense of what the average lot widths and
lot sizes are on these blocks so that you can understand that while we're getting refusals for
these de minimis uh dimensional issues uh what we're proposing to cut this one larger parcel up
into is is you know very much uh in character on the block and then the last one is we have a you
know a similar rm1 refusal for lot size okay um here is a letter from the coordinating rco my
understanding is nilda pimentel from um nscan is on is on the call um to sort of uh echo the
sentiments of her letter as well attended um you know they just wanted to make sure that as far as
the construction process goes and any potential street closures that that's managed properly which
of course you know we will do and we've already kind of had those preliminary conversations with
the RCO to make sure that they're comfortable. Here's the letter that the chairman sort of
read out. We also have a letter of non-opposition from Council Member Lozada. Aerial views. So this
black building that's flag-shaped, that's the building that we're talking about here. So you
have the Hancock duplex on this side, and then you have the three Palethorpe single families on the
Pialthorpe side. Here's the zoning map. We're cutting the parcels right at the
Here's a zoning map. We're cutting the parcels right at the change in zoning, so that RM1
parcel will have a little pan handle there. I'm not sure if that's going to be very usable space,
but we're cutting it right on the on the change in zoning so that we no longer have split zone
parcels. Here's photographs. This is the front of the property. These are both garages. As I
mentioned. This was an automotive use from Hancock and from Pellthorpe. Posting Hancock and Pellthorpe.
Here's to the right of the property and to the left on Hancock and then to the right of the
property on Pellthorpe where there's been some newer development and to the left of the property.
Here's the plans and drawings. So we're going with classic brick facades, slightly different
brick colors to make it you know a little bit more variable and architecturally interesting
cornice lines lentils um cast stone uh sort of sort of towards towards the bottom level
um really you know just sort of classy looking buildings zooming in here on the site plan
first i'll show you this is the duplex on the hancock side um the parcel is 16 feet wide
um it has an ample rear yard here's the pale thorpe side we have single family so all three
of the building structures are going to be the same but the lot size is slightly vary just because
of site conditions and the lot furthest to the left we're building in a common three foot wide
easement this was obviously one large parcel so there was no need for an emergency egress
within that one property now that we have four parcels we need to basically make sure that we
have a means of egress for all four of those parcels so that easement will serve all of them
um and that that makes this this far left parcel a little bit larger than the other ones
oh and by the way we have that going back to this page we have a we have a four inch setback on this
side let me we have that four inch setback on this side down here but again uh you really can't even
tell that's there. Here's the building elevations. Here's the floor plan for the duplex.
So the lot is now going to be 966 square feet. We have two units. You go in on the ground floor
right here. You make a left. It's a one bed, two bath with living space in the rear. We have
some living in the basement, uh, with no intention to put bedrooms down there, but, uh, we would
like to have additional living space, uh, down there as well as a utility room and washer and
dryer. Um, that, uh, building that first floor is three feet, six inches above grade. And that
basement ceiling height is eight feet, six inches. So I, by my math, that would make the basement
depth uh five feet below grade going up the stairs you have um you have another unit uh it is three
bed three bath larger larger unit uh it is approximately 1274 square feet we would have
in-unit trash storage for this unit and we would have trash storage in the rear um for the uh the
ground floor unit because they have access to the rear yard going to we also have a roof deck for
that upper unit going to the the single family which there's one floor plan but all three
buildings are identical you would go in on the front you have on the first floor an open concept
kitchen living and dining some additional living and storage space down below and then on the second
and third floors you have uh you know the bedrooms and a primary suite on the top floor as well as a
roof deck another elevation these building structures are 34 feet 10 inches to the roof line
here's the subdivision plan
our rco meeting notice we met with nscan on june 10th uh in person meeting the notice went out in
a timely fashion to 103 properties here are those mailing certificates application for appeal
here's the deeds of the property it's been in hector's family for a very very long time
and the tax clearance. With that, I'd like to ask Hector to raise his virtual hand
so I can have him adopt my testimony. Hector?
Hector Vicente is coming in as a panelist. Thank you.
You're welcome.
so al she basically had three single homes and one multi-family duplex that's right and
just one more thing while hector's getting in here i wanted to mention
i took a sort of a survey of the similar lots on the palethorpe and the hancock sides
on the hancock side i counted 17 you know of these typical size lots the average lot size was 963 and
the average lot width was 15 feet. We're proposing on the Hancock side, 966, which is like right on
the average number and 16 feet in width. For the Pailthorpe side, there were 14 parcels.
They averaged 690 square feet. So those are pretty small lots, those typical lots on the
Pailthorpe side and 14 feet wide. And our Pailthorpe lots are 872 square feet, 704 and 728
square feet and ranging between uh 14 and a half to 18 feet wide on that wider parcel with the
easement so we're really providing bigger lots than what's typical there Hector yes I'm here
hi Hector could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer my name is Hector L
Vicente could you spell please oh sure Hector H-E-C-T-O-R my middle initial is L my last name
is v as in victory i c e n t y do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth is nothing
but the truth yes please proceed counsel hector did you hear my testimony today yes and was it
true and correct yes and do you adopt it as your own yes thank you questions from the board
yes so looking at the pale throat street side the majority of the homes are two-story
and um i just wanted to know was the sort of justification for doing three stories
and a basement yeah so you know we wanted to have ample large living spaces and um from my view of
the the block while there are two-story structures on our side and adjacent to us there's a large
multi-story property directly across the street i don't think that we're going to have any
detrimental impact on natural light because of that building structure that's that's there's one
next to us and i believe across from us um there's some newer development that's going on on the
pale thorpe street side um so yeah i mean we wanted to provide sizable single family homes
and then for the duplex um that first floor basement unit i feel like one that's a very
large one bedroom apartment like from a market standpoint it almost doesn't make sense yeah
And, like, because you've got such high ceilings in the basement,
this feels like that's a point where I would have made the argument
that you put a bedroom in the basement.
Yeah, I mean, I don't think that's the plan for Hector and Jackie.
I defer to the board.
You know, half of that space down there is basically utility space.
It's not half. It's like a third.
A third of the...
You've got a thin room that's really a bedroom without a closet,
and then you've got the whole front area that's the sitting room,
and then there's another one upstairs.
so and a bath and a full bathroom so i mean again you know i defer to the board um we'd like to be
able to make use of that space just like we would like to make use of the space on the palethorpe
side um so okay other questions
see questions from our attorney i do see you know i guess it's it's not it's not the purview i just
looked at the just looked at the photos and the issue around parking on that that block is pretty
rough um but it has nothing to do with the i think i have no issues with your plans for the most part
yeah and and the other thing about the parking is there's we have three garages we have three
curb cuts basically that we're filling in as a part of this development because there's two
garages on the palethorpe side and one on the hancock side that are going away and those curbs
WILL BE FILLED IN. IT'S NOT A ONE-TO-ONE MATCH, BUT WE ARE ADDING PUBLICLY AVAILABLE PARKING
BACK ONTO THE STREET. JUST THAT PEOPLE ARE PARKING ON THE
PAVEMENTS. ALL RIGHT.
QUESTIONS FOR OUR CHAIR, ARE YOU? NOT AT THIS TIME, MR. CHAIR.
QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS FROM THE VIRTUAL AUDIENCE?
YES, CHAIR. THERE'S A HANDUP BY THE NAME OF NILDA PAMENTO, AND THEY WILL BE ALLOWED TO SPEAK.
Nelda?
Nelda?
Thank you.
nilda pimentel can you unmute please yes can you hear me now yes could you please state your name
is spelled for the stenographer yes my name is nilda n-i-l-d-a last name is pimentel p as in
Peter, I-M-E-N-T-E-L.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Nilda, are you a neighbor?
No, I'm the chair of the zoning committee, the RCO, coordinating RCO.
Sure, please proceed.
Thank you.
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and board members.
I just want to mention that in addition to the points that we listed in our explanation letter for endorsing this application, for the record, I would like the zoning board to note that the design utilizing bricks blends very well.
You know, the facade of the surrounding properties, that is something that a feature that in terms of the design and the construction materials that the folks that attended the SUNY meeting noted.
And second, that while not a primary consideration for endorsing applications, communicating and cooperating with nearby neighbors is always a good policy and crucial during the construction period.
So we always take the time to poll nearby neighbors and other groups and given that to minimize the potential dangers to pedestrians and also prevent disruptions to street parking and traffic flow and protect obviously adjacent properties from potential damage.
We made a request. We were very emphatic about making sure that the property owner communicates with one of the largest multi-service organizations that we have in the neighborhood, which is right across the property under your consideration today.
the owner has agreed to make his project manager
and general contractor available
to meet with the organization
or any other neighbor
to go over his plan during the construction period
and we really appreciated that
so I just wanted to make sure that you were informed
Nilda, thank you very much for taking the time to call us
we appreciate it
is there anyone else in the virtual audience?
there are no more hands chair planning commission good afternoon chair and members of the board
michael gall but the philadelphia city planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends no
change to the split residential single family attached and residential multifamily zoning at
this location the appellant has demonstrated that there is a unique physical condition of this
property that would prevent it from being used in strict conformance with the zoning code
the proposed front yard setback and lot widths are de minimis in nature the proposed lot widths and
sizes for properties on hancock and palethorpe are consistent with the averages for those blocks
therefore the city planning commission recommends the board grant the requested variances for a
front yard setback lot width and minimum lot area mi 2025 001 879 2044 north hancock street i vote
yes michael johns my vote is yes cheryl gaston my vote is yes tenetta graham my vote is yes
i'm mcadams my vote is yes i win my vote is yes
thank you thank you counsel thank you we're going to go to um
number eight
mi 2025 001 895 109 to 11 pine street
um i believe we have three attorneys involved in this am i correct
all right okay okay
Meredith why don't we do this why don't I introduce all the attorneys first okay and
And then you could present your case, and the other attorneys will come up.
So, Meredith, why don't you go first?
Meredith Ferliger, F-E-R-L-E-G-E-R, of Dilworth Paxson.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
And just for the record, could you identify your client in a relationship to the property?
And just for the record.
Sure. My client is Mrs. Sally Katz, who is the deeded owner of the property.
Okay. Paul Boney, please.
Why don't you come and hit the microphone?
Come to the microphone.
paul bonnie uh b-o-n-i do you swear referring to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the
truth yes could you identify your client this is ideals of ecosystem okay thank you and do we have
the third attorney here?
Why don't you come up?
And Paul, why don't you sit right down front here?
We'll keep the lawyers down front.
No, right in the first row,
and then she can put her client up.
Come on up.
Hi, right here.
Good afternoon.
Could you please state your name
and spell for the stenographer?
It's Ellen, E-L-L-E-N, O'Donner, O-D-O-N-E-R.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
And could you identify your client, please?
Yes. Catherine Mulleran, C-A-T-H-E-R-I-N-E, M-O-E-L-L-E-R-I-N-G.
Okay. So what we're going to do now is we'll let her present her case, and then you'll have opportunity for cross, and you'll also have opportunity to also present your own case. Okay?
Thank you.
Myrna Teneta-Graham has a few questions for you.
Good afternoon.
Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of the hearing?
And do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
I do, yes.
Okay, thank you.
You may share your screen and proceed with your case.
Thank you, by the way.
It's a party.
All right. Mr. Chairman, members of the board, it's so nice to see you in person after so many years. Again, Meredith Ferliger of Dilworth Paxson. I am here today with Mrs. Sally Katz, who is the owner of the property at 109-11 Pine Street.
Despite what's going to seem as an unusually thorough and comprehensive presentation today,
given the nature of this particular request, it is ultimately we would submit a minor request
for a pergola to complement the existing single-family home in Society Hill.
You have an exhibit packet in front of you that contains 17 exhibits.
To briefly summarize the basis for today's request,
The application requests the erection of a backyard pergola to provide shade, entertaining space, and privacy to a historic Society Hill home.
In short, the zoning code limits accessory structures to no more than 130 square feet and 15 feet high.
While this proposed pergola is considerably less than 15 feet high, it is, as the zoning code would measure it, slightly more than 130 square feet.
As we hope the board will see through today's presentation, we submit this as a technical function of how the code would measure an unusual open structure like a pergola.
I would also ask this board to note that the original request did include a decorative trellis along the rear party wall, but that trellis has been removed from this application due to neighborhood concerns.
We did submit a revised plan and revised plan proviso form this morning, and the only change to that was to remove that trellis.
we did also previously to having the trellis removed from the application
ellen i had also previously issued an amended refusal as that very same trellis would have
warranted a refusal that they missed that amended refusal is shown in your exhibits at exhibit one
try and move this out of the way there we go
We do understand, quite obviously, that there is opposition here today, and we would implore this board not to allow unfounded concerns to distract from what we would submit are actual and true hardships that exist in this case.
So we do understand, quite obviously, that there is opposition here today.
And before I go any further, just for administrative purposes, it might be helpful if we have the administrator look for Charlie Kelly, have him unmuted and sworn in so that he's ready to go when I get to him in the presentation.
Why don't you continue as soon as you're there?
Okay, sounds good.
All right, so let me first orient you to the location of the property.
As always, the deed and tax clearance are included in the exhibits at Exhibit 2 and 3.
And again, you can see here that Sally Katz is the deeded owner of this property.
My entry of appearance in this matter is included at Exhibit 6, which was submitted to the board back in April.
In terms of orientation of this property, you can see here on the zoning map at Exhibit 4,
You'll note that this is a double lot on Pine Street in the core of Society Hill, just feet from Penn's Landing, which is just off your screen to the east of this orientation.
There are also aerial views shown at Exhibit 5, which are relatively unremarkable in terms of today's request, except for one main feature that I will call to the board's attention.
You will notice, starting in this photograph, but even more prominent in some additional aerial views on the next page.
You'll notice that these Pine Street homes, of course, back up to other single-family homes on Delancey Street.
There is no central alley that divides Pine Street from Delancey Street.
As you'll notice in this north orientation here, these grouping of homes benefit from a significantly unique condition of a dense tree cover that has grown in this location over many decades.
And from this orientation, if you look around this one particular block here, this is not a condition that is shared among many other blocks.
now before i show you pictures of the rear yard and the proposed pergola that is at issue
i would like to have the designer charlie kelly walk you through the zoning plans first as i
believe it's going to be a bit more helpful for the board to have some context as to what is
actually proposed here before you see the backyard itself uh so at this point uh i i see charlie
here so mr kelly could you please i state your name and spell for the stenographer sir charles
kelly i go by charlie kelly spelling c-h-a-r-l-e-s-k-e-l-i-y do you swear or affirm to tell
the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth i do please proceed counsel thank you uh charlie
can you just identify uh you already identified your name but could you identify what company
you're with and your affiliation and involvement with this project. Yes, Meredith. I own Plant
Design Group. We are the general contractor and also the company that designs this backyard
project. Thank you. I'll bring up Exhibit 7, and I'm going to bring up the revised zoning plan that
we submitted this morning that removes the trellis. Again, you'll see here the original
zoning plan had that trellis. The revised one that I will have Charlie walk you through has no trellis.
Can you just briefly describe to the board the overall improvements that are being proposed for this backyard?
Yes, Mary. So a couple of challenges when we started designing this project.
There was a there was a large birch tree in that top right hand corner that would be the northeast section of the backyard.
And so when we when we started designing this, we knew we had to limit disturbance of that that that tree because it was about 40 to 50 feet.
And we didn't want to mess around with the anchor roots and ultimately create a liability issue.
So what we did there was put an impervious deck. That's an e-pay deck in that area.
So no footers, no cutting any roots. And ultimately, that was actually a second tier to the existing backyard.
So there was limited disturbance to that area. So all we did was install clean stone. Actually, we took out a lot of brick.
But I mean, I'll get to that later, Meredith. And speaking to the design, there's there's a few there's actually a decent amount of raised beds in the backyard.
You'll notice we did that for water absorption. And the reason we did that was there is a.
for water absorption. And the reason we did that was there is a fieldstone foundation on that
house. And we were really concerned with water runoff in the area. So we left all that open
area with the raised beds up against the house for drainage. So it didn't affect the fieldstone
foundation that was up against the house. We were really concerned with that foundation and come to
find out there was an issue um that we just um that sally and and um their other contracting team
um found uh during construction so the the um the there's a new pavers so we we ripped
there's new pavers right behind the house and to the left hand side and that second
tier is the e-pay deck there is a pergola in that left top left hand corner
and there's a couple of retaining walls and raised beds as well there's a grill off to the left hand
side by the shed I'm not sure I'm sorry I don't have a pointer to point you guys all the native
trees that were there were left there and we've added a lot a lot of plants a lot of planters
a lot of mature trees trees that we could fit through a 27 inch alleyway so we did it the best
we could to add a lot of greenery in the backyard. So Charlie, you alluded to some water infiltration
concerns. Were those concerns speculative in nature or were they based on circumstances
that had occurred prior to you coming on to the site? They were speculative prior to coming on.
We were nervous walking around the basement when we were doing the design of actually getting any water near the basement.
So we wanted, everything was pitched, the old patio was pitched towards the back of the house.
And we wanted to get all the water off the back of the house.
So this design allowed us to pitch everything off the back of the house.
murder. And Charlie, were you aware at that point that there had already been a significant flood
into the basement when Mrs. Katz moved in? No. Okay. Okay. Can you describe the proposed
pergola to the board? Yeah. So the proposed pergola is all reclaimed barn wood. We actually
sourced the material from Bucks County, Lancaster County. We went out of our way to make sure that
and matched the area in the district that we were,
or the area that we're putting the pergola up.
And so we're also doing a timber frame pergola
in this application.
So it's not just an off the shelf,
Home Depot, big box store.
It's a custom pergola.
It's a very high end pergola.
And we made sure that we're using premium material
for this application for the cats or for Sally.
And what are the dimensions of the pergola?
Off the top of my head, it's 250 square feet.
i'm sorry i'm drawing blank on length by width right now okay uh charlie if you could look at
the screen and refer to the zoning plans that are up on the screen here does that help refresh your
memory here i'll bring it up over here for you thank you 15 by 16. and it's 240 square feet not
250 correct that's correct okay uh and where is it located relative to the rear property line
uh so two two foot six inches off the rear property line
now you you alluded to some site challenges uh in regards to the existing tree and in regards
to the water infiltration concerns was there anything else unique about this backyard that
you were working within when designing that designing this pergola and the the biggest
issues marideth where that was a big birch tree in that northwest corner i'm sorry northeast corner
and then the pitch towards the the back of the house um the there was an existing grill in place
So we left the grill that we installed in that same place.
So we really conformed the pergola and everything that was there or the pergola to the existing backyard.
OK, at exhibit eight.
I'm sorry, go back one more, Meredith.
Yeah. So there's also an existing tree and a climbing hydrangea along that whole back wall.
By putting the posts where we put them, we did not have to disturb any of those existing trees, mature trees.
That climbing hydrangeas spans the entire width of the west wall.
And then the tree that's pictured near the grill was left undisturbed with this design.
the grill was left undisturbed with this design.
Okay. I've brought up exhibit eight, which are renderings of this proposed pergola. Can you just,
again, reinforce any additional information that you can provide just based on these renderings
that give the board just a little bit more context to what is actually proposed here?
Yep. So the big tree in that bottom left-hand corner, that's the birch tree that I'm talking
was one of the biggest design challenges was leaving that undisturbed and not creating a
future liability in these courtyards and causing that to become unanchored and fall over in the
past or damage it. That's the birch in that bottom right-hand corner there. There's another
tree up in towards the top of the page there. That's a native tree as well that by putting
the pergola there, we would leave that undisturbed as well. There's actually a climbing
hydrangea right next to that entire or that that tree I was just speaking of not the not the birch
the the the tree towards the top of the page so again same thing by putting pergola here we would
not have to touch that hydrangea and did not touch that hydrangea or other trees okay and I'll just
briefly we have several different views this would be a view looking down from the second floor level
into the backyard and again charlie this this corner deck here this deck already existed
previously you essentially uh were just proposing to replace the decking material is that correct
well the the tier existed uh um previously the there was a brick tier um there prior we we took
up the brick and we're proposing to take up the brick and put the deck down in place um
yeah and and cholly what does the image that i have up on the screen here page 23 of our exhibits
what what does this approximate that approximates the the brick wall behind the cats's house that
would be from the the the neighbor behind the cats is uh from delancey street okay and this
wall is approximately 12 to 15 feet high is that is that a reasonable approximation that's reasonable
okay it's a significant drop down from the cats this house uh cats this backyard okay
all right just so i'm sure that's eight foot high the pergola is eight foot six inches high
i'm sorry chair this is the reporter could you please repeat the question i had my question was
is it eight foot and council responded eight foot six is that to the top of the beam or to the
underside i'm sorry head clearance or to the top of the beam it is uh should be on the site plan
let me double check that yeah that is to the very top yep just one more thing so
the yard behind it it goes above the wall the uh yes mr chairman we do have some additional
pictures that'll just literally show you that well that was about two foot the property behind
sits at a much lower grade than mrs katz's so we'll show you that in pictures just so you have
a better sense of that yes no problem um all right and you let us know how much higher the
pergola is above that that wall right i most certainly will but i i can i can tell you that
right now the that back wall is six feet high so the pergola is two feet six inches above that wall
and that that wall has obviously been there for many many many decades okay um charlie you've
testified about the impact of the existing trees on this site in locating the pergola um was this
based simply on preference or did you have a tree professional assess these stated challenges as
well no so we had an arborist when we were designing the backyard come in and tell us the
best location um and is that arborist report uh that was performed by your in-house arborist
included at exhibit 17 yep okay great and uh just i don't recall if you mentioned this but can you
just share with the board the proposed materials of the pergola yeah the proposed materials are
um reclaimed barn wood coming from bucks in lancaster county they were sourced from bucks
in lancaster county thank you very again very high material um to to complement the the improvements
that we're making in the backyard as well as the area that we're putting the material in
got it um mr chairman uh uh certainly up to the board's discretion whether you
Got it. Um, Mr. Chairman, uh, uh, certainly up to the board's discretion, whether you would like
Thank you.
to allow cross now, or if you want me to finish my introduction, some of the additional photographs.
This is still your introduction. This is, I have some more background in terms of some photographs
and things like that. Well, why don't you show, why don't you show the photo? Okay.
Then we'll have a better idea of what everybody's looking at. Perfect. All right. So with, uh,
And Charlie, just stick around for a bit as well.
So with some of this context in mind, let me show you some of the photographs that we've included at Exhibit 16.
Obviously, this is the exterior of the home from Pine Street, which you'll see here is a double lot.
So there is the portion on the right and then the portion on the left, which represents that double lot.
The home was first historically designated back in 1965.
I did also include a couple other photographs from Pine Street for context, but the Pine Street frontage is not relevant to today's request, so I will scroll through them fairly quickly.
And again, looking towards 2nd Street.
Okay, so this next photograph here is an image of the backyard that was taken directly from the listing photos from 109 Pine Street when Mrs. Katz purchased this home.
I include this so that the board can get a better understanding of the previous conditions that Mr. Kelly alluded to that ultimately led to significant water infiltration problems, which Mrs. Katz can fill you in on.
But the basement, just after they purchased it, flooded significantly and ultimately started this entire reconstruction project.
With that said, you'll also notice that while all of the brick material has been replaced with a more modern material, the raised deck itself has been minimized, and the patio outline itself has largely been retained in its historical outline.
moving on to the next photographs uh these are two different photographs on the left and the right
hand side you'll see that significant improvements have already been made to the backyard to the
extent that most of these improvements did not require zoning approval on the left hand side
here is a view looking down from the second floor where you'll see again the patio areas planting
painting beds and that raised deck area that Charlie testified to.
You'll also see here the wooden posts representing the location of the proposed pergola.
On the right hand side is a view that looks towards the back of Mrs. Katz's house from
that rear brick wall.
You'll again notice the location of the pergola posts in both of these photographs.
Skipped ahead on me.
This next view looks towards the back wall of the house.
And again, you'll see that birch tree that Mr. Charlie Kelly had testified to.
And you'll see the location of that existing rear six-foot-high brick wall.
Thank you.
Okay. Now, this next photograph here on the left-hand side shows an image that was taken many, many, many months ago when this trellis was still contemplated, which has now, of course, been removed from this application.
Unbelievably and incorrectly, Ellen and I came and cited Mrs. Katz for an unpermitted fence structure, which we probably appealed, as it is quite suspect that the inspectors could not clearly see that it was a sample sitting on the wall.
As an aside, they did also similarly cite her for building a deck, which we also appealed, even though the board has hopefully clearly seen here that that raised deck area already previously existed and just had the decking material replaced.
Now, in this image, you'll see the relationship, you'll begin to see the relationship to the property directly in the rear at 108 Delancey Street.
Now, in this image, you'll see the relationship, you'll begin to see the relationship to the
On the right-hand side, you'll see the location of the existing extension of the house that juts out into the rear yard, an existing grill, and that second tree that Mr. Kelly was talking about.
and again a better view of some of these conditions is shown in this next photograph
where the board can clearly see that virtually any relocation of the of this particular post
to move the pergola slightly farther from the wall would directly intrude onto that existing tree area
On the right-hand side, the board can get a better sense of some of Mrs. Katz's motivation behind the pergola structure, as the second floor of 108 Delancey Street looks directly into Mrs. Katz's backyard, depriving her and her husband of their inherent right to privacy.
Now, this board is going to hear today from at least two direct neighbors to the rear on Delancey Street, expressing resistance to this proposal.
In showing you the next photographs, we're asking the board to exercise your careful discretion in weighing the credibility and the validity of these concerns.
First, I will show you photographs that I took of the backyard of 104 Delancey Street, which, if you are looking in the rear of Mrs. Katz's house, is the home that is directly to the right.
As you can see here, the backyard of this property sits at a dramatically lower grade than Mrs. Katz's house.
The wall here in this area, as mentioned earlier, is estimated to be roughly 12 to 15 feet high, way overhead,
and rendering anything beyond it completely invisible, at least from the at-grade level to the homes.
Oh, there you are. They're a 12-foot wall. Oh, there you are, you can't say.
That is exact. So, right. So if you're standing in the backyard here and you're looking up, you're looking up at a 12 to 15 foot high wall in front of you.
Similarly.
Directly.
But just to be sure. But you're still going to see a pergola two foot above.
Right. It's a 12 foot wall, but you're still going to see a pergola two foot six.
am I right? If you are 12 feet below grade, I would question whether you would see two and a
half feet. Because it is set back two and a half feet from that back wall. Now, similarly,
directly to the rear at 108 Delancey Street, the grade is once again significantly depressed for
Mrs. Katz's house. As you can see clearly on the section of wall along the right-hand side here,
You can see that a little bit better in this image behind the tree, which coincidentally also has a structure right up against the rear wall.
Now, the neighbors at this location, and I believe they're going to show you these same photographs, but these photographs were presented during one of the RCO meetings.
I was able to capture them to show the board the actual view from the neighbor's property.
So this is again from 108 Delancey Street directly in the back.
So here you can see again the grade differential between the properties on Pine and those on Delancey, which again deprives homeowners like Mrs. Katz of the privacy her neighbors benefit from by sitting a few feet lower.
Here, you can see that the pergola will be barely visible and likely rendered entirely
invisible once some of the plantings have a chance to take hold.
This next photograph is slightly out of date prior to the posts being cut down to their
intended height.
At this time, you can see that that trellis sample was still up, and these posts were
at this time 10 feet high and have since been cut down to their intended height of eight foot
six inches. Here you can see abundantly the privacy deprivation issues that we have discussed here
today as 108 Delancey Street looks directly down into Mrs. Katz's backyard and in fact into the
back of the first floor of her home. That was ultimately part of the motivation behind the
trellis, but understanding the community concerns for the trellis, that was taken out of the request.
that was taken out of the request now again we do not say this to say that this is in any way the
Now again, we do not say this to say that this is an
fault of 108 lancy street certainly it is not but it is the reality of conditions that have existed
from when the homes were built back in the 1800s uh mr chair i do have my standard argument that i
would go through if you want me to do that first or have her have a chance to cross-examine mr kelly
Is your client going to adopt your testimony?
She will at the very end.
So who do you want crossed, your client or Mr. Kelly?
I was going to give them the opportunity if they wanted to cross Mr. Kelly.
Neither of us have any questions for cross.
For either.
Thank you.
Then I'll finish my argument and then we can move on.
All right.
Thank you very much.
Mr. Chairman, members of the board, regarding the refusals that were issued,
the application was refused for three reasons, one of which has now been resolved.
As I mentioned, a refusal was issued for the height of the proposed trellis.
Because that was removed from the request, I will not address it in the argument today.
Regarding the pergola, the pergola received two refusals,
and I'll bring up the refusal so you can see exactly what we're talking about here.
First, a refusal is issued as the code would dictate that the pergola should be set back nine feet from the rear property line, whereas two and a half feet setback is proposed.
Furthermore, the code would limit an accessory structure to 130 square feet, where 240 square feet is technically proposed.
I'd like to start first with the most abundant hardship, which is that the very nature of this
application cannot be readily applied within the current zoning code, which ultimately from our
position should have led to an interpretation in favor of the property owner instead of the
irrational result that has ensued. Join me in the irrationality. When the code seeks to regulate
square footage. It is contemplating a structure with four walls and a roof. The pergola has
neither an enclosed roof nor enclosed walls. It is simply four posts with wood connections at the
top. To consider this a structure for calculating maximum square footage results in irrationality
in the zoning code as there can be no discernible or identifiable difference in visibility or
impact by moving the posts closer together merely to shrink the pergola in terms of square
footage. What renders this point even more critical towards the property's hardship
is included at exhibit 13, where I have included confirmation from L&I that if this structure
were 130 square feet or calculated to be 130 square feet, L&I would not enforce setback
requirements, and the pergola could sit exactly in its intended location, actually even closer
to the wall. L&I would not enforce the setback requirement. It is unreasonable to surmise that
a 130 square foot structure right at the wall would somehow be less visible or impactful
than one whose posts are further apart and two and a half feet away from the wall.
In fact, we would submit that the further the pergola is from the wall, the more visible
it becomes at higher levels of the adjoining structures in the rear.
This is especially true when the board considers that the code would permit this structure to be 15 feet high, whereas the proposed pergola here is only just over 8 1⁄2 feet high.
To show you just how irrational a strict code application is to a pergola, at Exhibit 10, we have included a rendering of a by-right pergola, just a facet of a by-right pergola, in fact.
This pergola is located to the center of the property, where, again, under the code, a 15-foot-high pergola could be right up against the back wall.
So you can see here, this is in the middle of the property.
So imagine if this were right up against the back wall.
this would be infinitely more visible and more impactful than what is proposed.
This would be infinitely more visible and more impactful.
To add to this quagmire even more, the code would not restrict Mrs. Katz from having multiple
compliant size pergolas side by side along the back property wall. As we alluded to earlier,
this is a double lot that could, if it were two homes, have two pergolas of 260 square feet total.
So hopefully this exercise has shown the board just how irrational the code application is
to this type of open structure that cannot be readily applied within the bounds of the zoning
code. Beyond just the zoning code limitations, we also submit the evidence that we've presented
establishes multiple hardships unique to this historic property that warrants this board
granting relief. Mr. Kelly testified regarding the concerns over water infiltration issues
that Mrs. Katz will mention that she found herself stuck with upon purchasing this property
and the impact that those conditions have had on the design of the backyard. I understand that,
But tell me the pergola and the water.
How does that, why is that an issue?
May I have Mrs. Katz?
If you want, sure.
Name and address for the record.
I can just state your name and spell for the sign.
My name is Sally Katz, S-A-L-L-Y-K-A-T-Z.
You swear or affirm to tell the truth, told the truth, nothing but the truth.
Please proceed, Councilor.
Sally, you've heard Mr. Chairman's question. Can you just first, very briefly, explain to the board what happened shortly after you purchased this home in terms of the water?
That's the point I'm saying is, but, yeah, so the house flooded, but what's the pergola have to do with the house flooded?
I'm sorry, can I answer that, Meredith?
Go ahead, Charlie.
Yeah, so, sir, Mr. Chairman, there is a bunch of drainage lines running up against the house away from where the pergola is at.
So that open area where we have pavers and the raised beds, there's drainage lines under catch basins and drainage lines running in that area.
So we can't put footers for the pergola in that area.
We had to run all the drainage lines off the house.
So there's a bunch of Schedule 40 PVC running underneath the patio there.
Okay. All right.
And again, just very briefly, can you share with the board the flooding issues that actually occurred on this property?
Yeah, sorry, I may get emotional. After Ida, when we walked into our basement, we walked into like
three, four inches of water, and we did not realize where it was coming from. And we have
since then found out that the backyard was tilted. There was concrete under the brick,
which is why we didn't want brick to be replaced be there and it was tilted into the house and
the drainage system around the house was contributing to our flooding and so our primary
concern we have not even lived in the house we got it right before the pandemic and we just want to
enjoy our house without water and move in and live happily with our neighbors so we brought in this
design knowing that we had to work out the drainage system and save our house that half the
house was built in 1807 and the other half in the 1960s right we wanted to maintain our house and
the quality of its character and yet not add not due to the next person who bought the house what
was done to us so this design was part of rectifying this water issue thank you
uh just we're working around yeah a few more points uh again just as a reminder 109 pine
street sits at a significantly higher grade than the properties on delancey street which again
just further contributes to the deprivation of privacy for mrs katz while she enjoys her own
backyard furthermore as you've heard today mrs katz was very much working within the limitations
based on the historical conditions that existed in the backyard.
This is all accentuated by the existence of these uniquely mature trees,
which are unique to this portion of Pine Street and are critically important to preserve.
Property owners are inherently entitled to flexibility from any zoning board
from any zoning board to grant them a de minimis variance
to grant them a de minimis variance that will ensure that they can
that will ensure that they can make reasonable use of their
properties without intrusion from neighboring eyes.
This is especially true here since this property is historically designated
and in light of the hardships that the decades of neglect
Mrs. Katz has been seeking to remediate to ensure the long-term protection of
this property. We do submit this as a lease minimum
request as these are strictly dimensional requests for which this board is granted
additional flexibility in granting again as mr johns had asked earlier relative to the six foot
high wall that already exists this pergola only extends two feet six inches above that wall
these hardships and these variances requested are direct in direct relationship uh to
all of the testimony that has been offered in front of the board today in terms of the hardships
that burden this property. It is also inherently least minimum given that the pergola itself and
its very existence is not at issue, only its dimensions as applied within the limited confines
of the zoning code. Certainly the proposed pergola will not increase congestion, endanger the public,
or cause overcrowding.
Conversely, we propose that this pergola will provide privacy for Mrs. Katz as well as adjoining
neighbors, eliminating the currently direct view in and out of the backyard of 109 Pine
Street.
We do offer that the variance will not substantially or permanently harm neighbors' use of their
properties or impair light and air, as this is an open structure.
further analysis is included in my memorandum of law submitted to the board at exhibit 11
we did also include letters of support from a variety of neighbors uh in our exhibit packet
as well and i will have mrs katz just briefly address that uh sally what do we do she's going
to testify again for one one minute all right um sally have you heard all the testimony that i
offered in front of the board today yes do you agree that testimony was true and accurate and
would you adopt it as if you had given it yourself i do and uh in the process of preparing for this
zoning hearing in the rco meetings did you engage with uh your neighbors on pine street of course
in addition to your neighbors on delancey but did you engage with your neighbors on pine street yes
and what was the um position that they expressed to you in terms of this request
i'm sorry this is the reporter i'm having it we're doing it we're doing all my neighbors
both sides and in front that um i'll enthusiastically approve this design and the
pergola and and just to reinforce your neighbors on either side of you were also in support of
this application yes it will add value to the neighborhood and it was a beautifully designed
it's a beautiful design thank you mr chairman i would like to reserve the right to bring
charlie or mrs katz back uh in in case of any rebuttal do you want to anybody want to cross
or cross no mr chair okay not at this time who would want to go first i i wouldn't mind going
first sure thank you and i'm not trying to rush you how long do you think it'll take
you know i didn't time it but five minutes oh i don't have well for not time that's a pretty
good estimate so be sure please proceed i'll get a five minutes okay uh could i share my screen you
most certainly can yeah oh sorry okay well let me know if it's too loud but that's fine okay okay
Thank you. Okay. I'm going to share this. Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of the board.
My name is Paul Bonney. I'm an attorney representing the Society of Civic Association. We conducted
two community meetings in this matter, May 5 and July 28 of this year, with many people
in attendance. Our maximum attendance for those two meetings was 24 people for this
particular matter we are opposed to variances being requested in this matter this of course
is a beautiful home on the 100 block of pine a beautiful stable neighborhood a wide property
everything functions very well we are pleased it has new owners making substantial investment
in the property both interior and exterior we are not against pergolas
if it's of a size allowed by the zoning code and in a location allowed by the zoning code
And those are the two issues here. The size, the code allows, I think, 120 or 130. And this is 240. And the location is, it's within the nine foot rear yard setback.
and those are the two issues here the size
A lightning bolt hit me a few minutes ago. I was looking at what's on your screen, which is Exhibit 7 from the applicant. And if this plan was revised to reduce the size of the pergola almost in half, not completely in half, but almost in half, to just cut it off at that dotted line.
just cut it off at that dotted line that says setback you would then be in compliance with
the size of the structure and you'd be in compliance with the setback you wouldn't need
to move it to a different location in this very large backyard you could keep it in this location
and just pull it back to that dotted line, which is what, so, and we, we submitted only
a small number of exhibits, we have our RCO summary form, we have our letter that just
says we're opposed, and then we have some photographs, some of which you've seen, and
And I just want to review it with you.
The first is an MLS photo, real estate photo, I think from before the applicant purchasing the property.
As you can see, it's very wide.
It's beautiful.
And I would note for the record, it's not a double lot.
It's a wide lot.
It was two lots that were redrawn, and it's now one lot.
It's one lot under the law.
And we think, frankly, the possibilities are numerous, if you wanted to put this someplace else, and we hadn't heard any hardship.
The next photo is the work in progress.
This was provided to us by the applicant.
So you can see the extent of the work that was done in progress.
You could see that a lot of what you had seen in the previous photo was removed.
And now, yes, on that top right, that elevated portion is still going to be the elevated portion.
By the way, the tree that we hear so much about in the top right corner, it's really irrelevant because no one would think to move the pergola over there.
It would suffer from the same problem, size and rear yard setback.
So what we're talking about is the other areas of the backyard.
And so you can see the extensive work.
You can see, I think, the possibilities.
You can see certain – and you can see in this case the four posts for the pergola that had been installed that still exist.
Those are the four posts on the top of the top left corner of this property.
And, of course, we would mention that a pergola need not be installed at all.
A house is perfectly viable, usable, and lovely without a pergola.
Some people have them, most people don't.
If you don't have a pergola, it doesn't mean your house is suffering a hardship.
And as you can see, the applicant has put the pergola almost as far as possible to the neighbors to the rear, rather than closer to their own home.
I would add, and I'm looking, and now the next photo we have is, I'd say, the near-finished product.
And as you can see, the backyard is much more finished, maybe not completely finished, but, you know, all the paving is in, the decking and whatnot.
um i want to point out to the board that um if you look on the right hand side of this exhibit
you will see towards the right hand side of the right hand side photo
i don't know if that's qualified as an addition to the house or a pergola
But it is a pergola-like structure that has been added recently to the property.
to the property. You go to the next page, and you can see it now over the barbecue,
You go to the next page, and you can see it.
this pergola-like structure that is attached to the house. So again, I don't know if it qualifies
as an accessory structure or if it's merely in addition to the house that looks like a pergola,
but in a way, what we're talking about is a desire for a second pergola. No one is asking
let me make clear no one is asking for l and i to go out to check on this we don't maybe there
are permits we don't see it posted online but maybe there are permits that's not our point our
point is that this is a beautiful property that's going to it's going to be beautiful no matter what
happens at the board today um uh i guess i have you know a little bit of i don't have much argument
i can save it for later but there's just simply no hardship in this case right and uh we appreciate
the board's attention council i i'd like to ask my client to come up sure why don't you get closer
to the mic too sure sorry and your client lives on delancey street delancey street yeah okay thank you
i also would like to be able to share yeah sure um why don't we do this first um just for the
record state your name again sure it's ellen e-l-l-e-n o'donner o-d-o-n-e-r and could you
please state your name and spell for the stenographer. My name is Catherine Mollering.
It is spelled C-A-T-H-E-R-I-N-E. Last name is M as in Mary, O-E-L-L-E-R-I-N-G. Do you swear or
for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? Okay. Could we make sure
that she's on the system?
I believe so.
Is that yours?
Okay, it's coming up now.
okay okay um i'm an attorney and i'm representing katherine and in this matter
she lives at 108 delancy and my husband and i live next door to katherine at 10406 delancy
okay our two properties um uh but the rear of 109 11 pine street okay um our yards touch each other
and we all share the old historic brick wall that separates the property.
I have about four questions to ask Catherine,
and I hope at the end that I might have an opportunity
to make a very brief closing statement.
Okay, to start.
Catherine, when did you buy your house, and what attracted you to it?
I bought my home in November of 2016.
I fell in love with the historical nature of Society Hill, and then I fell in love with the house because it had such a great rear garden and beautiful open views.
Ed and I used to live in New York City, and we bought our house in 2020 as an escape during COVID for much the same reasons.
um catherine would you show the panel what we currently see and enjoy at the rear of our
properties absolutely i'm gonna turn everyone's attention to
Absolutely. I'm going to turn everyone's attention to the images on the screen.
It's just taking a minute to catch up. So one of the things that's special about I think your home
and my home is even though we live in a city, our homes are oriented to face our gardens. And that's
really you know the majority of what we look at and enjoy and you can see here
this is a picture of my home taken a few weeks ago and this next photo Ellen I
believe is of yours yes taking a minute I also have some photos showing the view
from our second floor showing again as you said all the shared walls we have in
common in the openness. And then this image is showing other properties on the 100 block of
Delancey, also sharing similarly low in nature brick party walls.
Catherine, did you know the neighbors who lived at 10911
Pine before Sally purchased the property? Yes, my husband and I, he's here, we knew the prior
owners, Nancy and Ivan, and actually were often guests in their home and enjoyed their outdoor
space. Did they express concerns about privacy? Did you feel concerns about privacy between your
two properties no that was never a concern so catherine i think if we could turn now to show
the board the impact of the proposed pergola if it is constructed in its proposed size and proposed
location sure so again just looking from um my property toward pine street um you can see
and here are the I think Sally's counsel shared this as well the red arrows show where you have
the current pergola posts and this is a photoshopped image of what those posts will
look like when the pergola is actually constructed what you have to speak in that I'm like that's
Okay. Okay. Sorry. How did you come up with the design and the dimensions for the photoshopping?
I did so in two ways. One was using the actual plans provided by Sally's counsel at our
recent hearings, and then also used, let's see if my cursor works. It doesn't. Oh, yeah, it does.
I also based it off of their first pergola-like structure and matched the height and also matched the beams and crossbeams as well.
Why don't you go on and show some of the other images?
So again, this is a Photoshop image of the completed pergola.
Unfortunately, we don't live in temperate conditions and so I also had a Photoshop image
of what it will look like unfortunately 50% of the year when things are dead.
This is an image showing from a higher view and again unfortunately in the cooler months
when we don't have the benefit of foliage what that would look like.
Catherine, were there other neighbors on the 100 block who have expressed their opposition to the pergola?
Yes, and in this photo, you can see the red dots denote where we have letters or signed petitions of neighbors who are also opposing the requested variances.
Oh, and I actually should say that we have some of those neighbors here.
One neighbor, unfortunately, had to leave early.
I just would like to close by saying that my husband and I adopt Catherine's presentation as ours,
and I have no questions for her at this time.
Thank you. Do you have any cross?
I do, Mr. Chairman.
um miss mullering or miss o'donner if you could go back in your exhibit exhibits please where you
show the view of mrs katz's yard uh from from your backyard mrs o'donner it was a little bit earlier
From your backyard, Mrs. O'Donner, it was a little bit earlier in your presentation.
Keep going. All the way back up.
Keep going. Keep going.
Oh, okay.
More. Yeah, it was towards the beginning.
maybe one or um and one one or two more maybe
okay uh actually yep sorry go back to that next one
uh okay so um miss miss mullering this this is the view uh if miss o'donner were not representing
you i would be asking her these questions uh directly but since she is your counsel i'm going
to pose them to you so these are the views uh from 104 delancey street is that correct
from the garden yes i'm sorry this is a little bit of an awkward situation because you are her
counsel so you can't i can't cross-examine you i'm happy to answer the question no but i
your counsel she should answer okay are you also representing yourself though as a protestant
okay then all right then then then i'll direct this to you uh so mrs o'donner is this a view
from uh your patio level of your backyard correct and was this photograph taken uh at a time when
the pergola posts were in place yes can you see the pergola posts from this image not not in not
in summer but i can see it from my second floor my third floor and my fourth floor okay we just
didn't have i just don't have those photos okay it's quite visible okay my question was about
from from your property at grade uh if you can then go to the next photograph then please
um maybe one more
i'm looking for one that's from your second level mrs mullering
Keep going.
No, from your second level.
This will work.
Okay, Mrs. Mullering.
so this this shows a portion of the view that you have from your second floor is that right
um this actually was taken but yes this is a this is a view from a second floor elevation
and do you acknowledge that if the pergola were shifted closer to mrs cats's house that you would
have equally if not a greater view of the pergola from the middle of her yard as from the back
i i i need you to restate that can you acknowledge that if this pergola were shifted closer to mrs
katz's house and away from the wall that your view of the pergola would be exactly the same
as it is as proposed from your second and third floor i don't think i can answer that okay
um okay if you can go to the um the the sheet where you have provided opposition from other
neighbors
okay uh thank you mrs mullering are are you able to estimate uh whether the neighbors at 128 124
one and 114 delancey street would have any view of mrs katz's backyard from their properties on
delancey street um i actually think the owner of 114 delancey street is here
oh she left just if if you can let her husband did his ill when she needed to go
if you can you use your best guess can can they reasonably see mrs katz's backyard yes they can
see her backyard they've sent us photos of the pergola from from their back how about 124 and
128 no they cannot reasonably see it okay um i i do want to bring mr kelly back at some point
um i i do want to bring mr kelly back at some point now listen to me you got to tell me how
much longer you're going to need because we're running out of time we we have another eight
lawyers waiting ready to go understood mr chairman then if you if you're going to take more time
do you think it's more than 15 minutes it's not more than five not probably more than i have i
have one question for mr kelly uh just in terms of the photoshop please proceed okay
okay um mr kelly are you still with us yes he's here uh mr kelly uh did you have you been present
for uh miss mullering and miss mrs o'donner's uh renderings that they put up on the screen
showing what they believe to be the view of the pergola i did uh do you believe that those
renderings were accurate no i think they're exaggerated the height of it is exaggerated
they look like it's at um the pre-cut um post height which was at 10 feet okay thank you
is that it just real quickly for mrs katz
did you receive any support from any neighbors on delancey street i did and what address uh it's the
address between it's 110 112 which is the one between the two red dots that's
all may I just comment on that sure that new that neighbor has not lived there
since 2016 and that cop that property is under contract for sale to someone else
okay well okay questions from the board
questions or comments from our attorney not at this time mr chair questions or comments
from the audience here is there anyone who has any comments questions or comments
questions or comments from the virtual audience yes i raised my hand david wolfson hi could you
please spell your name for the stenographer. You bet. David Wolfson, D-A-V-I-D, W-O-L,
F as in Frank, S as in Sam, O-H-N as in Nancy. You swear or affirm to tell the truth,
the whole truth, nothing but the truth? I do. Are you a neighbor? Yes. Thank you,
Mr. Chairman. I'm a neighbor. I'm on Pine Street across the street
from the Katz's at 110, directly across the street. I've seen the plans. I've toured the
property. I've seen the posts. I've seen the work that has been done so far. It's beautiful.
It's carefully thought out, and it overall improves the look of the neighborhood.
I think it is unfortunate that this seems to have devolved into a kind of a personal issue rather than an issue of common sense and even an issue of aesthetics.
If you look at the pictures, looking out the windows from the property of the Protestant who testified and her neighbor, they look out on a flat roof with a skylight that is not, I don't think Ben Franklin had them in his time.
There's nothing particularly aesthetic about that view.
I also noticed that there's a shed in the back, which is a structure, which I don't think is permitted under the code.
I think there's a fundamental problem with the code, which Counselor Ms. Katz alluded to, which is that it lumps together as structures something like a pergola.
I don't think there'll be any significant difference or any real difference at all in terms of aesthetics in viewing the pergola that set back the existing code number of feet versus what has been proposed.
So the pergola allows in light.
It allows them to put plants and vines on it.
it will be a beautiful thing. And I wholeheartedly endorse their proposal and hope that the board
will overturn the decision of the committee. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else in a virtual
audience? How do I do it? Yes. Can I join that way?
Um, how do I do it? Yes. Can, can I, can I join that way?
I don't know. Darn it. Now I'm out because it was, sorry.
Uh, yes. Uh, Alexandra Janou, my wife would like to speak.
Alexandra, could you please state your name and spell it for the stenographer?
Yes. Alexandra Janou, Alexandra, A-L-E-X-A-N-D-R-A, Janou, G-I-G-N-O-U-X.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
I do. You've heard a lot of what your husband said. Please, if there's anything else you can
offer, but could you please tell us whether you're in favor of this project or against the project?
I'm very in favor, and I really respect the way they kept the trees, which I think is the most
important thing for this neighborhood. Thank you very much. Anyone else in the virtual audience?
No, Chair.
hands planning commission good afternoon chair michael gall with the philly zilfee city planning
commission the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the residential single family attached
zoning at this location the appellant has demonstrated that the proposal is unlikely to
cause impacts to the immediate neighborhood beyond what other might be otherwise expected therefore
the city planning commission recommends the board grant the requested variances for accessories
restructure rear setback and maximum area thank you um we've heard a lot of testimony today i
want to have an executive session with the board to see where we stand with this and we're going
to vote on this next wednesday at 2 p.m understood thank you thank you for your patience here take
this let me get my computer
number five mi 2025 001 890 15 to 21 south 11 street rachel pritzker is the attorney
there's unanimous non-opposition from washington square west civic
and a letter of non-opposition from council member squill
good afternoon
My counsel, could you please state your name and a spell for the stenographer?
Yep. Rachel, R-A-C-H-A-E-L, Pritzker, P-R-I-T-Z-K-E-R.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client in a relationship to this property?
Yes. My client is Josh Rosenblum, who is the owner of JWN3 LLC, who owns the property.
Our board member, Tynetta Graham, has a few questions for you.
Good afternoon. Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of this hearing?
And do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Thank you. You may share your screen and proceed with your case.
Okay. Thank you.
Can you see my screen?
We can.
Okay, so this is, sorry, I'm equally tired listening to that, 1521 South 11th Street, as mentioned.
This should be relatively brief of the two I have in front of you today.
Anyway, this is a CMX 5 property, and we are proposing the erection of a six-story addition with a roof deck for non-residential use,
accessed from a six-story over an existing five-story structure for use as a sit-down restaurant with all other uses in the same structure.
this is a referral this is a special exception and the only use referral that we have is that
it requires a special exception if you want to propose a roof deck for
non-residential uses and as mentioned this is going to be for a sit-down restaurant
this is our appeal the property which i'll show in a second is a cmx5 property
It has a ground floor of Honeygrow and also has locations with Milk Boy Philadelphia on 1100 Chestnut Street.
And the area is accustomed to a lot of non-residential uses.
The roof deck is going to function as just an extension of seating for patients that are already accommodated within the restaurant
and will not introduce any additional parking transportation demand that's disproportionate to what's typically required for a restaurant of this scale.
And that is sort of situated on a CMX 5 commercial corridor in our city.
There's also SEPTA and bus routes located 11th Street and Market Street.
So we don't anticipate this causing any major traffic issues or any noise or air quality.
It's just going to function as a non-residential use to support the existing building and the restaurants in the area.
area. This is a deed, tax information. Here's a zoning map of the property. Again, it's a corner
property, CMX 5 on South 11th Street, surrounded by almost all CMX 5 high-density commercial mixed
use projects and buildings. Just right off of Ludlow, Market Street, and then Chestnut Street
sits in between, and again on South 11th Street. This is sort of a very far away aerial view,
but it's around all the major high-rise buildings that we're familiar with on South 11th Street,
Market Street, and Chestnut Street, with the small street being Ludlow Street. This is the building,
if you're familiar with the area.
This is the Ludlow Street view.
It has a ground floor of Honeygro
and it's a mid-rise building
next to the Jefferson,
brand-new Jefferson Honigman Building.
Just the zoning posters that we posted
on all sides of the property.
Again, another view
just from the Ludlow Street side.
Another view. This is currently some of the exterior photos of the space.
The exit, mechanicals, some green space, I don't know why there's a picture of that
mat here's the inside showing the ventilation and again more photos as mentioned um so just
permits just showing the other uses in the building and for uh the takeout and restaurant
downstairs which is the honey grow this is where in the code we're seeking um a special exception
for as you can have roof decks for residential uses would be permitted by right but for some
reason for non-residential uses in CMX 3, 4, and 5 we would need a special exception so that's
what we're here for. We had a meeting with the Washington Square Civic Association on Tuesday,
May 27th and as mentioned they sent us a letter this is the notices we sent out and they sent us
a letter, 10 people in non-opposition of this project. We also have a letter of non-opposition
from Councilman Squilla's office, and we have Mark Wallace from Core Architecture who's
here as well to just quickly go through the plans and be able to answer any of the more
technical questions that the board may have. Is there a Mark Wallace in the virtual audience?
And he's coming in now as a panelist. Thank you.
Hello, ladies and gentlemen of the board.
Can you please state your name and spell
for the stenographer mark wallace m-a-r-k w-a-l-l-a-c-e do you swear or affirm to tell
the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth i do please proceed counsel uh mark can you just
go through the plans for the board that i have on the screen please yeah so essentially um there are
three shades of gray on this uh on this site plan the darkest shade is the enclosed area that we plan
on building the bar structure. The medium gray area is the exterior deck, and the lightest gray
area is the footprint of the existing building. Essentially, our goal is to have a structure that
is mostly non-visible from the street, so we worked hand-in-hand with the historic department
to make sure that we set back our structure so that it is not visible from Market Street all
the way down 11th and then um we have a drastic setback on the ludlow side so you can't really
see anything on the ludlow street roughly we are enclosing the area of the existing roof deck
Roughly, we are enclosing the area of the existing roof deck, and we are expanding that roof deck then out past that about 18 feet in the Ludlow direction and about 7 feet in the 11th Street direction.
and these are just the site sections showing um the existing structure how the roof slopes
and how our enclosed structure will sit and how the deck the adjacent deck sits
one from um cutting through north south one cutting through east west
thanks mark yeah just worth noting that we did get this
approved through the historic commission um through staff level approval so um this has been
supported and approved by the historical commission at the staff level
um other than that if i could just bring on the owner josh uh rosenblum just to adopt my testimony
Mr. Rosenblum, we see his hand.
Yes, and he's coming in as a panelist.
Thank you.
So you're still coming in?
here we go. Can everyone hear me? Yeah. Mr. Rosenblum, could you please state your name
and spell for the stenographer? Sure. Josh Rosenblum, J-O-S-H-R-O-S-E-M as in Nancy,
B as in boy, L-O-O-M as in Mary. Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth,
the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? I do. Please proceed, counsel.
Thank you, Josh. Have you heard my testimony today? Do you believe it to be true and accurate,
and do you adopt it as your own thank you thank you questions from the board
yes for the access to this restaurant how will patrons get to the sixth floor so there is a
there's a lobby along the southern um party wall side that will be a main entrance in there they
will gather in the lobby and then come up to the space there's also um a currently it's a bagel
shop that the goal is to operate in tandem with um the the rooftop bar and eventually the uh
people will be queuing through that space the bagel shop has access as well it'll have access
to the lobby so so it'll it'll provide a way for people to come in and be um to have access to
their elevator okay and then what's the because it just because it's not included in this
permit what's the plan for signage and like wayfinding
um we don't have any signage as part of the application currently um when we come uh we
don't have an operator mr rosenblum is the owner of the building so our goal is to have the
structure um erected and then find a tenant that would occupy the space and at that point
applying for signed permits would be on the tenant.
Okay. And so the lobby that we're referring to is the doors to the right of the bagel shop?
Yes. So if you're looking at the lower right-hand corner of those four photos,
it is the main entrance to the commercial spaces above currently. And then again,
the goal is to find an operator that will take both those spaces.
And then what are the other commercial uses that are happening in the building on the existing floors?
So it's just the two. It's currently the bagel shop and the honey grow.
So the other four floors are currently...
I apologize. I thought you were asking just the first floor.
Yeah, there are offices throughout.
Other questions?
Yes. When you said people would come into the lobby and then go up into the space,
So is that steps? Is there an elevator?
Elevator access would be the main.
There are two existing pilot houses that come up to the roof for emergency ERS off.
No patron hopefully will ever use them.
Hopefully it will only be the elevator access.
Okay. And there is, what about accessibility?
um uh what about accessibility yes so it's an accessible entrance along the 11th street side
Yes. So it's an accessible.
and you'll be able to um the elevators are along the accessible route and they open up into the
restaurant space which will also be fully accessible all right thank you questions
questions or comments more attorney actually one more question what's the anticipated occupancy
of the of the space that's now going to be on the sixth floor
um i believe we are around 200 patrons i believe but um all of the infrastructure um meets code
to support that i don't know the exact entrance because again it's going to it's going to come
down to who the operator is so um i mean the prescriptive method of the code i think we were
right around 180 but again seating can change and our permanent change based on that sure but you
guys still enclosed the space assuming that it was going to have some type of layout so i guess my
thought is like what because there's no plan right right now we're just looking at no we can bring
up brachel can you bring up the floor plan please we have plans and renderings okay give me one
One second.
And while we wait, I have a question.
How will you guys determine hours of operation?
Will it match what the existing restaurants are down at the bottom?
levels
josh do you want to take this one um yeah sure so the um uh the plan for the the restaurants on the
ground floor are more daytime operations so the the restaurant the restaurant on the rooftop would
be more of an evening time uh into nighttime operation um we are not planning to have it
open more than, say, 11 o'clock at night at this point, but the actual final determination
will be worked out with the operator when they're brought on board.
Sorry, it's a lot of stuff. So, no, I don't. That's the wrong. Do you have it on your screen,
Mark? I do. I can pull it out. I would appreciate that. Thanks.
i guess while you guys are pulling that up for mr rosenblum uh what was sort of the
what drove your decision to decide to put a restaurant here um
well a couple things the main the main thing is that we think that the area itself is um a good
candidate it's a good neighborhood for uh for nightlife and hospitality and uh we think that
it's an interesting building that would be a good draw for something like that and we think that
there are not enough rooftop experiences in Philadelphia generally, perhaps in part because
of the requirements of the code. And so we think that having a good opportunity to do something
here where you have an interesting building in a great location that has minimal housing
residential uses in the immediate neighborhood, it seemed like a really good place to try to do
something interesting and creative that would help continue to spur the development of the area.
Okay. Does everyone see my screen? We should. Okay. So these are the initial renderings of
the space. The interior is a little bit vanilla on purpose because, again, we're trying to attract
a tenant that would have their own aesthetic. Moving into the floor plan, we do have a series
of um interior and exterior seating um of course when inclement weather and throughout the winter
either won't the deck really won't be in use it will just be the internal um space um and our
total count 48 54 and 14 are the amount of seats i had that somewhere i apologize for not having
that plus 14 we're currently showing 116 seats um where's the location of the commercial kitchen
there is no kitchen okay it will it will just be drink service and light fare
got it and so there's no prep stations no refrigeration well there will be refrigeration
We have under-counter refrigerators for drink storage, and there will be the proper health department sink mix for essentially cutting citrus fruit to put in drinks.
Can you point out where that is anticipated to be?
Can you point out where that is anticipated to be?
So we have the bar along the eastern side.
All of that work will take place either under the bar or on the back portion of the bar.
We have a series of commercial refrigeration, dishwashers, all under counter equipment.
And triple sinks, vegetable sinks, hand sinks, all of them are in here.
okay and then they would go into this i guess this hallway and take this the singular elevator
down to the lobby that's like that would essentially be the only way to access
correct this is there's one there are two elevators in the building one only one stops at the elevator
or i'm sorry stops at the sixth floor um they the the other one stops at the fifth floor um the main
entrance would be here we would have a hostess they would come through i'm sorry you guys do
see my crosshair yes okay um so uh there is um there'll be a hostess to greet them and sit them
and um the the goal is to have a um uh a higher level drink experience rather than a local corner
barb okay questions for our attorney hillary emerson not at this time what's your comments
for the virtual audience i see no hands chair commission good afternoon chair members of the
board liz fuselay liz last name fuselay capital f-u-s-e-l-i-e-r on behalf of the philadelphia
city planning commission do you swear or affirm that tell the truth the whole truth and nothing
but the truth i do please proceed the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the cmx5
commercial mixed-use zoning at this location the property in question if completely redeveloped
would allow a much taller building than the proposed six sixth story edition this building
previously received approval from this board to add a sixth floor with commercial use in 2015.
given its context the proposal for a roof deck for non-residential use is unlikely to cause
detriments to the local community beyond what might otherwise be expected and is compatible
with existing uses nearby therefore the planning commission recommends the board grant the proposed
special exception for a non-residential roof deck mi 2025 001 890 15 to 21 south 11th street i vote
yes michael johns my vote is yes cheryl gaston my vote is yes tanetta graham my vote is yes
Ryan McAdams, my vote is yes.
I win.
My vote is yes.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Rachel, we'll have another case here for you.
Thank you, everyone.
All right.
Thank you, everyone.
All right.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Rosenblum.
MI 2025-001893, 3408-50B Street.
Rachel Pritzker is the attorney.
We have a letter of unanimous opposition from ASEE, and we also have a letter of support from the 7th Ward RCO.
Rachel, just for the record, could you state your name?
Yes, Rachel Pritzker.
Could you identify your client, the relationship to the property?
Yes, my client is Judah Angster on behalf of 3408 B Street, LLC, which is the owner of the property.
And our board member, Tenetta Graham, has a few questions.
Good afternoon again, Rachel. Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of this hearing?
And do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Thank you. You may share your screen and proceed with your case.
Great. Thank you.
So this is a refusal for 3408 B Street.
some of the board members may remember this project from like two years back
as this property back in 2023 was granted a variance for the erection of an addition
above an existing two-story structure for use as 50 multi-family dwelling units
with 16 class a bike spaces parking eight parking spaces for off-street accessory parking
to include one van accessible space which was approved back in 2023 and issued in 2024.
Since that time we've tried to get work with the project to get it financed and also
we're trying to resolve concerns around having 50 units and only eight parking spaces.
The developer spent a lot of time with the architect and construction team to figure out
how do you include additional parking spaces which we'll discuss which requires an additional
structure to lift the building up to provide parking can't do underground parking as this is
an adaptive reuse of a long-standing blighted structure that hasn't had anything
an adaptive reuse of a long-standing blighted structure that hasn't had anything going on with
it since at least 2017. And so although we went through and were successful at that process,
we decided to bring it back to make the project a little bit better, address some of the parking
concerns, and provide, again, a raised parking because you can't go under the building
for 38 spaces as opposed to the 30 and an additional 25 units to help support all the
additional structural needs of the building in addition with improving the landscaping
security facade and other requirements for this project the site is zoned i2
so it's an existing industrial warehouse again this is a an adaptive reuse and the refusals
that we have are again for the multi-family even though it already was approved for multi-family
for the building height 60 feet which is permitted in i2 versus 72 feet that we're proposing and then
for off-street loading spaces which is mostly triggered by the i2 zoning classification for this
site just some of the information for the appeal again it's zoned i2 it's almost 20 000 square foot
intermediate lot featuring an existing structure that's been vacant and was prior to the current
owner was used for unpermitted warehousing since at least 2017 it has sat vacant and blighted ever
since there were holes in the roof there were a significant amount of violations on the property
including an imminently dangerous violation which my client resolved and did all the repairs
in order to bring this property back into a safe condition there's was probably i don't know five
or six different um violations that were resolved uh by the now current owner and again um when the
client purchased the property we went back through it went through the process to get 50 units and
eight spaces put her back here again which we think makes it a better project um most of the
conditions are related to the doing an adaptive reuse in an i2 zoning district and again trying
accommodate 30 additional parking spaces and the structural steel and things that are needed to do
that while also making a building that is financially feasible given the amount of work
that goes into this adaptive reuse the areas surrounding it which you'll see at the zoning
maps is a lot of rm1 which is why i think the board granted the variance originally because it's
mostly around multifamily development. And it's on B Street in the city. So it's not really a
commercial corridor, a strong industrial corridor anymore. And so kind of the multifamily use is in
line with both the residential multifamily directly adjacent to the property and also
the residential single family. Again, given this is a 20,000 square foot lot with an existing
structure proposal for single family is not appropriate here for this the loading zones
i think our architect probably explained better than i do but i think the requirements based on
my understanding the code were based on needing four loading zones which relates to the i2 zoning
i don't know that a building for 75 units would need four loading zones typically is for industrial
uses with frequent deliveries which is not applicable for this project in particular
and so we kind of align this project more with the rm1 use considerations and we will have loading
and things of that nature i will be working with ppa for that but we're not able to provide four
loading spaces for this building we went through civic design review and now in front of the zoning
board of adjustment and um for whatever reason i think due to some court or rco coordination
and council office coordination we were assigned two different rcos for different parts of this
project which is probably why you which is why you see the two different letters the uh assay is uh
their boundaries sort of abut this um and have a little bit of overlap but the seventh ward rco
RCO has residents that are directly in this neighborhood and the ward leader who runs
the RCO lives across the street from this property.
So that's why you see their letter of support.
And again, I'll go into the community a little bit just so the zoning ward can see the makeup
Just so the zoning board can see the makeup of the zoning near the property, as I mentioned, you have sort of this I2, which is our structure, a little bit of an island over here where a lot of the other I2 is concentrated more on the right side of the screen.
of the zoning.
And then you have mostly residential and multifamily, a little bit of CMX2 a few blocks away.
but this certainly isn't a strong industrial site and obviously it's been vacant for quite some time
so just shows the lack of of investment and um viability of this site in particular for for
industrial again surrounded almost entirely by rm1 and again across b street rsa5
this is an aerial shot just the board can kind of see the size and scale of this building
building. So it is really quite a large site. And even just from the aerial view, you can
see kind of the nature of the building. This does a better job kind of showing the current
site conditions. Again, the current owner has cleaned up this space a lot. It's got
no violations on it. And, you know, given the need for approvals, it hasn't been able
to be fully developed into an adaptive reuse multifamily property
which is also showing showing the zoning posters the lot spans both 3408 through 50 b street so
if you can get a sense of the size of this this photo does a bit of a better job just showing
sort of the the linear nature of how long this and big this industrial structure is
Again, another photo.
It's just the zoning archives to show the prior approval as I mentioned for the 50 units
and eight parking spaces.
This is where in the code that you can't have multi-family in I-2, same with the other
their height considerations, and the loading zones.
As mentioned, we went through Civic Design Review, which was approved after just one
hearing by the Civic Design Review, which I included information about that in this
presentation.
We went to both a meeting, we did a combined meeting with both RCOs.
We thought that that would be a little less challenging and confusing for the community
groups and also for the neighbors when we noticed them to invite them to one meeting where we
discuss both civic design review and zoning at the same meeting given we didn't want to notice
two different rounds of people for two different things and that meeting was back in i believe may
May 1st.
It was via Zoom.
Here are the notices that we sent out, 255 notices for this meeting.
This is the letter of support from the 7th Ward RCO, again, that is directly adjacent
to the property.
The ward leader lives across the street and most of the residents affiliated with this
RCO do live in directly adjacent and in that directly adjacent community.
They provided full support for this, and a lot of it was because this was kind of the only property that had been kind of an eyesore still, as they had seen a lot of other redevelopment with the other industrial structures nearby.
Bye. I'm going to go through the plans. I think maybe last, well, I guess maybe we'll have our architect. Can we bring on Raymond Rolla to just go through the architectural plans?
And then I can go through the civic design review comments and go from there.
Why don't you go over to civic design while he's coming on?
Sure. So as mentioned, we did civic design review for this project because even though we'd gotten 50 units approved and this is an existing structure, the additional 25 units required civic design review.
As you can see from this rendering, you can kind of see the other buildings along B Street and kind of close to the property that have this kind of large scale industrial structures.
it's not like some of the other projects i've seen where you have just like one big industrial
building and kind of everything else is leveled as a single family you know 38 feet or 28 feet
so it kind of isn't matching with the adjacent structures around it and again because the the
nature of what's needed on this building in addition to to parking have to provide a number
of units that can function in this building we have an elevator we're going to have landscaping
lighting, security, steel structures, rooftop as an amenity as well.
um as well so just given the nature and the quality that that the developer is looking to
So just given the nature and the quality that the developers.
provide in this neighborhood um we needed the additional units in addition to wanting to
include the parking this just shows the site context which i think we've gone through and
this just gives you kind of an idea of what this project looked like before this developer
took it over this has literally been sitting for almost 20 years with nothing going on to it no
investment no interest and um we are proposing a significant reinvestment in this site um to be
able to kind of eliminate that blight from this community all right the architect please
hello hi sir could you please state your name as bell for the stenographer my name is ray rolla r-o-l-a
Walnut Street, Suite 1300
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
I do. Please proceed, Council.
Yeah, Ray, I just wanted you to go through the plans. I don't
know that we need to go through all the
details on Civic Design Review, but
do you want me to go to the zoning plans?
Yeah, go to the site plan that shows
the parking. I guess we can start at the lower level.
There we go. Scroll down a little bit.
Okay, so this is the, I'll actually go up because this doesn't show the parking on the exterior. I guess we want to see the, yeah, this will show it. Okay. So at the bottom of the screen, you can see the ground level plan. You can see there's open space to the south, which is on the left side and open space to the right.
there's sort of existing parking in those two areas. So we've taken the ground floor of the
building and turned it into parking as well as utilities and two elevators and two fire exit
stairs. The way that the parking works is you enter from the south side through a gate, a
security gate, and you turn right. It's all one-way parking. So you come in, you make a right
into the building and there's diagonal parking for approximately the first half of the building
and then there's parallel parking just past the lobby area. So there's the total of 38 parking
spaces and landscaping as required by the city planning and the zoning code. And we also have
a trash pickup area across from the lobby entrance where trash will be held and trash
pickup will occur through the north parking area. Dumpsters will be rolled out through the door
and into commercial trash trucks. Okay, next level up a little bit. Okay, so this is a typical
floor plan where we have, I just want to check my notes here, 61 bedroom units, 15 two-bedroom
units, total of 75 units. The light color is the one-bedroom units. The dark color is the two-bedroom
units. The one bedrooms are around 600 square feet, and the two bedrooms are around 700 square
feet. And they're very comfortable units. All rooms, the living spaces have windows with Juliet
balconies. There's a laundry in each unit. There's also provisions for a very energy efficient HVAC
system that provides fresh air directly through the exterior of the building, the BPAC units.
And each floor also has a very generous lobby space off of the elevator, which is kind of like
lobby spaces in the sky. And so each floor basically is that floor plant. And then there's
the roof deck. You can also see part of the reason that the building had to
exceed the height limit of 60 feet was because the first two levels, because we
wanted to reuse the exterior wall of the existing structure, those windows are
very high, provide for very high ceilings and also the high space for the parking
area, so we couldn't really squeeze all of those floors into the
required the height of the building. And so the exterior of the building is
designed as the masonry is going to be restored on the first level. The parking
area openings are going to be done in decorative glazed brick so that we
provide more visual interest at the at the street level. Done in glazed brick
this used to be a fabric mill they made wool worsted wool so we kind of played off of that
and created a pattern of glazed brick for the openings that are required for natural ventilation
for the parking area and above the brick would be above the masonry would be metal panels and
You can see the Juliet balconies and also the exterior VTEC units.
and also the exterior VTEC units.
Here you can see the upper level will be two-tone of metal, kind of breaking up the facade.
You can clearly see the Juliet balconies and the V-PAC units providing energy efficiency and fresh air at all times to the units.
This would be the entrance.
We were hoping to do some kind of an artistic mural.
on the front around the entrance, and also there'd be sidewalk lighting attached to the building,
so the sidewalk would be bright. We've included a lot of street trees and bicycle racks, and so we
feel that the streetscape will be a very lively space. These were some solar studies that we did
in order to determine what the shadows were like now in the existing building, as well as what they
would be if you did a 60-foot high building, which is by right, and what the difference would be
between a 60- and 70-foot building. One of the interesting things is that the shadows, because
the building is oriented north-south, you really don't get a lot of shadows for a long period of
time in any one place. A lot of times during the day, the shadows are heading north, and there's
an industrial site to the north. So I think the Civic Design Review was very appreciative of these
studies for for not blocking the sun for any extended period of time to for the neighbors
this is just a shot looking at night again there will be sidewalk lighting another rendering of
the building and a view from the roof deck very uh dramatic view from there into center city
These are the lobbies on the upper floors that I mentioned, kind of a place where people on the floors can kind of sit down for a minute and get to know their neighbors and provide a more sociable environment.
This is the parking area at the lobby where we've made a space for smaller trucks for a short-term loading that they could unload.
If somebody's moving in or out, the truck could park there for a short period of time, not block any other cars, and furniture could be loaded or unloaded there.
It's another shot showing some of the higher buildings in the area.
just the uh cer packet and application um
this was the um letter from civic design review as i mentioned they concluded civic design review
after one meeting and stated that seventh ward rco was in support of the project they had also
acknowledged that they had not sent the correct email to the other RCO as far as the timing of
the meeting or the date of the meeting, but they had reached out right before. And again, that was
an advisor, as we know, an advisory meeting. And they had sort of, Planning Commission kind of
had apologized for that, but we did have some RCO representation at that meeting and stated that
it's been an eye store for 20 years and they um also had wanted us to look at there was some
surrounding lots in the back of the uh property that might be uh available to be improved as well
sort of the last kind of pieces here mostly their comments were about sustainable metrics and color
of the great panels um and can do items like that include a dog run and uh other residential space
They again confirmed that this was completed for this meeting.
It's also worth noting that at the community meeting we had with both ASE and the 7th Ward RCO,
one of the ASE had brought up was a kind of speculative concern around like would 30
additional parking spaces cause more traffic. We had shared that we believe that no additional 30
spaces, as opposed to the eight, was going to actually alleviate parking. But we went ahead
and got a traffic engineer to write a report and study it a bit just to make sure that we provided
them something from an expert. And ultimately, what this report states is that this actually
would alleviate traffic, not cause more traffic, because you'd be bringing 30 additional spots
onto the property as opposed to off the street.
And that given the two driveways on B Street,
this would help alleviate a lot of that, any congestion.
Obviously it doesn't eliminate all the congestion
in that neighborhood or in the city,
but that adding an additional 30 units
uh that adding an additional 30 units was actually going to be uh beneficial um to kind of and and
was actually going to be beneficial.
would cause insignificant differences as far as adding congestion uh specifically the proposed
75 unit building will not result in significantly higher volume of traffic than what was generated
under the prior proposal um and that would not have any adverse impacts the current proposal
with 38 spaces would generate less traffic than the previous proposal to provide eight spaces.
The only other thing kind of worth mentioning is that we went back and forth after the community
meeting that we had with both. We got a letter of support, as you have, from the seventh ward RCO,
and then we were pretty surprised to get a letter of opposition from seven members of ASE.
We went back and forth with them over their concerns.
We, in order to address the parking, we got a traffic study.
Then the concern was affordability and density, so we said to them that we would, and senior living, so we agreed to do 10% of the units dedicated for seniors.
It's also an elevator building, so it will be accessible to seniors.
I think also some of that lobby space that was mentioned on the upper floors allows for some congregation.
more akin to seniors, and also that we would also have a senior discount for the entire building.
So try to address those concerns. We had looked at removing units from the building,
but we had explained that given the need for parking and the structures that that wasn't going
to work. And we went back and forth for months up until like a week ago, trying to satisfy their
requests, and it just wasn't feasible to add more than we were doing. In addition to,
we offered up the roof deck as a community space as well so that anybody from their organization
or others that needed a place to meet could utilize the roof deck as a meeting space for
community-related activities or meetings. Ultimately, again, the directly adjacent RCO
RCO was in support of this. So that's why you have those two letters. And we do believe that,
you know, given all that we've presented today and all the sort of fair dealing we've tried to do
through months of this, that we'd ask that the board consider the seventh ward RCO letter and
those additional, you know, concessions that we made and were willing to make. We have really
wanted to work with everybody, but one project can't satisfy every single requirement. And
we weren't able to ultimately satisfy their last request, which was for, I think, between 30 and
50% of AMI for a 50-year deed restriction. This is not a subsidized project. This is not getting
any state money, federal money, city taxpayer money. It's not part of a program. It's not
included with PHA. And so we're not able to do a 50-year deed restriction for a project like this
um for that level of ami and so what we'd offered we had thought was um sufficient or at least what
we could commit to so um that's where this stands and uh if we could bring on judah angster to
just adopt my testimony and then we're happy to take any questions that the board may have
no we were joining
can you hear us judah yes no i do great date your name and spell for the stenographer
my name is judah angster j-u-d-a-h last name angster a-n-g-s-t-e-r you swear a firm to tell
the truth told you is nothing but the truth i do please proceed counsel judah have you heard my
testimony today do you believe it to be true and accurate and do you adopt it as your own
yes i do thank you questions for the board yes could you restate for me again the justification
for going up an additional 25 units so sorry go ahead so um part of the reason we decided to pause
even though we were approved for 50 and we were ready to pull permits for 50 apartments,
is that the local neighborhood had mentioned parking as being an utmost concern for them.
And I had promised some of the folks in the meeting that I would see what I could do with
our architects to try to accommodate more parking. So we went back to the drawing board with Ray
Rollin. We tried to explore ways that we could increase the parking. The only way
was to go basically with a ground floor parking, creating a steel structure,
because you need to have a special fire rating between the residential and the steel structure
and that fire rating is really thick really intense and has to last for several hours in case
And that fire rating is really thick, really intense and has to last for several hours in case, God forbid, there's a fire in the parking garage.
And by doing so, the cost to build that structure is so much that without the additional apartments, you can't afford to build it.
You need to have additional revenue to balance out the cost of that structure.
The other issue we ran into is as you're creating this higher ceiling to accommodate the parking garage, you end up going higher in elevation by a few feet above what was typically permitted.
So that created the second refusal that we have to go for.
And finally, one of the concerns was they didn't want to have cars parking loading and offloading into the building.
So what Ray designed was actually a loft, a loading dock within the parking area.
So that way, when people are moving in or moving out, they wouldn't have to disturb any of the folks in the neighborhood driving around.
Those reasons combined is why we ended up with a building that's a little higher than what's permitted and with more units than what we originally were approved for.
Our initial design with the parking, which we tried to attempt to accomplish, was the 38 parking spaces with just 50 apartments.
but it wasn't financially feasible. No lender would give us the money to build it because it
didn't make any sense. So we had to just add a few more units, which is just one floor. That's
all we asked for was one more floor above what we were already approved for in order to accommodate
that extra cost. And frankly, during the meetings, we were incredibly open with them.
We said, we want to address all your concerns. We're approved for 50 units today. I can pull
permits for 50 apartments with eight parking spaces and tell the neighborhood, I don't care
about your parking problem. But we really wanted to work with the neighbor. We are a neighborhood
conscious developer. We're not the type of group that goes into an area to build without the
support of our neighbors. And so we really are trying to accommodate them. But during the
meetings, we said, listen, we can't give you certain restrictions, but we'll do whatever we
can. They said, well, we have a lot of seniors in our community. I said, great. We'll give a
senior citizen discount and we'll designate 10% of the apartments for seniors, period. And they
said, well, our seniors need a place that they can relax. I said, okay, every floor, instead of
taking space for an apartment, we're going to give more space into a lobby on each floor because some
people aren't so mobile that they have a place to relax. Well, there'll be a couch, there'll be a
little table, there'll be a place where they can relax outside of their apartment. And then they
mentioned, what about the rooftop deck? I said, well, we're happy to share that with the community
once a month, any community group that wants to throw a function and needs a location can utilize
free of charge our, you know, they can't throw a party, but they can throw any type of meeting or
group meeting or function once a month on the rooftop deck. We're happy to work with the
community. And they sounded really positive. And during the meeting, all we heard was positive
notions and positive accolades. And then there were some emails where they asked for a little
bit more and we accommodated. Then they kept going and seeing how far they could go. And the last
email was literally, I would say today we're on Wednesday, but the last email was on Thursday or
Friday last week where they gave us a list that was impossible to comply with and said, if you
don't do this, Asia is not going to support you. And we were reviewing it with our architects and
reviewing it with our financial folks. And they all said it's impossible. And at that point in
time, we said, hey, we're here to work with the community. We want to add parking. We want to try
to do what's right we have all trash services contained within the building that means that
the exterior side of the building will not have any trash pickup it trash room is in the building
um trash collection is happening from within the parking garage i mean we're doing everything we
can to be a good neighbor here question for you um the your original project what was the the
total square footage and cost per square foot versus the new
plan square footage and the cost per square foot.
So that needs to be the rub, right?
Yeah, that would be the big differential.
Give them one second.
We actually have this on.
Google Drive.
Dan, your B Street numbers are on the Google Drive.
so it sounds like you really did try to accommodate a lot of uh the requests so
yeah and with that like nine plus months right with what that means in terms of making those
changes and what you had to do to kind of get get to to kind of where you are from a buy right you
had the you had the 50 unit eight eight parking spaces kind of you could build right then
to not only was it wasn't by right uh well not by right but I'm saying you were you were ready
to go was approved correct ready to move and having this sort of wanting to do this accommodation
having this sort of wanting to do this accommodation and add that you needed to add
and add that you needed to add
this. I just want to understand what that meant. I'm pulling it up right now.
Okay. Our 50 units without the parking came out to a, and this is a per unit price because the
square footage varies a little bit between the residential and the non-residential came out to
per unit cost of about $145,000 without the parking structure per apartment. That came out
to a total of hard, soft labor and subcontracting, $11.78 million to do the project without the
parking. The parking structure component alone is almost $2 million extra of expenses.
If we did the 75 unit absorbing the cost of that parking structure within the building,
it will come out to being basically $154,000 per unit. So we're spending $10,000 more per apartment
to build the infrastructure, right? If we do the 75 units, because we were able to blend away some
of the expenses, as opposed to if we did the 50 unit. If we did the 50 unit, it would be cheaper
for me i can do the 50 unit all day long it's much cheaper all right thank you i have a question
about the entrance into the building so now that you've added the parking what is the like lobby
and egress into the main building going to be like for the tenants so rachel if you can pull up the uh
sorry and there's two there's two components to it right there's the parking garage um entrance
yeah i guess because you guys had a lot of renderings and i don't remember seeing that
on the floor plans um i can pull up this site plan too which i have a little bit further up
which might be yeah go to the ground floor plan you passed it i think yes
okay perfect the lobby is is rather small if there's two elevators there and there's
a fairly large mail room because buildings like this need need a lot of space for mail
so we have a large uh counter space for mail on the right side we have some space for one
of the exits to exit through the lobby. We had to push back the glass wall that leads into the
parking garage because I didn't want anybody walking directly into the traffic area. So
if we can, during construction drawings, you know, nip and tuck and make that lobby a little bigger.
But the positive thing is you have all these lobbies in the sky on top of it. So the lobby
at the ground floor is not going to be a place where people hang out and get to know their
neighbors it's going to happen upstairs on a floor by floor basis on a more intimate basis
and there's a large window at each lobby can be furnished as judah had mentioned especially for
elderly people who love to sit around on a chair and talk to their neighbors and uh talk about
what's happening in the world uh i think that's a better uh approach than having having a large
lobby that really doesn't have a function totally get the functional spaces for the tenants i was
just really i'm just trying to understand how people are getting in and out of the building
the functional parts that um and then trash is being stored in each individual unit no let me
go through this ray i want to go i want to leave this part go to the park perfect rachel stay on
that screen please okay so we have a drive-through garage which means folks are entering on the left
we have accommodated parking which is going to be for uh handicap accessible closest of course
to the lobby uh and then they're going to exit on the right so it's a full drive-through so there's
no there's a one-way traffic zone in that garage portion you're going to come through the lobby
which you see on the bottom part of the screen there's going to be an emergency stairwell a
fire escape there and then to the left are two elevators that can go on each up to each floor
if you were to continue through the garage you're going to see a trash room
that trash room will have the trash compactor and we'd be connected to a trash chute which will
also be on each floor and what we do currently in our buildings each trash room has a trash chute
and it also has recycling bins and we also have a place for people to leave boxes for large
deliveries that they've received and every day the cleaning crew will go through every trash room
taking out the large boxes taking out the recycling or anything that was too large to go through the
trash chute so this allows that folks aren't keeping trash in their apartments long periods
they're also not dragging trash through the hallways down the elevators out into the garage
to throw it into a dumpster it's an efficient system that we maintain really really well
okay and the two elevators there's no freight elevator it's just the two elevators
off the lobby there are two elevators but they're going they're going to be large enough to be able
to accommodate move in and move out so it's going to be almost like a freight level okay
Okay. And then the only other thing I would say is a comment, like to have 75 units, I think understanding the community wanted to accommodate seniors. It did seem like this was an ample opportunity to offer up some affordability.
and then the only other thing i would say is a common like to have 75
So our rents are already pretty low. We don't build super luxury. We try to create what we call middle market apartments. Our rents are at a really reasonable price.
But with that, we also have them maintain a really high occupancy in our building where we know that folks are happy to stay and live there for a long period of time.
The challenge with today and with this building in particular is we're not using any tax dollars.
We're not using any money that's coming in from, you know, any public works.
And we do that because we really believe in what we're doing.
And we also do that because we think that the way that we're designing our apartments really makes sense for the average working person in Philadelphia.
understood um okay i have just one question which is what's the breakdown of the um units i mean
how many is it one bedroom two bedrooms they're mostly one bedrooms as you can see the corner
units are going to be two bedrooms um the advantage to one bedrooms is that they can work really well
for either young folks who are working and or a couple they can't afford a lot of rent and it also
co-work well with seniors who want to downsize from a larger building or a larger property
and just want to have, you know, a clean, quiet space of their own. There'll be a few two bedrooms
on each floor, but for the most part, this is a one-bedroom building. And that'll help minimize
also the impact on the local school district. This helps minimize the impact on traffic as well,
because you won't have, you know, large families living that might have three or four cars
in these in these apartments. So I didn't get a number. So how many
two-bedroom units? There's 15 two-bedroom units and 61 bedrooms.
Okay. Thank you. Sorry about that.
Yes. So in reviewing the refusal and the plans for this, I noticed that
there and you talked about it quite a bit um that there's a roof deck and roof deck access
structures um while those are included on the plans those are not included on the refusal
um so i discussed this with ellen i and they did advise me that there really needs to be a corrected
refusal issued here um because that the roof the roof deck and the roof deck access structure
structures need to be noted in the scope of work um and based on a quick review of the plans they
may also generate another refusal.
So I would just ask that the board
hold this matter if they weren't already
because we will need to request
a corrected refusal.
That's fine.
Thank you, Hillary, for looking into that.
I think just, Chairman,
if Sloan folks from the council office could...
If you give me a chance,
I want to call for questions
or comments in the virtual audience.
sloan's not there he's raising his hand uh chairman chairman folks how are you sir
good afternoon chairman and uh zba board my name is sloan e f as in fire o lks i am uh
Representing the Office of Councilmember Kathy Lozada, room 40 for the City Hall.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do, sir.
Please proceed.
I'm going to speak directly on the community process.
There are two separate and different letters from the RCUs.
The council member, the council member, I'm sorry, the council member reached out directly today to both leadership, both RCO leaders to discuss the project.
The Seventh Ward RCO has representation that's more directly affected by the project.
They have a vast number of seniors and residents that live around the project, and during the
community meeting process, they showed a great deal of interest in actually finding homes
at the project. The council member is going to support the project based on those meetings with
both RCUs and the input that she received from the residents of the community.
um of the community
okay thank you anyone else in a virtual audience
no hands chair planning commission good evening chair and members of the board
liz fuselay liz last name fuselay capital f u s e l i e r on behalf of the philadelphia city
planning commission this proposal previously completed its civic design review the civic
design review committee's advisory recommendations are not an expression of the city planning
commission's recommendation or opinion regarding zoning variances special exceptions or other
discretionary approvals associated with this proposal the comprehensive plan recommends no
change to the i2 medium industrial zoning at this location this property received a variance from
this board last year for 50 dwelling units on this industrial industrially zoned location
the current proposal would increase the number of proposed dwelling units from 50 to 75.
the appellant has demonstrated that there are unique physical conditions and circumstances
circumstances of this property that would prevent it from being used in conformance with the zoning
code. Therefore, the Planning Commission recommends the board grant the requested
variance for multifamily use, maximum building height, and off-street loading requirements.
Thank you. Counsel, as our esteemed counsel has said, we're going to come back with this.
Hillary, what do you want to do with this? We'll give it a date or once we have it.
um just i would give it uh just two we'll vote in two weeks two weeks we'll vote on wednesday
at 2 p.m thank you very much okay thank you thank you i'm going to take a five minute break
but let's come up and get ready we'll be right back i i've been watching you guys sit there
2025 mi 2025 002 371 260 in west rittenhouse street
Alex Goldberg is the attorney.
Mr. Goldberg, could you just state your name, please?
Alex Goldberg.
You've been sworn, if I remember right.
I have been, yeah, Alex Goldberg.
Right, and could you identify your client in the relationship to the property?
My client is Danielle Bush.
She's sitting to my left.
She owns the property.
Okay, and Danny Graham has a few questions for you.
Good afternoon.
Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of the hearing?
I have.
And do you stipulate to the refusal?
I mean, do you, I'm sorry.
I'm just chewing.
Do you waive the reading number of refusal
and stipulate to its accuracy?
I waive the reading.
I believe there's an error.
There's something omitted.
I discussed this with Attorney Emerson.
I'll let her sort of fill in the details on that.
Yeah, so.
Don't you love when she finds things that are missing?
I just.
So in looking at – so the applicant in this case had applied for an amended refusal to have commercial space with uses in the CMX2 zoning district, and unfortunately the way the refusal was worded, it's still listed as vacant commercial space, but it's a vacant CMX2 commercial space, and it didn't give a refusal for those CMX2 uses, which it should have.
um it's clear from the rco's letter that they understood that that's what the applicant was
asking because they asked for restrictions on those uses um so i had suggested to mr goldberg
that um this is something that could be addressed via proviso um so if the board is inclined to
grant we can just hold this for a week and i can put together some proviso language just to be clear
um what's what's being granted yep so thank you sure sounds like a plan
okay um can i be um promoted as a panelist
you haven't you will be very soon
thank you
all right um so 216 west rittenhouse street is the address this is an rsa5
property really in name only. I think that the zoning should probably be changed for this
property. It's got a long history of a residential unit on the second floor, a commercial space at
the front, and this is a long property. Marion Street is the cross street. You can sort of see
it on the left side of the image here. There's an office space there that my client and her husband
have used for their own uses and a garage that my client and her husband have used for their own
uses, they want to go through this process to basically formalize the zoning so that
formalize the zoning so that they can rent those spaces out if they wish here is the notice of
they can rent those spaces out if they wish.
refusal we have multiple principal uses on the parcel we have that vacant commercial space we
have a business and professional office we have a wholesale distribution and storage use really it's
a garage my client's husband is a contractor he keeps his construction equipment there but i think
they would be be interested in allowing you know a tenant to be able to do the same there
and then a single family there's an apartment above there's been a history of permitted you
know commercial uses here but because it's an rsa5 property anytime the commercial use changes
you have to go through this props process in 2017 there was a bmw service center 2018 was natural
Root Salon and Extension Bar. 2019 was a facial, skincare, and lash extension place. None of them
lasted very long. They'd prefer to have some flexibility to finding a high-quality tenant
that will be there for a long time. That's the reason why we're asking for that CMX2 commercial
space. As you'll see on the zoning map, that commercial use is contextual. We're adjacent
to CMX2.5. We're across from CMX2. That's how we landed at the CMX2 use. Here's correspondence
from the coordinating RCO. They were in support. It was a well-attended meeting. They had two
provisos. The first one was that they asked for us to not have any commercial uses that are
prohibited in the overlay that falls on this property. So we have no issue with that. The
overlay would not allow it. And then no sale of smoking products. My client is not interested in
having that type of business here. So we have no issue agreeing to that as well.
here's a zoning map so again corner of rittenhouse street and marion street there's very large
apartment buildings directly across from us that one's under construction and then to the right of
us that one's complete you know this corner intersection here there's kind of a lot going on
and very clearly um you know this has a long history of commercial use at this site this is
the front of the property. It's been vacant for some time. Here it is in 2011, that same
commercial storefront. As I mentioned previously, there's been a mix of commercial uses in and out
of there. My clients also own 218 West Rittenhouse Street. Here is the Marion Street perspective.
So you have these two garages here. That's where that wholesale storage use is going to be as
proposed. And then there's a door right here sort of where my mouse is and that's where the office
space is. And I have interior photos of all this to show you. Here's the posting photos from both
street frontages. Here's that large apartment building to the right of the property. Here's
the one directly across. This is to the left of the property. Here's Marion Street to the right
and Marion Street to the left. We're not proposing to do any construction at all to this property
aside from the future tenant build-out that'll be in the commercial space this is the apartment
rather nice they don't have any tenants in here at the moment this is a listing photo
they have had tenants here in the past and that apartment is about 800 square feet one bed one
bath here's the commercial space vanilla box it's about 750 square feet and it does have a bathroom
here's the office space uh it's about 800 square feet and it has a little loft as well that you
see that staircase running up to a little kitchenette
and here's the garage also has a loft you'll see on the plans there's two garages they're
detached from each other um you can see that here i'll zoom in so the the plan that i think
you should pay the most attention to and i'll show both if i can on the sunscreen is the one
on the bottom um here's that commercial space it has entry from rittenhouse street the residential
apartment also has entry from rittenhouse street in this little staircase there's that bathroom
to the commercial space there's a space back here in between the office use and the commercial use
that's where the utilities and the mechanicals are stored
and that's owner access only
moving backward on Marion Street
here's the office space
you have that
you have a bathroom
you have that loft here
you can see the loft up here
there's these big skylights
that shed a lot of light down in that office space
and then here's the two garage spaces
they are
1,700 square feet combined
approximately
And it also has a loft the larger one
Here's the RCO meeting notice.
Here's the RCO meeting notice I have
I have interior photos for you, if you just bear with me.
I'll just pull those up in one moment.
Here's the RCO meeting notice.
We met with the 59th Democratic Ward.
Again, they were in support of this project.
The notice was mailed out.
Here are the properties that it was mailed to, 96 in total.
Mailing certificates, application for appeal, deed to the property, and tax clearance.
So with that, while I'm pulling up the interior photos for the board's view, I would ask my client to be sworn.
Could you pull the microphone and turn it on and bring it close to you?
Hi, could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
Danielle Bush, D-A-N-Y-E-L-L-E-B-U-S-H.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, told truth, nothing but the truth?
Counsel?
Ms. Bush, did you hear my testimony today?
And was it true and correct?
And do you adopt it as your own?
Thank you.
Questions from the board?
Questions or comments?
I do have a question.
So in the future, are these going to have, like, suite numbers to be able to delineate, like, if a tenant comes in and they have to come back to zoning for any reason?
For which?
For any of them, because there's now two garages.
There's the office and there's the retail space and the apartment.
Just sort of, like, administratively, how will they be identified?
I'm not sure how that will function.
um hillary i don't know if would you just apply generally for that use and say tell the examiner
it's for a specific space usually when we're in a multi-tenant building when we apply they ask for
a general plan so that they know exactly where they do but i feel like we usually like i'll
provide those suite one or floor one yes so we so
generally a use applies to the entire building unless it's specified at a certain location
And I think, honestly, I think they're trying to do, it's my understanding that they're trying to do away with, like, identifying specific suites and stuff so there's not as many people coming so they can just have it applied to the whole property.
However, that gets a little complicated when you have tenants coming in with specific units.
um so i'm not exactly sure what lni's process is but in this case because it because it is the
the owner applying um the way the refusal is written this you know this applies to the whole
building and if there was all three will apply to the whole building um technically the garage
right before the four well and then you have to get excuse me you have to get a use permit just
to confirm whatever the cmx2 use ends up being um but yeah that the way this is written is that
they would apply for the they would apply to the entire building yeah it seems weird to have a
residential unit that technically have a commercial space in a garage approved to be a single family
residence yeah i mean it's a funky building any other comments from our attorney um i i did have
a question. So the refusal for the tobacco products. So one, there's not a specific use
for that. And two, that's technically regulated by the health department. However, businesses
do have to have the correct zoning to be able to sell tobacco. Normally that's some
sort of retail sales um so would your client be okay with no retail sales period or would like
i don't think so i mean my understanding from the community meeting was that they weren't
interested in us having like a convenience store or something like that or obviously you know like
a pipe place or a smoking lounge or anything like that and some of that is allowed in cmx too
which is what you know which is why they wanted some assurances that we would not have those
types of uses but retail as a whole i think closes us off from a lot of viable uses one of the
potential tenants they're talking to now is i think she makes dyed yarn or something like that
i think that would be a retail use selling that so yeah i think i mean
And for, I mean, there's, so there's, we just had this come up the other day.
I mean, there's a drug, there's a drug paraphernalia category, but that's not necessarily going
There's a drug paraphernalia category, but that's not necessarily going to encompass, I think, the tobacco products they don't want to see.
I mean, it's really – it all kind of falls under consumer goods, retail sales of consumer goods.
I think that's what people typically need to have in order to be able to sell tobacco products.
um and then sometimes i think well sometimes people will do that also with food beverages
and groceries although i think technically they need the consumer goods part so that would be
like the that would be the probably the section of if your client was okay with not selling
tobacco products it would have to be like no retail sale of consumer goods but i realize that
that might be more limiting than you would like but we also are a bit constrained on what we can
do with tobacco both because the health department regulates that and also um state law limits what
we can do as well front so what would you do with the storefront if you can't do retail sales
yeah i don't think that the rca i can't speak for them i don't think their intention was to
limit us that much um we were on board with what the conversation was which no sort of
negative yeah so i don't know if you know i i understand that the board would want to honor
what the rco is asking for but if what they're asking for is a result of that is you know so
So let me – I'll just look at one other thing because it's possible that in this area, tobacco permits are capped.
So even if you wanted to sell tobacco products, you would not be able to.
So if that's the case, then that might help them be like, look, we couldn't get a permit if we tried because they're capped.
So I'll just – I'll take a look at that.
But I suspect this area may be capped because most of the areas in the city are.
you can't get its back apartment to sell products so that works for us yeah i'll take a look i did
have one other question is there a rear yard no so for the businesses in the future where are they
going to be doing loading garbage and are they all separately metered in that interim interstitial
space yeah so as far as garbage and loading um we don't anticipate with the the office use and
that small commercial use we're going to have there's going to be a lot of deliveries or loading
needed um it would you know it would probably be happening on rittenhouse street because it's a
wider street and we wouldn't be blocking the street uh as as easily um do you know if there's
any loading spots on on rittenhouse or marion there's large apartment buildings directly across
they may have loading spaces um i don't think there would be a lot of loading in and out of
the garage spaces because they would pull into the garage um so
questions or comments from the virtual audience
planning commission chair we do have a hand um charles richardson and he's coming back in as a
panelist good afternoon again mr chair um mr richardson you uh are always there uh just state
your name and proceed yes sir charles richardson r-i-c-h-a-r-d-s-o-n office of councilwoman cindy
bathroom 508 city hall uh with regard to the commercial space in the front i do know that
the rco and the community he was not interested in convenience stores uh smoke shops things along
those lines so you know any type of proviso that could be you know that there could be figured out
that would be beneficial and would be not opposed as long as there is some kind of movement towards
you know possibly no retailer things along those lines it depends on types of retail and that type
of thing but at this point you know she is is is not opposed but again leaning towards those
provisos that the 59th board has put forward. Thank you sir we appreciate it. Anyone else
their virtual audience planning commission good evening chair and members of the board
liz fuselay capital f-u-s-e-l-i-e-r on behalf of the plant philadelphia
city planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the existing rsa5
city planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the
residential single family attached zoning at this location this location has a documented history
of commercial use on the first floor the appellant has demonstrated that the proposed uses would not
cause detriment to the community beyond what might otherwise be expected therefore the city
planning commission recommends the board grant the requested variants for multiple principal uses and
business and professional and wholesale distribution and equipment and material storage uses with a
recommended proviso of interior trash and material storage along written house thank you uh hillary
two weeks one week one week so uh next wednesday at 2 p.m we'll vote sounds good thank you very
much and thanks for being patient okay um we're going to go right into the 3 30 list
first of all is there anyone whose case has not been called on the 2 p.m list
i see no hands chair good afternoon my name is bill bergman and i will be
chairing this meeting of the philadelphia zoning board with me is our board member cheryl l gaston
present mr chairman or member tanetta graham president mr chairman board member michael
johns president mr chairman board member taiwan president chairman or member ryan mcadams president
mr chairman also present is the board attorney hillary emerson and our board administrator
lakeisha dandy recording of this hearing will be posted on the zba website by participating
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Number five.
number five mi 2024 006 1228 14 brighton street um this case has been continued
to 3 25 26 at 3 30 at 3 30 p.m
is there any other requests for continuance
i see no handshare number one i have no exhibits mi 2024 006 137 67 north 63rd street this is the
second listing um case was continued on 2 1926 um and miss janice ferguson appeared we still
do not have any exhibits. Ms. Ferguson.
No hands,
Chair. This is the second
listing. We still do not have any
exhibits. So
MI 2024-006-137-67
North 63rd Street, I vote
to dismiss.
Michael Johns, my vote is to dismiss.
Cheryl Gaston,
my vote is to dismiss.
Toretta Graham, my vote is to dismiss.
Brian McAdams, my vote is to dismiss.
I win, my vote is to dismiss.
And MI 2024-006-058-120-66 Abbey Road, this case has been withdrawn.
MI 2024-006-112-120 Scherz Lane.
one one two one twenty shares lane william o'brien is the attorney
William O'Brien is the attorney.
there's a letter of opposition from the manning out neighborhood council
mr o'brien please state your name is spelled for the stenographer uh good afternoon mr chairman
members of the board william o'brien obr ien from the manny uncle office on behalf of main street
properties, the owner of
120 Shores Lane. Do you swear
or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing
but the truth? I do.
Tanetta Graham has a few questions for you.
Good afternoon, or evening. Have you
submitted your documents five days in advance
of the hearing? Yes, I did.
And do you waive the refusal
and stipulate to its accuracy? I do.
Okay, thank you. You can see your screen and proceed
to put your case on. May I be
elevated
to a panelist?
We'll take care of that.
and as a panelist
you have to accept um permission to okay here it comes
and if i may share my screen please
You're coming up.
Bear with me, I'm sorry I had it.
There we go.
Well, I submitted the documents as indicated in this index page.
There are a total of 11 documents.
I'm going to focus my presentation on the first six, but I do wish the final five to be admitted into evidence, that being the zoning notice and UPS.
And deed and revenue clearance and the other items.
This is an application to legalize multifamily use in a portion of 120 Shurer's Lane.
Let me skip to the, this is an aerial image.
This is from the Philadelphia Water Department parcel viewer.
The property is outlined in red.
It's the city block.
It's about 36,000 square foot, oops, 36,000 square foot lot between Shores Lane to the south, right side of the image, Jamestown to the north on the left side,
The Crescent Street elevated rail line behind the building to the east and Station Street to the west.
This appeal focuses on the third floor of the building, which is approximately 14% of the 43,000 square foot structure.
And that's in this corner on Jamestown, the third floor of my cursor is now.
I'm going to go through a few photographs.
So this is the Jamestown facade.
You can see there's two floors.
That's actually the second and third floor because of the slope.
station street to the to the west is actually the ground floor which is just
out of view those doors to the left of the image are the entrance to the
building at that level there's a lobby right and left of the elevators are
Right and left of the elevators are commercial areas on that floor.
commercial areas on that floor
The elevator serves the second floor.
This is the second floor lobby.
You can see in the distance one of the two fire exits from this floor.
And then this is the lobby entrance looking with Jamestown on your right, the elevator there in the distance on the left.
this is a hallway looking with Jamestown to your back looking along the the hallway towards
in the direction of Schur's Lane and this is the opposite direction with Schur's Lane at your back
and looking back down at Jamestown as you can see the hallways are well lit they're clean
and they're decorated with art this is a trash room on the second floor that's dedicated for
these five apartments. This is a cycle storage area on that floor, which is being used by the
tenants. This is the second of the two fire exits, and this is the staircase from that exit,
and this is an image of the exit outside.
The final photograph shows in greater detail
the entire floor is as a fire suppression system.
This is an image of that area.
This is the floor plan.
Bear with me while I try to find it again.
Okay, because you can see the floor plan.
And there are five apartments.
They range in size from 790 square feet to a little over 1,000, 1,044 square feet.
Four of the apartments are two-bedroom.
The one towards Shrews Lane is a one-bedroom apartment.
Are these existing?
These are existing.
Each of these have washer and dryer.
They proposed the existing zoning for this building is ICMX, and multifamily is not permitted.
But the surrounding uses allow multifamily, and I'm going to show you this exhibit.
I'm getting there, bear with me.
Video, these are on a laptop.
Okay, so this image shows Scherz Lane, Jamestown, and Main Street.
The property is identified on Main Street A through G.
Have commercial on the first floor and multifamily above a total of 34 units in those buildings on Main Street.
The two properties on Schur's Lane, H, is 11 Schur's Lane, which is also zoned ICMX.
This board granted a variance last year.
That building is now under construction.
That's the one along the railroad.
That's right next to the rail line.
Right, right.
Right. Up the hill. Right. For 42 units. I remember. And then I is a building that zoned I2, which was approved for 162 units. I believe that's going to be reconsidered later in a few weeks. Right.
But it was approved for 162. So this use, and again, the hashed area in the 120 Shores Lane, that's the area of the building that we're talking about. Those five units are in that location. This use is compatible with all of the surrounding uses. And the change from ICMX to allow multifamily has been done before and very recently.
And then this is just a summary of those properties, the number of units in each building.
And then the following pages are all the zoning permits and proof that those numbers are supported by the record.
And that's about it for my presentation.
That's about it for my presentation.
Well, how long are the.
Bill, how long have the units been there?
The units have been there five years.
And explain to me what's...
I can't excuse the fact that they were introduced without permits.
I can certainly explain it.
The building, as I've represented, is large.
It has an extraordinary debt insurance and tax burden.
There was a commercial tenant in that spare area in the third floor who left near the end of 2018.
The owner spent over a year trying to find a commercial tenant to take the space and was unsuccessful.
Soon after the city closed as a result of the COVID pandemic, the owner made a decision.
He had to do something.
So he went ahead and made the change.
He put five apartments.
He put five apartments.
Five apartments.
I will note that it is fully sprinklered. As far as I can tell, it's been built to code.
He did self-report this. This is not as a result of a violation notice.
And if the board grants the variance, the next step will be to file a building permit application to legalize the improvements, which will include complete inspection.
The owner, Mr. Dan Edison, is in the virtual audience. I'd ask him to raise his hand.
And he'll be back in as a panelist.
could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer
Daniel Robert Netison.
Netison is N-E-D-U-C-S-I-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, counsel.
Good evening, Mr. Netison.
Are you the managing member of Main Street Properties LP?
And have you been in the virtual audience listening to my testimony?
Yes, I have.
Was my testimony truthful, and do you adopt it as your own?
Yes, I do.
Thank you.
Questions from the board?
Yeah, I have two questions.
The first question is, have there been tenants consistently since the apartments have been developed?
Yes, they've been occupied for the last five years.
One of the current tenants has been there for three.
The rest, all the leases are one-year leases.
They currently expire anywhere from April to August of 26.
There is no parking in the building.
However, the owner is a member of the Manningham Development Corporation, which operates four parking lots in Main Street.
And through that membership, there is parking available for a fee.
I did check. None of these five tenants have taken advantage of that.
And could you just summarize the opposition that you received at the RCO meeting?
Well, the opposition was, I guess, a level of indignance because of the owner's self-help. And because of his experience, they thought that that was highly inappropriate.
I will note, if you take a look at the meeting summary, which I think is page two of the materials, it notes that there were 40 members present and there were 15 votes recorded in opposition, which means that 37% were opposed.
and 64% or 63% were not opposed.
So it's a bit of an anomaly that they reported as opposed.
But there was no real objection to the use itself.
It was more indignation that an owner with this experience
would have engaged in self-help.
So there was no concerns with sort of building management,
cleanliness things of that nature it was all just the nature that this was done
off the books and netizen properties has been managing multi-family uses in maniunk for
almost 40 years and have won many awards for their their property management
and then is the plan once approved or if approved and permitted to get a rental license yes
Any other questions?
Any other questions?
Questions or comments from our attorney?
Not at this time, Mr. Chair.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
Yes, Chair, we have Mr. Hunter.
Mr. Hunter, you can unmute yourself and wait for the chair.
Good evening.
Hi, Mr. Hunter, could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
Yeah, my name is John Hunter, H-U-N-T-E-R.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth, Mr. Hunter?
Please proceed.
Thank you.
If you look at our original letter, it was dated back in January when the meeting took place.
And Mr. O'Brien characterizes our response as being indignation, but I don't think it was.
It was just trying to understand how a property development and landlord-managed company was in such a situation where they allowed this to happen, and without any documentation that, I mean, even Mr. O'Brien's recent photographs, there's no view inside what the residences are like.
And although the building's sprinkled, sprinklers have to be accommodated to the layout.
So the original sprinkler layout would be for an open office environment, I assume.
The building itself, as Mr. O'Brien said, these units only take up 14%.
The rest of the building is taken up with a variety of different ICMX uses,
such as Architect's Office, Landscape Architects.
Temple Health is directly below these units.
They have an office there.
And it provides ICMX uses,
which are useful to provide a broad range of uses for Maniank
and also to be compatible that the parking requirement
tends to be a daytime requirement,
whereas the majority of the surrounding properties
are of residential use,
and therefore the demand is in the evening.
What we couldn't establish is exactly what this proposal to legalize the property, even though the actual refusal talks about proposal, but they are actually, as Mr. O'Brien has said, is that they're already there and they've been in operation for some time.
What happens to the rest of the building? And is this just the first stage of what would be sometime in the future a precedent for converting the whole of the building into residential use?
The actual residential uses for this particular suite is not really ideal.
The building backs up onto the elevated railway line, and so the only windows are on the south side of these units.
And if you looked at the plans a little more closely, those are where the bedrooms are located.
So the kitchen and living areas are internal.
They have no windows as far as we can see from the plans, assuming that the residential units were developed as the plan show.
So all in all, we just think this is not only a curious and unusual situation, but we don't think it's one that's appropriate for the use of the building and maintaining the ICMX use for the whole of the building.
How it's resolved, given that there are tenants with, I assume, leases already granted, we didn't know.
So it wasn't indignation. It was more a level of how do you get out of this situation?
And we don't think that it's appropriate to just legalize these units.
And so that's where the level of opposition came from.
Just to sort of try and explain Mr. O'Brien's question about the vote.
Our meetings are recorded from when they start via Zoom, and at the very beginning, there was a number of people attending.
I can't remember exactly, but I think the January meeting that this occurred in was quite a busy meeting, and it's not unusual for people to leave the meeting, especially when it's a Zoom meeting, because it's easier to do, and they don't vote.
They don't vote, and therefore that reflects a unanimous vote, but less than the 40 people that attended.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hunter.
Anyone else in the virtual audience?
I see no hands, Chair.
planning commission good evening chair and members of the board liz fuselay last name spelled f as
Planning Commission.
Good evening, Chair and members of the Board.
in frank u s as in sam e l i e r on behalf of the philadelphia city planning commission
the comprehensive plan recommends no change in zoning at this location from the existing
industrial commercial mixed use icmx the proposed use as multi-family residential is compatible
with the commercial residential corridor surroundings and will not cause detrimental
impacts beyond what would reasonably be expected. The Planning Commission recommends the Board grant
the requested variance for multifamily living. So MI 2024-006-112-120-Sherz Lane, I vote yes,
with proviso, certificate of
occupancy to be obtained after
proper
certificate of occupancy to be obtained
after proper inspections.
Michael Johns, my vote is yes with proviso.
Cheryl Gaston,
my vote is yes with proviso.
Tanita Graham, my vote is yes with proviso.
Ryan McAdams,
my vote is yes with proviso.
Iowan, my vote is yes with proviso.
Thank you, counsel. Thank you.
Thank you.
Number six.
Mr. Goldberg is back.
MI 2024-006-161-1434, West Van Angus.
Letter of support from Nyonga, from Nicetown, Tioga,
Improvement Team RCO.
Seven in support, one opposed.
uh mr goldberg just for the record state your name you've already been sworn
alex goldberg um could you identify your client in relationship to the property
my client is man property holdings llc uh which is the owner of the property and its representative
winston manning is in the virtual audience okay and tenetta graham has a few questions
good evening have you submitted your documents five days in advance of this hearing i have
And do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes, I do.
Okay, thank you.
You can share your screen and proceed with your case.
All right.
So this is a case that we were retained for after the community meeting occurred, so I was not at the community meeting.
It's a letter of support.
If the board wants any more color from how that meeting went beyond what the letter says, my client can testify to that at the conclusion of the presentation.
this is a property that was approved for three dwelling units in 2017 by this board
the five under prior owner my client purchased the property last year that prior owner then
got a building permit in 2018 started what appears to be started the work based off of
the interior photos that you'll see and then i think they ran out of money covet happened
and they abandoned the project um so it's framed out for three units my client purchased the
property and just sort of wants to finish the project uh that's the the 30 000 foot view of
the situation here's that refusal um just for use as three family household living in an existing
attached structure letter of support from nicetown tayoga uh seven in support um a couple people that
wanted more conversation and and one uh in opposition um there was discussion it appears
about you know monthly rental rates about hiring local contractors and having you know good open
lines of communication with the rco all of which my client is on board for here's the philadelphia
2035 plan proposing to change the zoning of this property which is currently rsa5
to rm1 which would allow the proposed three dwelling units as of right
comparable density in close proximity 1424 which we were in front of the board for not that long
ago 1425 west venango 1433 1507 so not out of character the multi-family use on this 1400 block
of west venango here's a redfin listing just showing how the property was advertised when
my client purchased it in july of 2024 as a multi-family structure which it was properly
approved for you can see that permit here in 2017 it was approved for the three units
zoning map single-family zoning in close proximity to broad street and all those cmx3
properties here's the photograph so this is an accurate depiction of the current condition of
the front hoping to do some you know it needs some tlc restoring you know that facade and
Hoping to do some, you know, it needs some TLC, restoring, you know, that facade and cleaning up the brick.
cleaning up.
Here's the rear of the property.
Here's a posting photo to the right on West Finango and to the left.
Interior photos is just basically the shell.
My client hasn't done any, you know, additional work than the condition that he bought the property in.
So there's not much there.
Just framed out units.
Here's the plans and drawings. So we've got three one bed, one bath units, about 800 square feet each. The living spaces are all facing the front on Venango and the bedrooms all face the rear. There's an existing basement, unfinished basement. It has an existing basement walkout. We're just planning to use it for storage and utilities.
but it is accessible from the first floor unit only the upper level units will have
ventilated trash closets and the trash for the first floor will be stored in the rear yard
my client who you'll hear from in a moment will self-manage the property as he self-manages
several other properties in the city of philadelphia here's the rco meeting notice
he created with that refusal 105 properties were notified here's a receipt from that mailing
certificate a little different than what we usually provide the board but this documents that
more than the 105 mailings were provided 110 in total application for appeal
deed to the property and tax clearance so with that I'd like to ask Mr. Manning to adopt my
testimony mr manning if you're in the virtual audience please raise your hand i think he's
still around i texted him not that long there is and he's available chair yes can you hear me okay
now. Hi, sir. Could you please state your name and spell it for the stenographer? Sure. My name
is Winston Manning, W-I-N-S-T-O-N. Last name is M-A-N-N-I-N-G. Do you swear or affirm to tell
the truth, told truth, nothing but the truth? Yes. Mr. Manning, could you turn on your video?
I'm not sure how to do that, sir. Yeah. All right. Okay. So, all right. I see counsel.
Winston, did you hear my testimony today? Yes. Was it true and correct? Yes.
and you adopt it as your own i do thank you okay questions from the board
the plans is shown as the existing condition or are there any changes that or is this proposed
it's framed up as this it is already framed as though um do you happen to know when they started
construction in 2018 had they pulled framing permits and done the city inspection i see a
building permit um but i'll alteration or full i'm gonna pull it up right now i had started to
pull it up it's an expired commercial building permit um for alterations with complete change
of occupancy erection of an addition at the rear um building to be fully sprinklered separate
permits for mep and fire suppression work yeah because i was just wondering what that addition
So the addition is done?
Okay, because there was also an addition permit from 2014,
and I was trying to figure out if they were...
Neither of them looked like they were closed out.
I think we should...
I mean, it needs a CO anyway, but yeah.
That's fine with us.
I thought we should turn the board.
Do you know if the meters have already been separated?
Uh, Winston, do you, can you, uh, no, no. So what I know about the property is that there was a building inspection done or framing, excuse me, framing inspection done. Um, it had passed, but since that, none of the work got done and then, and the permits expired is what I know. So there's no electrical work done. No.
Okay. I would just for you, I would still suggest that you have a structural engineer look at that.
Sure. Of course.
It has nothing to do with zoning. That's just my
advice. Comments from our attorney, Hillary
Emerson. Not at this time, Mr. Chair. Questions or
comments from the virtual audience? Yes, Chair
Charles Richardson.
I'm here.
It's apparent. Just for the record, state your name.
certainly charles richardson r-i-c-h-a-r-d-s-o-n please proceed sir and office of councilman
certainly charles richardson r-i-c-h-a-r-d-s-o-n
please proceed
cindy bass room 508 city hall the councilman has no objection to branding the variance
thank you very much is there anyone else in the virtual audience
no hands chair planning commission good evening chair and members of the board liz fuselay on
behalf of the philadelphia city planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends
a change in zoning at this location from rsa 5 residential single family to rm1 residential
multi-family the proposed zoning would allow three dwelling units without a variance the city
planning commission recommends that the board grant the proposed use variance for three dwelling units
Thank you. MI 2024, 006161, 1434 West Vananga Street, I vote yes.
Michael Johns, my vote is yes.
Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes.
Tanetta Graham, my vote is yes.
Brian McAdams, my vote is yes.
Iowa, my vote is yes.
Thank you, counsel.
Thank you.
And thank you for hanging out.
Yeah, have a good night.
Okay. Number two, MI 2024-003-972-4018 Lancaster Avenue. Sharif Islam is the owner applicant. It's a pro se. This application is for use as a takeout restaurant in an existing structure. The proposed use takeout restaurant requires a special exception approval in the CMX2 zoning district.
Letter of Support from Hope, Philadelphia
Mr. Islam
Oh, sorry, I was talking on the mail
Yes, yes, sir
Could you please state your name and spell it for the stenographer?
Sure, thank you very much
Good evening, everyone
My name is MD, Shariful Islam
First name, MD
The middle name is Sharifu, S-H-A-R-I-F-U-L.
Last name is Islam, I-S-L-A-M.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
One of our board members, Tanetta Graham, has a few questions for you.
Good afternoon, good evening.
Have you submitted your documents five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, I did.
please proceed sir uh thank you very much uh you read the refusal to the record already oh yes
so let me share my screen
thank you sir it's coming up thanks all right so i am the owner of 4018 lancaster avenue
Philadelphia, Lancaster Avenue, first floor, Philadelphia PA 1904.
I applied for joining permit but that was last year and the L&I denied that and they
They give a deny and I need a specific exemption to approve this case and their referral and
I appeal that.
That was last year.
This is the appeal application.
So this is the application I did last time under my property and here I want to summarize
some questions.
it's uh mr islam this is what i would recommend you do sure i think you should show your plans
for the property and also show us some photos of the property thank you thank you sure
we have all your paperwork yes
That's your RCO meeting, right?
Can I explain on the RCO, Rebecca?
On my RCO meeting with the neighbors and communities, there was more than 15 participants and all
of the participants support me.
So my community leader, my community leader, Kevin, Kevin Brown,
leaded that meeting and I voted in favor on that project.
Right.
Right. We have a copy of that. We have a copy of that letter from the RG.
We have a copy of that letter from the auditor.
this is
This is my deed.
Let me go down.
So the project doesn't have submitted any plans because I am looking for now the joining
permit.
After that, I will provide all of the designs, so I don't have any submitted currently any
designs.
needs. So, this is tax documents. I have paid all taxes. This is the notice.
Mr. Islan, let's go back a minute. So, do you have copies of plans, what you're going
to do with the building? No, because for this case, I don't have
any plan, but the initial plan I have, first, the L&I said you have to take the joining
permit. When you come for the zoning permit, you have to show us your plans and photos
of the property. Yes, sure. If you showed L&I plans, we need plans.
Sure. So, this is the property, 4018 Lancaster Avenue, and this is the street view on the
property. Let me go to my property. My property is third, three stories building on second floor
and third floor has a residence and this is the residence door and this door is for my store.
So this is store used to is a barbershop. I am converting to a restaurant that's I'm looking
for a zoning permit, this property is about more than 14 square feet and this picture
is presented.
This is the apartment door, this is the easter door and this picture is presented.
This picture is presented at the walkway in front of the building and toward the street
to the city from the building.
And I want to explain.
This is the main insight of the building picture.
So I have planned to make a restaurant if I get the joining permit.
So, this should be a takeout restaurant.
So that means not sitting restaurant.
So on the back side of this space, I want to make a kitchen and front side, I want to
make a, this is the entrance, the arrow we can see on the left.
So then the customer can pick up food from here.
I want to make a counter here.
Mr. Islam, hold up one minute.
um hillary can we have can we make this resumptive hearing or he'll come back with some kind of
plans well he's not required to submit plans to lni because this is a change of fees application
yes thank you yes right well we don't know we don't we don't have to he's not required by lni
so it's kind of hard for us to require it as well but he's he's showing photos i mean once he gets
to, I believe if he is approved and has to go to the health department, they're going
to require plans at that point to show like where the kitchen and all of that is.
That's the second step.
That they said from L&I.
So, and this picture is the backyard.
I want to take care of my trashes.
So it's a big backyard, so I don't have any congestion to make my trashes or other work
on the back there so this mark is present entrance to the basement also I have another
entrance of the basement so I can install some unnecessary things in the basement so
I have on this call I have some witness I have some supporters and neighbors they are
neighbors there can be businessmen around this neighborhood. So, they are listed on this page.
Now, this is the last page. I want to explain why this project is important.
This restaurant will serve as a model of Indian-American halal food.
This restaurant will serve as a model of Indian-American halal food.
That's very important to communities because this neighborhood is a mix of people.
There are many Indian, Asian, African, international students.
They are studying at Drexel University, Penn University.
So, according to my research, it's very important to make this type of model of Indian-American
and halal food. Also, I research in this neighborhood has many Muslim people. They are always looking
for halal food. That's why I am going to make this project as a halal food-related restaurant.
Also, there are many international visitors and international students around here. So,
So I searched on the Google and I found 1.5 miles around my property doesn't have any
halal Indian related restaurant.
So this project is this type of restaurant and this project is very important to me.
So that's why I'm looking forward to build this restaurant.
So that's all.
All right.
Questions from the board.
Do you have a photo of the basement?
Basement is as same as my store size, but I don't have any picture on the basement right now.
And then, so what's your, what's going to happen in the basement once you, if you were to get approved?
I don't have any plan on the basement because I have big store, big space in the, in the first floor, also the backside.
So basement right now, totally neat and clean and finished basement basement.
But in future, probably I want to keep some unnecessary stuff like my ladder, my other things.
So right now you're anticipating that all your storage is going to be on the first floor?
Yes, yes, correct.
And then are you going to be the operator of this restaurant?
Are you looking?
I am the operator, yeah.
I want to run myself, yeah.
I just want to inform based on your stick.
I want to show you a picture.
uh this is a building same category of building of mine uh this is one of my family member is
running there is a groceries there is a restaurant also so i i have good knowledge we have good
knowledge how to management the neighbor environment and traffic everything so just
as a reference so right and then my last question is given that your last use on that commercial
space was a barbershop what is your plan for exhausting for the restaurant um i want to make
a new plan for um decoration to make my restaurant so as i mentioned my restaurant is a takeout
restaurant so but you would your commercial kitchen would still have a full you still want
to have a full stove set up right yes correct on the be doing live cooking on site is your plan
exhaust out the back of the building on the back of the building means the you see that i have the
um lot of space on the backyard so that's my plan uh here to do it on the back instead yes yes so
totally you oppose the roof did that come up in the rco meeting at all um what is the question
sorry so would you oppose having to do it through the roof my roof is totally brand new that's i did
two two two years ago so yeah so the exception fan i don't know put on uh through the roof yes of
course okay of course of course i think that's are the apartments already laid out above are they
existing or what uh the apartments uh second floor my parents is living uh sometime i also
live but uh currently i'm leaving another address but my parents is living on second floor and third
floor i rented okay so the so the apartments are already set up as apartments yes totally uh
finished up yes and what are your hours your operation gonna be uh it should be our
restaurant so nine to six initial plan yes
can be a little bit late like nine to seven because this is a very busy spot and bus uh
trolley there are many people is going on there there are many shopping centers so
depends on the business but initial my plan is nine to six oh and is there already a bathroom
on the on the commercial space yes this is a bathroom sorry this is a bathroom here yep
i don't have any other questions questions or comments from our attorney
questions or comments from our attorney
um so just to clarify um mr islam you are just seeking this use on the first floor and i guess
the the basement as well because you will be using that for storage eventually um
the stories i don't need to keep anything just i explain there is a nice bed uh basement but for
storage like food storage or other water or whatever restaurant related um storage i don't
want to do in basement because i have big this is a actually 1400 1500 square feet there is a uh
this is a bathroom and behind the bathroom there is another room big room also behind the room i
have the backyard big backyard so everything i have planned to do on the first floor and safely
But do the residential units have access to the basement, or is it only the first floor commercial?
No, no. Residential door is totally different. They have everything separate.
Okay, so they could not access the basement?
No, no, no.
Okay, so it's only the commercial space that can access the basement?
Okay, I thank you.
Yeah, all right.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
here we do have one hand up and i have allowed them to speak sure
why could you please state your name and spell it for the stenographer
hello hi could you please state your name yeah uh my name is uh kajol shaha uh 4d section
lancaster avenue uh spell your name please uh my name kajol k-a-j-a-l and shaha last name is
shaha s-a-h-a you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth
yeah yes um proceed with your comments yes i interest for that this project is a good project
because this area i don't see i i have a long time for here but i don't see for asian food and
you know indian and american food for for near me so i interest yeah but thank you very much
for calling we appreciate it is there anyone else in regards audience
no more hands chair planning commission good evening chair and members of the board liz fusel
on behalf of the philadelphia city planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends
no change in zoning at this location from the existing commercial mixed-use cmx2 the proposed
use as takeout restaurant is compatible with the commercial corridor surroundings and will not
cause detrimental impacts beyond what would reasonably be expected the planning commission
recommends that the board grant the requested special exception for takeout restaurant thank
you mi2024-003-972-4018 lancaster avenue i vote yes michael johns my vote is yes
charles gaston my vote is yes tennetta graham my vote is yes i am mcadams my vote is yes
i win my vote is yes thank you sir you have your votes thank you very much thank you everyone
Good night.
Is there anyone in the virtual audience whose case has not been called?
I see no hands, Chair.
We're done.
We're done.
Thank you, everybody.
And, you know, we had a new person for planning here.