ZBA Hearing - October 1, 2025

through Wyoming Street you would walk up the stairs here to the second floor there's a long

hallway here you can walk down the here hallway here and you could actually exit again on Hurley

Street so there are two methods of egress to this building you can exit on the side you can enter on

the side hurley street go up the stairs and enter each apartment and you could come out the front

on wyoming street um and i'll go through the apartments basically they're all small one

bedroom apartments they range from 350 square feet to 525 square feet i'm just going to enlarge it

little so you can see it a little better. So you can come in. So they're all occupied now too?

They're all occupied units. This is basically a larger one bedroom unit. This is the living

dining room area. Here's the kitchen. We have a bathroom area here with a full tub. We have a

den in the back here, and then we have a bedroom. The second unit is a smaller unit. It's a one

bedroom in the rear. You have a bathroom with a bathtub in it, and then you have the living room,

dining room, kitchen area here. The other units are made up similarly. You walk in this unit,

you have the living room, dining room, kitchen area, you have the bathroom area here, and you

have a bedroom here. Similarly, the fourth unit is basically made up the same and the fifth unit

is made up the same here. I'm just going to go back to the main presentation here

and I'm going to scroll through some of the pictures. This is really a super commercial

area. There are businesses on both sides of the street. Parking in the daytime is somewhat of an

issue most of the businesses close at eight o'clock and there's ample and sufficient parking

in the evening after that that's a straight on a look at the business

i took some interior pictures to show you we're hardwired we have the correct exit signs and the

fire extinguishers and here are some pictures of the interior of some of the apartments they're

very well appointed. Nice kitchen areas, nice counters. This is one of the smaller apartments

that has the bedroom in the front. Here's a picture of the bathrooms. It's a picture of the

posting. This is the hallway. I tried to show you on the plan. You can come up one way, you can walk

all the way down the hallway, and you can

exit the building.

Sorry about that.

Is that one commercial unit on the first floor?

Actually,

it's like two spaces, and one

is occupied. Can you still see

my screen? Yeah.

I can't. We see the

entrance.

All right.

I'm going to slide down a little further.

that's just the uh stairs uh exiting the building i believe that's on hurley street

uh this is uh one of the bedrooms before they were all occupied

That's another exit, exiting on East Wyoming Street.

that's the another exit exiting on east wyoming street

And that was just another picture of a room before it was occupied.

That's the entrance to the apartment.

Here is the back of the building, and it actually is a little alleyway.

It's actually locked, which was a concern of the community.

They wanted to know whether or not the residents would have access to the alleyway.

The owner indicated that he'd be happy to give them a key.

Sometimes, depending on how much trash is stored in here to the trash day,

some days the trash is actually stored on the outside.

It's just another picture of one of the kitchens.

But here's an outside picture of the side of the building on Hurley Street.

As you can see, there's a side entrance, which I showed you,

which the stairs lead up to the second floor out here sometimes we store the trash out here in the

back sometimes we will store the trash in the enclosed gate here we do participate in the city

trash program the city does pick up our trash at the meeting they were concerned about the lighting

on the outside we did indicate that we would put some additional lighting there there was also some

safety concerns concerning exiting the second floor and i believe um we did notice a meeting

here's the meeting i believe about seven or eight people attended the meeting

here is the proof of mailing i did send out 141 notices uh we did get a letter of support uh

looks like there was five people that voted i think there were a little more than five people

at the meeting. Here is the letter from the community organization granting full support

for the project. And with that, I'm here to answer any questions that the board may have.

I want to try to see if we can get the owner one more time. I'm here. Okay, good. Thank you. Sir,

could you please state your name and spell it for the stenographer isam sarama and spelled i-s-a-m

as in mary and sarama s-a-r-a-m-a do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing

but the truth yes sir i do please proceed counsel uh mr sarama um the attorney for the board miss

emerson asked me a question and i believe you're in a better position to answer it

is the commercial space on the bottom that's currently in use,

is it more than 2,000 square feet?

The space is about 29 square feet.

Okay, so that is an issue, Ms. Emerson.

You are absolutely correct.

Are there any more questions?

So you had mentioned, Ms. Threat, there are two commercial spaces

and one of them is occupied right now?

Yes, one is occupied.

Okay, so the occupied one is 2,900 square feet, and then there's an additional space that is vacant, so that would need a permit when that use is determined.

I'm not really sure.

Is the 2,900 both together or one?

Or one.

Okay.

Okay.

Mr. Sarama, is the whole first floor 2,900 square feet, or is it just one 2,900 square feet, or are there actually two units down there?

I can answer. The building is three buildings next to each other, 436 to 40. So the whole three buildings is the whole commercial space downstairs. So that's the complete, the total is 2,900 square feet.

But the question I'm asking you today, sir, is I see that there looks like two commercial spaces on the bottom.

The consumer goods store currently, is it occupying the whole 2,900 square feet?

Frankly, we're trying to figure out how you got the use permit for the consumer goods on the first floor.

Yes, the permit is for the whole, the entire thing.

So are you saying the consumer goods store occupies 2,900 square feet on the bus?

No, no, it doesn't occupy the whole entire thing. About 2,000 square feet from it is being occupied.

All right, then. Thank you.

You're welcome.

Okay. Questions from the board?

Yes, sir.

Okay, for the commercial space and the 2,000 square foot that's being occupied, are the other whatever square footage, is that still in that legal space?

or is it a separate empty space unit what's left is in the back of the

building if this question is for me in the back of the building yes that would

In the back of the building, yes, that would be just empty or some storage in it, but it's not really like used as the retail space.

be just empty

Okay. And then all of the utilities for the five units above, are they in the units themselves or are they in a shared space somewhere else in the building?

They are in the basement, the five meters for up the stairs, and the meters for the commercial, and also there's the water heaters, also five water heaters down there.

And is there universal access into that basement space for all the tenants?

If they ask for storage, then they're allowed.

But, I mean, if you ask me if they have storage spaces, that's what your question is?

No, I'm just asking, like, if I had to call PICO next week because something was happening with my meter, do I have access as the individual tenant to get into that space to allow them to service the meter?

Yes, there is codes. Yes, there is codes. Correct.

Other questions?

Questions from our attorney, Hillary Amberson.

Not at this time, Mr. Chair.

Questions or comments from the virtual audience?

i see no hands chair planning commission thank you chairman and good afternoon david effecto

with the city planning commission chairman and board members the comprehensive plan recommends

no change to the cmx1 commercial mixed use zoning at this location the appellant has shown that the

proposed retail sales of food beverages and groceries will have no detrimental impact beyond

what might reasonably be expected the refusal for ground floor commercial space exceeding 2 000

square feet will not injure the use of adjacent property and the refusal for additional dwelling

units is triggered by the cmx1 zonings adjacency to an rsa5 residential single-family zoning

district absent this adjacency two dwelling units would be allowed the appellant requests five units

but has stated that these are pre-existing dwellings the city planning commission recommends

of the board grant to propose special exception and use variances. Thank you. MI 2025 001 835

436 to 40 East Wyoming, I vote yes. John, my vote is yes. Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes.

Tanetta Graham, my vote is yes. Ryan McAdams, my vote is yes. Tyowin, my vote is yes. Thank you,

counsel. Thank you. Thank you very much, commissioners. Have a good day. Okay. And

our last one, I think. MI-2025-002098, 319 South 16th Street. Gabriel Fellis is the attorney.

Gabriel Fellis is coming back in as a panelist now, Chair.

Sure, thank you.

hello everyone good morning council just for the record state your name you've already been sworn

my name is gabriel fels all right could you identify your client their relationship to

this property yeah my client is m porsche llc right and um tanetta graham our board member

has a few questions for you good afternoon have you uh emailed your documents five days in advance

of this hearing yes and do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy

okay okay thank you you may share your screen and proceed with your case

you guys see the table of contents we can sir great and i will mention too that the uh

The Center City Residence Association has a letter of non-opposition, and you also gave us a petition with 12 signatures, four from the media block.

Great. Awesome. Yeah, so.

We have all your paperwork, sir.

Great. All right. So here we're seeking approval to legalize the existing use of the property.

A seven-unit multifamily refusal is issued because the property does not meet the minimum lot area requirement for each dwelling unit in the RM1 zoning district.

Before we get into the exhibits, I'm just going to provide a little bit of background.

So Ms. Horish, she's the principal of M. Horish LLC.

She purchased the property in 2001 in the same seven-unit condition that it exists in today.

It was marketed and sold to her as a seven-unit building.

She hasn't altered, converted, or expanded any number of units.

She's been there for over 25 years.

She's been a responsible and attentive landlord.

All seven units are currently rented to long-term tenants.

All seven units are currently rented to long-term tenants.

She's never received any code violations or neighbor complaints.

She's never received

Once she learned the property didn't have the proper zoning permits, she took it upon herself, essentially, to begin this process to bring the property into compliance.

So here I have a page with links to all the interior photos and narrated video walkthroughs of each unit.

I believe the board should have had access to this and to review these beforehand.

They give a clear picture of the property layout.

To save some time, I won't go through each individual video unless you guys want me to.

I'll gladly share them at the end if you guys would like.

We've also included some aerial views of the property on 16th Street, just a few blocks from Rittenhouse Square.

And these are some general floor plans from all four levels, along with these 3D renderings here.

so just as an overview uh the first floor has a one bedroom one bathroom unit and a studio

um the second floor sorry second floor has a one bedroom one bathroom unit and studio

the third floor has two studios each with one bathroom and the fourth floor also has

one studio with the bathroom again these lines will take you to the 3d renderings of each respective

floor here's a zoning map of the surrounding neighborhood uh property zone rm1 which allows

multi-family use uh however as it stands uh the lot size does not meet the uh the court's minimum

area requirement per unit so this is the most recent zoning permit uh i found in the public

records so in 1959 variants allowing five units in a doctor's office so at some point between then

and 2001 prior owner i we believe converted the property to its current seven unit configuration

so we think maybe the doctor's office once occupied the entire first floor and then

divided into those two units resulting in the seven units that existed when

when Ms. Horish purchased the property in 2001.

All right, so we also included a list

of some nearby properties that received variances

for six, seven, and eight unit dwellings.

As you see, there are several,

such as 334, 332, and 311 South 16th

that received approval for seven units

despite having smaller lot sizes.

Again, the refusal here is based on that lot area per dwelling.

This is the deed showing 2001 transfer of ownership to M. Horish LLC.

This is our application for appeal and project information form.

So now we'll turn to our community outreach efforts.

This is the community notice letter sent out on June 25th.

We met with the zoning committee of the Center City Residents Association on July 22nd,

where we received their letter of non-opposition.

Ms. Horish also spoke with nearby neighbors who were not present at the RCO meeting.

As you said, gathered 15 signature support, sorry, 12 signature support.

And these are our certificates of mailing sent out in advance of that July 22nd meeting.

We have our statement showing real estate tax compliance and the posters at the property

in anticipation of this meeting here.

So with that, I'd like to bring my client, Maureen Horish, on to adopt my testimony and answer any questions.

you guys might have.

You say

she purchased this in 2001?

Correct. So this is 24

years it's been like this? Yes.

That we know of. That we know of, yeah.

Okay.

Maureen, you want to raise your hand?

How about?

She should be coming back in as a panelist now,

Chair. Great.

good morning uh hey marine how are you chairman good good morning to the board thanks for taking