correct that that's is the way i submitted i um and we don't have any problem with that proviso
um the ground i have photos of the sellers sellers just utilities and storage um right
right no i just noticed they didn't i i figured it out by looking at it but i know they didn't
clarify on the the refusal that that was that's kind of a change from the vacant space on the
first floor to these the specific uses so yeah i i don't uh we can get into this another time
but my understanding is that lni is getting away from unless the zoning board uh has the restricts
it to a particular area of the property they're not writing refusals anymore that limit a use to
a specific portion yeah not not usually no not through the zoning process we do not have an issue
with that um my client spent a lot of money making the upper units david we're good we're good
questions or comments from the virtual audience
mr chair i do not see any further hands raised thank you planning commission
ina solomonic the planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the
existing residential single family zoning the property has documented prior use as multi-family
the proposed use is consistent with neighboring corner properties the city planning commission
recommends that the zoning board grant the variance for multi-family and personal services
use first floor only okay first floor only is fine yeah that would be fine because it's only
they're um they're recognizing from what how i'm reading this they're recognizing the
multi-family is already existing so it's just the first floor mi 2025 006 632 1254 to 56 south
18th street i vote yes with proviso first floor only and sorry mr chair would specify commercial
uses on first floor only because there is a multiple principle use commercial lot commercial
use first floor only yes thank you instead of commercial can we say the cmx1 uses so that
there's no question i just said commercial uses because it has personal services and it says
commercial uses as allowed under cmx1 so i was trying to encompass both of them that's great
that's fantastic yeah that's fantastic i just didn't want to get back into the commercial thing
no last zoning permit have that happen all over again you know we could say approved approved
commercial uses um on first floor only and then that should cover everything
approved commercial uses on commercial uses first floor only okay michael johns my vote is yes
with proviso sure yes sure guest and my vote is yes with proviso tenetta graham my vote is yes
tennetta graham my vote is yes with proviso mcadams my vote is yes with proviso iowen my
with proviso mcadams my vote is yes with proviso
vote is yes with proviso thank you counsel thank you maybe excuse yes you can thank you uh number
three am i am i twenty twenty five zero zero six six three five fifteen seventeen west cumberland
Alan Nockamson is the attorney.
It's your first time today?
Oh, wow.
But I think we have two in a row.
Am I correct?
Yeah, I have three, so I don't know.
Oh, okay.
All right.
Well, I see.
Well, we'll get to it.
All right.
So, Mr. Nockamson, could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
Yes, Alan Nockamson, A-L-A-N, last name Nockamson, N-O-C-H-U-M-S-O-N.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Mr. Nockamson, could you identify your client in relationship to the property?
Uh, so my client here, uh, is, uh, Wasky Construction LLC, uh, in a virtual army, uh, next to me to
left is Samuel E. Wise, uh, E. Wise, right? Yes. The owner of the property. Um, somehow I
didn't, uh, I didn't. So just for the point, there's a letter of support with provisos from
all in the family CDC. Okay. That's correct. We're aware of that, right? That's correct.
our vice chair has a few questions thank you good afternoon have you submitted your documents and
exhibits five days in advance of this hearing yes we have and do you waive the read another
refusal and stipulate to its accuracy i do okay thank you share your screen and proceed with your
case thank you
As the chairman stated, we met with the community. I believe it was either a letter of non-opposition or support with certain provisos, which we accept.
This is a rather dilapidated property just off of Broad Street on West Lumberland Street.
During my presentation, I'll present 11 exhibits, and then Samuel will be sworn in, and he'll have some questions for him regarding my presentation.
Uh, so this is an RSA five property, um, where we originally seeking, uh, three family dwelling
here. Um, we, you know, the property to the right of us is a duplex and there's many examples of
multifamily use nearby, which is not uncommon given that we're basically a block away from
broad street. Um, my client after meeting with the community agreed, uh, that, uh, to provide
PROVISO TWO RESIDENTIAL UNITS, A MAXIMUM OF TWO RESIDENTIAL UNITS, ALSO AGREED TO PROVISO
NO LIVING IN THE BASEMENT, JUST UTILITIES AND STORAGE IS DOWN THERE FOR THE FIRST LEVEL UNIT.
SO, AND I BELIEVE THAT ACCOUNTS FOR THE PROVISO. IF I MISSED ANYTHING, PLEASE LET ME KNOW.
TRASH IS STORED OUTSIDE ON THE FIRST FLOOR FOR UNIT NUMBER ONE. THERE'S A VENTILATED TRASH CLOSET
for unit number two um on you know as part of part of unit number two we met with the community
again they were supportive based on those provisos uh you know next door neighbor is in support of
this project again that's multi-family next to us the 2035 lower north district plan also has this
as a non RSA five property so I think the City Planning Commission has accounted for the fact
that we're so close to North Broad Street that this should have multiple units in it and you
can see the mixed zoning here as well and you can see how far close we are to Broad Street as well
as well as the Broad Street line again very dilapidated property Samuel purchased this
property with the intention of reviving it uh you know to its you know former glory
and then you can see even here he's had to board up the property because people have
you know trespassed onto the property so he's trying to protect you know having you know
trespasses in there so he's looking forward to hopefully developing this property as a duplex
uh this is cumberland street to the right of the property uh until after the property
And then simple plans and drawings. We're not changing the shell in any way. We're, you know, again, it's a rather large structure. And again, we changed our floor plans based on the comments from the community. But, you know, you walk in here to the left, there's a study area, there's a bathroom here, dining room, and a kitchen area, and a bedroom.
dining room and a kitchen area and a bedroom
and then if you go up a flight of steps instead oops sorry let me go backwards
go up a flight of steps instead you have a similar type of open floor plan here where you have a
dining room kitchen area a sitting area two bedrooms here with a bath and then you have
on the third floor again existing we haven't changed it basically a bedroom and a bathroom here
we met with the community i think it was a well-attended meeting we met with them on
february 10th at 6 30 p.m we emailed that notice to them a few weeks beforehand as we typically do
showing proof of mailing of the notice that went to 115 addresses these are the addresses we sent
to along with proof of mailing to those addresses showing that we filed this application for appeal
on behalf of waski construction llc along with the notice refusal and the project information form
the deed to the property showing that wax ski construction llc is the owner of the property
they purchased it in j in june of 2025.
and then the certificate of tax clearance wall shows a balance due it's not due until march 31st
of 2026. I would ask that Samuel be sworn in. I have a couple questions. Samuel, could you please
state your name and spell for the stenographer? Thank you. I'm Samuel Awusi. Awusi goes by E-W-U-S-I-E.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes. Counsel? Yes. Samuel, you heard everything I had to state about this zoning matter.
yes is it true and correct yes and do you adopt this your own testimony
yes specifically to provide those with you know maximum of two residential units
and no living in the basement yes thank you questions from the board
okay how many units are we talking about here two and how is this the first floor has one unit
That's correct. And then the second and this part of the third is a bi-level. That's correct. Okay. And can I see that first floor unit again, please?
Let me get through this.
Let me try to do it. Otherwise, my computer's jamming up a little bit.
Oh, it's just a slow computer today.
Oh, I think it's right here.
So you come in this entry away here, you make a left, there's a study here.
there's a bathroom here um maybe one of the things I didn't bring up is the way to get out
to the rear is right here and there's a breezeway here and then here's the rear yard and this is
where the garbage would be stored this is the dining room and living room area and then this
is the bedroom so the bathroom is down here that's right and the bedroom is back here so
yeah and there's like a little study here too so i think you you know my little pet peeve here these
we're bathrooms i know i've heard it i'm where you have to wander all through the living room
and in the kitchen to get to the bathroom at three o'clock in the morning it's to me it's not
a good setup but no i hear you i mean so when you're dealing with these older row homes it's
is a little bit tougher um you know we're not expanding the building structure in any way
we're not doing any really you're not doing any structural work on at least that unit so we're
trying to keep it as is and we're agreeing not to do any living in the basement as such too so okay
too so okay so just just saying other questions i think it's more of a comment is that it is
Just, just saying.
that the existing layout in the first floor i'm sorry is that the existing layout on the first
one is existing layout or is this a gut job um that's existing layout so basically i'm just
whatever that's all there i'm just making it like look better that's all okay i think um you know
understanding that you reduced from three units to two i think that second unit the bi-level unit
was most likely to be rented to a family it's three bedrooms and i just you know the comment
that there's no bathtub like you have a bathtub in the first floor unit that's one person
and typically families need a tub if they have younger kids and you've got two full bathrooms
and they both have stand-in showers, so I would just think about that.
So, in Unit 2, on the second floor, that bathroom is supposed to be a bathtub,
so that's a correction I'm happy to make.
It's supposed to be a bathtub.
That's supposed to be a bathtub.
It's the third floor that it says.
It doesn't look like it's long enough to be a bathtub,
so you might want to look into your configuration.
and then i think the second question is just about trash storage for the
bi-level unit because it doesn't look like there's a
ventilated trash closet or a laundry oh is it the laundry room
here's obviously the the i think the floor plans need some work
yeah yeah i i think i agree i agree yeah when i looked at these floor plans i
looked at that but i think once he's hopefully has the
approval of this board he's going to revisit those floor plans with his architect okay i looked at it
too also you got a lot of like hallway all the questions other questions questions from our
attorney hillary emerson not at this time mr chair questions or comments from the virtual audience
mr chair do you not see any hands for the matter planning commission
ina solomonic with the planning commission the property was remapped from commercial mixed use
cmx2 to the existing yeah existing residential single family rsa5 zoning in a community remapping
in 2014. the appellant has not shown that the property cannot possibly be used in strict
conformity with the zoning code and the variance is therefore unnecessary the city planning
commission recommends that the zoning board deny the variance for multi-family use mr church just
you know just can i just comment sure you've got it's it the philadelphia 2035 plan actually
recommends that it this property revert back to that zonia cmx2 which will allow two
residential units plus one commercial unit and there's many examples on the block of multi-family
there there are non you know multi-family sorry designation thank you both of you so mi 2025
006 635 1517 west cumberland street i vote yes with proviso maximum two dwelling units
no household living in the basement michael johns 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.
Thia Nguyen, my vote is yes, with Proviso.
Thank you.
So we're going to go to number seven.
MI 2025, 006-778-322 Milner Street.
Alan Nockamson is the attorney.
mr knockamson just for the record could you state your name alan knockamson all right could you
identify your client a relationship to the property uh yeah my client selected me paul
kushner the owner of the property okay and um there's a letter of support with proviso from
the 13th ward rco our vice chair has a few questions good afternoon have you submitted
your documents and exhibits five days in advance of this hearing yes we have and do you waive the
read another refusal and stipulate to its accuracy i do okay thank you you can see your screen
proceed with the case thank you mr chair i also believe there's a letter from solo yeah i see i
see there's a letter here from um 13th ward in favor there's also a letter from solo germantown
um um they have uh also uh provisos and there's a letter of opposition from swamp poodle so we
don't have the swamp poodle i did know the solo one so i'm just you know the swamp poodle one
just came in today i can forward that to you all right thank you thank you so this is what i would
just woman i i see where they their um letter of opposition but they also have some things
their um letter of opposition but they also have some things in yeah but both solo family dwelling
certificate box fee all trash and recycled stored outdoors etc but go ahead why don't you just yeah
i mean and again i think we embrace all that i think you know this is 322 milan street this is
a really unfortunate incident i i know how the board feels about like legalization the structures
this my client's not a developer he hired a licensed contractor to do the work and that
and we'll show you that that that it was he was a licensed contractor until he lost his license
and i don't know if it was we're the tipping point or this was just uh illustrative of what
he was doing back in the day but it's a real shame and it's unfortunate that we're here today
and this is a single family structure so it's not like we're trying to squeeze in more units to do
in addition to this property so we'll review the many exhibits that are part of our presentation
and we'll go straight to the refusal right basically we did this we enclosed the porch area
we we added some square footage on top of the porch area and in the rear we did like a little
overhang like in in the back and we have two refusals right so first our building facade
doesn't match the building facade to the right of us so that's the first refusal and then the
refusal in the rear is because of the rear yard depth. But you'll see from our drawings that
it's in a regular shaped lot, you know, where the longer part of the lot meets that nine foot
rear yard setback. And everyone else has what we're looking to do, what we did do,
we thought legally. So it's not out of character. It's a single family house. It's a single family
house. And it's just, it's a shame. And so we met with the 13th Ward RCO committee, which was a