Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
I just wanted to know, Mr. Chair, that we did receive a copy of the letter this morning,
the letter of non-opposition from PennSport. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Questions or
comments from the virtual audience? I do not see any further hands, Mr. Chair. Planning Commission.
Amy Ward with the Planning Commission. Comprehensive plan recommends no change to the
residential single-family RSA 5 zoning at this location. The dimensional variance is
is existing and was construction without the benefit of permits.
There are no unique physical circumstances or condition that would prevent the fence height
for being in conformance with the zoning code.
However, the opacity issue was pre-existing when the appellant purchased the property.
Planning Commission recommends that the Board deny the requested variance for fence height
and grant the requested variance for opacity on Titan Street and Howard Street.
MI 2024-002-620-1126 South Front Street, I vote yes.
Michael Johns, my vote is yes.
Terrell Gaston, my vote is yes.
Sonetta Graham, my vote is yes.
Iowen, my vote is yes.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, counsel.
Hillary, number 12, this is the one we didn't get to.
Yes, the property owner, I understand, is available.
MI 2024-002-622-10916, Nandina Lane Amin Safay is the owner.
There's a letter of support from the Somerton Civic Association, vote of 27 to 6, and a letter non-opposition from Council Member O'Neill.
hello this is hamza the applicant and i have amin the owner is with me right here he's on the line
okay so we we're well we're going to use amin is the owner that's going to testify for us okay
correct okay amin could you please state your name and spell it for the court stenographer
Hey, good morning.
My name is Avin.
Last name is Safayev.
Could you spell your name, please?
A-M-I-N.
Go ahead.
Last name, Avin.
Last name, S-A-F-A-E-V.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
So this application is for the elimination of one interior garage parking space to close the existing garage door and the creation of one surface parking space accessory to an existing semi-detached single-family dwelling.
The proposed surface parking space is located in the front yard, which is prohibited in the RSA 3 zoning district.
Could you please start your presentation?
Mr. Chair, I don't know if there's any way, because it seems like the property owner is on the phone with the...
Hillary, I got it. Absolutely. Can you see these? Are you going to be able to see the documents?
Hello?
i mean i mean can can you see the documents
can you see the documents i mean but yeah sorry you you got to stop your
coming in there okay i mean can you see the documents
i mean
Yeah, I think the only way we can proceed, Mr. Chair, is if the property owner comes on to the Zoom separately so that we can see him and know that he can see the documents that are being presented.
So, I mean, I think I'm going to continue this, shall we?
Yes, Mr. Chair.
So MI 2024-002-622-10916-9AD.
002-622-10916, Nanadena Lane.
Cases continued.
Thank you, Board Chair.
Thank you, members.
Thank you.
Number 13, MI 2024, 002-641, 621 North 64th Street.
Mahari Bailey is the attorney.
There's a recommendation of support from the Neighbors of Overbrook Association,
9 to 3.
Coming back in.
Great.
Thank you.
I'm sorry.
I'm trying to start the video.
I apologize, Chair.
Good afternoon, Chair.
Good afternoon, Board members.
Will you state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
Mahari Bailey, M-A-H-A-R-I, last name Bailey, B-A-I-L-E-Y.
do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
i do but you identify your client the relationship to this property yes sofinite mconin is the owner
she should be in the uh in the audience as well you stipulate to the reading of the refusal and
you agree with its accuracy yes why don't you start your presentation counsel i'm going to
share the screen and then share screen. Okay. You are screen sharing. Okay. Can you see my screen?
You might want to make it a little bit bigger. Yeah, I am. I am. I just wanted to know if you
know your screens help, sir. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. So 621 North 64th street. I'll go through
the documents, and then I'll give you the story once we make our way through the documents.
It should be relatively quick. We have the refusal, the application for appeal. The packet
was mailed in probably a month ago. We've been ready. Project information form, the deed is there,
the notification to the neighbors. We had the RCO meeting as well. RCO is in support.
One second, she had a lot of mailings.
She's compliant with the taxes, photographs.
Okay, so these are the photographs of the exterior with the notice.
And then we'll go to the, these are the interior photos, and I'll refer back to these shortly.
I don't know if you need me to slow down so you can see the photos, but she purchased a home renovated already.
So these are the photos of the interior and these photos are from the listing when she purchased the home.
Yeah. And then here I'll shrink this. Here's the the layout in the plans from the architect.
um so as you can see she has the home was built as a single family home and sold to her
as a four bedroom two and a half bath home but there's the basement in this house is above grade
so when the home was uh when the home was renovated they added an in-law suite because
the home was built to miss mcconin's needs uh her parents were in north jersey and they were
retiring and moving in with her. So she requested that the home be built with an in-law suite.
So permits were pulled. The house was built accurately. As you can see, there's access to
the basement on this. There's a rear stairwell in the back of the house, if you see, to access
the basement from the stairwell. So when she purchased the home, her family moved in. She
lived in with her family. Her family subsequently decided to return to North Jersey and she decided
to rent out two rooms in the home, one of the rooms being the basement area. So she got her
rental license. And as you can see, it's owner occupied, single family dwelling, renting two
rooms. But she had a landlord tenant dispute with one of the tenants who became unhappy.
So they subsequently called L&I.
L&I came out and determined that the building should be listed as a duplex because the in-law suite contained a separate kitchen.
So they wanted her to go through zoning to get it zoned as a duplex so she could continue renting the two spaces.
So as you can see, here's the original listing as well.
I'll make that bigger for you.
Here's the original listing, the RCO meeting.
The RCO is supporting the change.
The RCO is supporting the change to a residential duplex.
And then if you look here, almost the entire block is multifamily.
So east side of the street, 11 out of the 19 properties are multifamily dwelling.
And on the west side of the street, there's one, two, three, four multifamily dwellings that are known.
I think there's a few that aren't known.
um but yeah miss mcconin purchased the property as a single family home she rented out the two
rooms counsel how do you get into the property again could you show that i'll show you yeah
there's two there's two means of uh of egress into the into the property so if you go to the
you want to see pictures or you want to see the plans well the plans if you have pictures it
makes it easier it might yeah so i'll go back to the pictures um so as you can see uh the photographs
that's the front door here this black door um and then i'll show you from the interior
again the basement is above grade so if you look here you see this door here
sorry i'll zoom in this door here is another means of egress to enter that space there's
also an egress window above grade in this space as well i don't know that it's in it's if you if
you see where this door where the pointer is to the right of that there's an egress window so
there's multiple means of egress from the from the above grade basement and then there's um
two means of egress from the first floor of the upstairs as well okay um yeah so miss mconin just
wants to make this a legal duplex so that she can remove the city center of violation with some
fines. So she's trying to get the fines removed. And we just want to legalize this as a duplex so
she can continue to rent out. Do you want to bring her on, please? Yeah. Can you raise your hand,
Ms. McConaughey? She has been about to speak. Hello. Hi, could you please state your name and
spell for the court stenographer? Sure. It's Sophanit Makanen, S-O-P-H-A-N-I-T, last name
Makanen, M-A-K-O-N-N-E-N. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the
truth? Yes. Please proceed, counsel. Thank you. Ms. Makanen, have you heard my entire testimony?
Yes. Okay. Has it been truthful and accurate? Yes. Do you adopt it as your own? Yes. Thank you.
questions from the board
yeah go ahead
I was just wondering is there a question
I mean a picture of the
exterior of the building where these two
clear story glass block windows
are to say
that again in this last photo
that you had from the interior of the basement
where there's the two windows up
above do you have a photo of the building
from the exterior at that
view I'm trying to hold
I'm going to go through all the pictures, so I'm not sure what. So here's the, this is the front
of the house. This is a front bedroom. That's the bay, a middle bedroom, second bedroom. There's
three bedrooms and two baths on the, uh, on the top floor, which is the second floor.
This is the first floor living area facing the front of the house. Um, this is the dining room
and the rear of the house is here so there's a door that exits the rear there um that's a
half bath in that in this room here to the left is that half bath to the right is the egress
um i'm not sure what windows you're talking about so let me go through you'll see keep going
keep going those those is there a photo of the of the facade of the house oh no that's a breezeway
that's not um that's a breezeway so the the house is built on an uh on an incline in a hill
so the level of the basement at this point the ground is about here where my arrow is
but it it runs like this down so at some point it drops and then there's steps and you go down
and it's above green yeah i was just wondering okay i understand no there's no exterior uh
There's no exterior photos of the breezeway. I apologize.
And then how do you, is there a rear exit for the basement?
Like does the basement have.
Yeah. I showed that in the.
I heard you mention it. Okay.
That's the exit right there.
And where's that exiting into the rear yard, into the rear yard.
And then how is there an alley or can they walk through the breezeway to get
to the main street?
Yeah. I'm sorry. So you exit this door. You're in the rear yard.
So you exit this door, you're in the rear yard, you turn left, and you make another left, and you're in the breezeway.
you turn left and you make another left and you're in the
So there's, let me go back to the, here, here it is.
So we do have pictures, sorry, the architect did take pictures.
So that, this is the door for the first floor here, where you come out and you go down the steps to enter the rear yard.
This is the door to enter the apartment.
There's a little storage area and then a second door inside.
So you turn left and then you come here and you see what I mean?
You go up these steps and then you just walk through the breezeway.
Okay. And do you know the width of that breezeway?
No, it varies at certain points because you see here, this is the average width.
Yeah, it's definitely it's definitely up to code because it's it's bigger than three feet.
I just don't know the exact number.
Okay. Other questions?
Yes. I'm assuming your plan is, or I shouldn't assume, but is your plan to completely seal off the basement from the first floor since it's going to be zoned truly as a duplex with the appropriate separation?
So, Fanit, are you preferring to do that, to separate it, or are you preferring to leave it and do it as the owner-occupied room rentals?
I'd follow whatever is required.
So, is the request to do a two-family dwelling?
Yes, the request is to do a two-family dwelling.
Falling separated by one-hour fire rating, so there'd be no connection between the two.
That's what she's going to want to do.
So then the only egress and ingress would be through that breezeway that you described.
Yes, and then there's an egress window here as well.
you keep saying the egress window but if those if those are the two windows that you're showing
the plan that's not an egress no no no no these are the two windows that she was just asking about
they're here in the front here this here these windows are above grade and egress so to the
correct height they're not depicted they're not drawn on the plan as egress windows are usually
notated but you did say that when you when you know when I when I say egress I'm sorry I don't
mean the egress well it's not below grade it's above grade so when I said window I said it's
not they're not the size like egress windows have a specific yeah specific size and documentation
on floor plans that that is not showing and you did not have a photo of the window you said the
window is over here so we we haven't seen it is all we're saying okay let me see if we no she