residential single family attached zoning at this location there is no evidence that the mixed use
was construction with constructed with the benefit of permits and there are no unique physical
conditions or circumstances of this property that would prevent it from being used in conformance
with the zoning code therefore the planning commission recommends the board to deny their
requested variances for multiple principal uses and commercial use mi 2025 001 573 2505 east
venango street i vote yes with proviso sure approved use is vacant commercial space on the first floor
use registration required prior to occupancy and single family household living above
michael johnson 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 iowen my vote is yes with proviso thank you counsel thank you mr thank you
on board okay number four mi 2025 003 848 502 to 04 south juniper street david orphanetes is the
attorney
david orphanage is coming back in as a panelist
and i'm going to give them to you
that's it my name is good afternoon mr chairman
um council could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer certainly
um counsel could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer certainly my name is
david orphanetes last name is spelled o-r-p-h-a-n-i-d-e-s right do you swear or affirm to tell
the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth i do counsel um is the owner of the
the other property present um let's see let's find out uh donna or john de stefano present
you could raise your hand they're online yes they are they're in the audience and I will promote
uh one of them you don't have to promote them right do you want them on now and get them on
the record Hillary uh it might not be a bad idea I mean the board can ask them what questions they
need to ask them I think the board has more questions of them than I do but I'd be happy to
to to to have them state their their position regarding this matter why don't we bring them on
sure at least one of them sure
Donna Stefano has been promoted
donna yes hi hi good afternoon good afternoon to you could you please state your name and
spell for the sonographer it's donna de stefano d-o-n-n-a d-e-s-t-e-f-a-n-o right do you swear
or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth i do um just for the record
could you state your address 1330 lombard street philadelphia pa 19147 all right so
just for the record our attorney has just a few questions how's that sure um good afternoon mrs
mrs stefano um thank you for taking the time to to come on um we just wanted to be clear since
this is a case that involves um a lot line adjustment that involves two properties with
different owners that one um you were aware of of the proceedings today what is being requested
um by your neighbor in terms i am aware of the response yes go ahead okay i was informed by um
mr orphanetes that there was a correction needed to the deeds these properties were one property at
on one deed at one time and when the deeds were separated they were inaccurately recorded
I had some things back and forth with this owner in the past and I do have some concerns but I do
I would look forward to them building provided they take care of the property that's adjacent
to them which is my property uh i have had several issues in the past and would like to make sure
that those will be addressed and things would be taken into consideration i was informed that the
property lines would need to be changed and i don't know if and i am a real estate broker
there was no agreement of sale that was done to to transfer those property lines or agree to
change those property lines for any fear or anything like that. So I'm not looking to pay
a fee for them. They've made the suggestion for the changes. I don't know the numbers. I don't
know how that will end up, but I would like to see something happen. I was disappointed that
the building was knocked down in the garage. I don't know where they stand at this point with
moving forward okay all right that that is helpful and i think the the the main concern
here was that the the property lines would be adjusted as you said there was they were one
property they were divided and then they it is the board's understanding that the the way that
they were laid out in the the deeds was was incorrect and that would require um a correction
um right and i was i was also informed that i would not be absorbing any of these costs
there are also other costs that have that have been absorbed by me in the past uh for this
building for this lot next door and also recently as per requested by jay ernst the owner the current
owner and haven't been reimbursed for so i i don't know how that will proceed but i was given
assurances that i would be reimbursed for moving drains and i had lines that were removed without
me even knowing or uh telling me they were going to be removed giving me time to remove them so i
would like to have notification when things get done all right that that is that is certainly
all right that that is that is certainly understandable um and you know obviously any
understandable and, you know, obviously any arrangements.
arrangements that you know you make with you and the neighbor not not subject to the board's purview
but we do wanted to correct and i don't have a problem with them moving forward okay all right
well that is that is the the biggest question that we has we wanted to make sure it was clear
yes so we do thank you for for coming on um i don't know if there's anything else you'd like
to say now or if you have any comments at public comment you could no i just wanted that to be on
record that i would hope to be reimbursed and would i'm not going to continue to do work without
being reimbursed for it for what they need understood understood thank you very much for
your time mr orphanetes have i sworn you in yet um i i believe so do you swear or affirm to tell
the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth i do would you identify your client in relationship
to the property sure my name my client's name is uh james ernst he goes by jay ernst and also uh
now he is going by jay de chico but on the deed it's uh james ernst and he is here today our vice
chair has a few questions for you good afternoon have you submitted uh your documents and exhibits
five days in advance of this hearing i submitted everything except for the tax clearance which we
submitted i believe yesterday okay all right and do you waive the reading of the refusal and
stipulate to its accuracy i waive the reading and stipulate to its accuracy yes all right thank you
share your screen and begin your case of non-opposition from washington square west and
also the council member esquilla okay hopefully you can all see my screen
um again my name is david orphanetes and i'm representing um jay ernst um who you've heard
referenced by the neighbor uh the owner of one of the owners of 1330 lombard street
um in this photograph this is the current condition of the property the vacant lot
with the bricks and the paving is my client's property there is an alley here to the left that
runs off of Juniper Street. This is Juniper Street in the foreground. Miss DiStefano and
her husband John owned the property to the right with the green trim around the windows,
which was 1330 Lombard Street. Historically, there was a garage located closest to 1330
and then a three-story building located to the south of that, all having the address
of 502 to 04 south juniper street um the the matter of the issue that the board's council
and mr stefano spoke about um at the beginning of this proceeding was that back in 2009
1330 was purchased by lombard capital llc and at that time the property legal description
And I'll use an aerial image here.
The legal description included, let me zoom in a little bit, extended from Lombard Street all the way to the alley that I showed in that initial picture.
The full width of 1330, the building that presently stands here, all the way to the alley.
What happened is in 2009, Lombard Capital LLC purchased the property and then subsequently sold off the back, the garage and the three-story building to the rear to Ronald Hyman.
Now, in that deed, there was included a legal description for the property that it was 41 feet from the southwest corner of Lombard,
and then it was 34 feet on the frontage of South Juniper, and then went 18 feet deep.
Now, after that time, the same Lombard Capital LLC sold the property, the front property, or what everybody thought was the front property, to the DeStefanos.
Now that original deed, and that was June 13th of 2008, so he sells off, or Lombard Capital LLC sells off the back portion with the legal description for the garage and the house at the back, and then subsequently sells 1330 Lombard.
Now, that deed did not have a legal description with it, but subsequently the DeStefano's recorded a legal description with the deed from themselves to themselves that extended from Lombard Street to the alley, the original legal description, which is the legal description that was in the deed for Lombard Capital LLC when they purchased it.
My client purchases the property, as you can see in the deed here, on October 18th, 2016,
and then sometime thereafter starts the process of getting approvals from the City of Philadelphia
to demolish the structures that are located on them because they are imminently dangerous,
they were designated as such by L&I, and to thereafter construct a single-family dwelling
with with a garage in the same location of where the garage was previously.
with a garage in the same location of where the garage was previously.
My client went to the Philadelphia Historical Commission because the property is both located
in its historic district and individually designated, and he secured the approval of
the Historic Commission to demolish the building and to thereafter construct the structure that
is going to be built today.
And I can show you here are the plans that were approved by the historic commission.
Those are the same plans and same renderings that we are presenting to you today and that my client subsequently submitted a zoning permit application to construct this property.
The problem was when they submitted the zoning permit application, the physical dimensions of this vacant lot from the back of 1330 to the alley doesn't match up with the deed that was transferred from Lombard Capital LLC for 502 to 504 South Juniper Street.
This area from the back of the building to the alley is actually smaller.
So the zoning drawings that were originally submitted to L&I resulted in an RFI where the examiner rightly said, your zoning drawings, the size of the building, the footprint of the building doesn't match your deed.
Well, that started us on a whole journey with the survey district, the second survey district,
to come up with the survey plan that we eventually submitted to L&I, which you see here, in which
the Zephanous had seen, which essentially calls for the relocation of lot lines for what's known
as 1330, and everybody has acted, that's being 1330, which is the building located at the south
west corner of Lombard and South Juniper, and drawing the property line between that 1330
and 5020504 at the rear of the building that you see right here in the picture.
Then I'll have to zoom back out right here. So part of this application is, and the reason why
the board wanted to hear from the DeStefanos is to relocate the lot line for both properties here.
right now the lot line is at 502 504 is actually bigger the legal description and the lot line is
three feet nine inches under the building of 1330 so we want to correct that and the building that's
to be built is from the back of the building to the alley which is shown on the survey plan
so the application other than relocating the lot lines to put the common property line at the rear
of the building at the corner of southwest corner of lombard and south juniper is to construct a
single-family dwelling, as I mentioned. It's four stories tall. It has a garage that is in the same
location of the curb cut. Because the frontage, the wide part, is across Juniper Street, and as
mentioned, the depth of the property is only 18 feet deep. The existing garage went to full depth
of the lot, and the existing three-story structure extended to full depth, the full 18 feet, for most
of its footprint. So we simply wanted to, my client has applied to build a building that
similarly runs from the front, from Juniper Street all the way to the back, now occupying
100% of the lot. And that has generated the refusal that we are here for today, which is
simply that with a lot that's less than 45 feet, that it needs to have a seven-foot rear yard
depth, and obviously we have none. Again, the existing building that you can see here from
the Sanborn maps, if I can pull those up here, if I zoom in, shows here is the building that used
to exist. This is in 1916. There was before there was a garage, and you can see the building
extending the full depth. It's a little harder to see in the Sanborn map from 1946, but you can
And here you see here in 1951, where after the garage was constructed, again, that the existing buildings,
oh, let me go up here.
Sorry, I have to go slowly.
Here you see.
And here you see both the garage and the building extending the full depth of the lot, the full 18 feet.
That's the width of both 1330, and then the depth of 502 to 504.
uh we did as mentioned we appeared before the washington square west civic association
that uh we received a unanimous letter of non-opposition and you can see that letter
here at tab a one and you can see the vote was 10 to zero to zero to not oppose and then we based
upon that letter from washington square west civic association we received a letter of non-opposition
from Councilman Squillis' office.
from Councilman Squillis' office.
Real quickly, the property was posted.
Real quickly, the property was posted in conformance
with the requirements of the zoning code.
You can see those pictures here.
They even withstood all the wins we've had
over the last couple of weeks.
And there was the proper 14303 notice
that was sent out to the list of addresses
that we secured from the Planning Commission's link
regarding the Washington Square West
Civic Association meeting on July 22nd, 2025,
and our original Zoning Board hearing of October 29th, 2025.
The posting was done with the posting,
the photos that I showed you,
the posting of the property were for today's hearing.
They weren't from the prior posting for the prior hearing.
Tab G has our tax clearance.
And again, you can see my client has legally changed his name
from James Ernst to James to Chico.
And we have that clearance here.
Real basically, here's the color renderings again
that were provided to historic commission that we're presenting to you again today um it was
thoroughly reviewed by the historic commission it was approved it wasn't the original design
but this is a design that was ultimately arrived at through the various meetings with the
architectural community committee and the full commission you can see here a section of the
property it's pretty obviously it's not very deep um every square foot is important but you can see
how it's been designed we don't have a pilot house on top we have an open staircase leading to the
roof deck to lower the visual appearance of it because we have gone the full 38 feet to squeeze
in the full store for the four stories but you can see here from across the street there's no
visibility of the roof deck that's also located on top of the proposed structure and we also have
the floor plans you can see here very very you know very very very limited in the amount of
square footage as i've mentioned so in terms of the the refusal for rear depth there's not a lot
of lot area to work with here it's a very small lot and we're using all of that but we're not
impacting any of the surrounding properties the depth of the building goes or the property goes
up to against the side of another building and then we have we don't have any windows in that
side facing east we don't have any windows in the rear of 1330 facing south and there are no windows
in the building across the alley to the south of us facing north so we won't impact the air and
light any more than was previously impacted with the structure that we're looking to uh construct
at this property um with that I would have my client adopt my statements James Ernst could
be promoted to a panelist hello mr ernes could you please state your name and spell for the
stenographer hello hi sir could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer
James DiCicco, J-A-M-E-S-D-I-C-I-C-C-O.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, sir.
Counsel?
And James, I'm sorry that I keep calling you James Ernst, but that is still what's reflected on the deed, and I know that legally you've changed your name.
It's all right. It's been 40 years. I can handle it.
All right. So, James, thank you for coming today.