Shermer that as soon as he arranges
the meeting and contacts
Ms. Dandy, the supervisor, we can immediately schedule him as opposed to our six-month window.
That's perfect. Thank you. Okay, Mr. Shermer. Thank you, Mr. Shermer.
Thank you, Tanya. You're welcome, Chair.
Number eight, MI 2023-002-195-2715-17 West Flora Street. Michael McElhaney is the attorney.
A letter of support from Brewery Town Chargedwood Civic Association.
Michael McElhenney is coming back in as a panelist.
Good afternoon.
Counsel, could you state your name, please, and spell for the court stenographer?
Michael McElhenney, M-C-I-L-H-I-N-N-E-Y.
Right.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client in relationship to this property?
My client is Flora, F-L-O-R-A, Street Flats, LLC.
And they are the owner of the property at issue.
Okay. Our vice chair has just a few questions for you.
Good afternoon, counsel. Do you agree to wait the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Thank you. Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that are needed and able to proceed, in this case, five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, I have.
Well, tongue twisted there.
Please proceed and share your screen.
Excellent.
Thank you.
On my screen is the index of exhibits that consist of exhibits 1 through 15.
Preliminarily, the – I'm going to move this to the other side.
The – our zoning appeal is at tab 11.
Our zoning poster showing the property was advertised with the zoning posters is at tab 12.
Exhibit 13 is the RCO neighbor notice letter.
We met with the RCO on June 15th, and we do have that letter of support that the chairman referenced.
My client's deed is at exhibit 14.
My client took title to the properties July 29th, 2022.
My client took title to the properties July 29th, 2022, and they are the owner of 2517 all the way through 2725 West Flora Street.
Our tax clearances were provided at tab 15.
There are three separate OPA accounts for these properties.
As part of my exhibit packet, we do have the vote total from the RCO, just showing 18 in support, 6 opposed, 2 abstained.
And after that letter was, that email was received, the RCO on Friday of last week did send the ZBA directly the letter of support that I have on the screen.
And the community was in support of the single family units that we're proposing with the off-street parking.
And they did request that we coordinate construction on a related project down the street that was before the board on August 2nd.
And we agreed to coordinate with that developer.
Our refusal is at tab two.
And I'll zoom in to summarize the refusal. Our application is to relocate lockout lines. We're going to create four lots from the existing five parcels. And we're proposing to erect four houses with roof decks, roof deck access structures.
and each of those four properties, three of them will have interior off-street parking
and one will have rear off-street parking. The property is zoned RSA 5, so that creates a
zoning refusal for the lot size we're creating. The minimum is $1,440. We are proposing lots that
are 835 square feet and we have a use refusal for the off-street parking. Parking is only allowed
by right from a shared driveway, alley, or rear street. Three of our houses are front-loaded
parking, and the fourth house is accessed from a side street. So that creates those use refusals.
Exhibit three is the zoning map for the property and the street map. The first photo just showing
we're zoned RCA5. The properties to the south of us are the Girard Avenue properties, zoned CMX 2.5.
looking at the second and third photos are just an overview overhead view of the immediate area
our property is bounded by style street to the north edding street to the east we are at flora
street to the south and we front on flora pennock street to the west what's unique about this area
and this immediate block there's no street parking on any of these four streets that i just
referenced. And on August 2nd, our neighbor came before the board for the same proposal at 1224-26
Pennock Street. And that was approved by the board on August 2nd, 2023. As you can see there,
they proposed a single family house with front-loaded parking, which as you'll see,
that's what we are proposing as well. Exhibit four is just a satellite 3D view to give context
to the immediate area in the Brewery Town neighborhood. At the time of purchase, my
client, this was a warehouse building. And exhibit five are historic photos of the property.
And if I can zoom in.
it's this warehouse building in the center of the property it had existing it was a storage
warehouse building that had existing curb cuts and off-street parking as part of that
that building that building has since been demolished as you'll see on exhibit six which
are our site photographs the property is currently a vacant lot that has been paved
by my client while we go through the zoning process. And turning to the second page, just
looking north at the properties on Edding Street, just showing there's no on-street parking on
Edding Street. And the block consists of single-family homes like my client's proposing.
The other photos are other angles looking down Edding Street on page three, looking to the south.
page three the last photo second photo are the properties to the north of us
which are existing off-street parking basically a surface parking lot to the north of my client's
properties and then the remaining properties on pennock street are existing single family
houses with off-street parking at 12 13 and 12 15 pennock and then that other property i referenced
12 24-26 pennock that was just approved by the board two weeks ago for single family with front
loaded off-street parking. The next photograph on page five is showing the view on Style Street,
just showing there's no street parking on the immediate block that my client's property is
located at. And the remaining photos are the properties on Style Street that are existing
and have off-street parking, such as 2717-19 styles. We have 2709 West Styles, 2705 West
Styles, 2704 West Cabot, that that property runs street to street. So this is an area that doesn't
West Cabot, that that property runs street to street. So this is an area that doesn't have
to have
on-street parking available. So bringing cars off the street, that's why we have the support
from the community. My client's subdivision plans at Exhibit 7. At the top of the screen
is the existing parcels. As you can see, they are set up currently at 16 feet wide by 35 feet deep.
uh four of those parcels the middle parcel is a double wide parcel that's 31 feet by 35 feet deep
our proposal is to redraw those lot lines to create four equal partials so reduce the unit
count from five to four and to create larger more sizable parcels so we're going from an average of
that 560 square feet lot size to lots that end up at about 835 square feet so we have properties
that become 26 wide or 23 wide by 35 deep.
Our zoning plan is at tab eight.
And I'll see if I can zoom in.
We're proposing, starting from east to west,
identified as premises E,
we are proposing one car off-street parking
for the first unit.
The next two houses would have two car off street parking and the corner property, because we're close to the corner, we would not have sufficient clearance so the parking off street parking is at the rear of that property.
And the proposal is dimensionally compliant we have a full seven foot side yard, or rear yard I should say, we comply with the open area and 38 foot height limit so our refusals again, is requesting off street parking because there is no street parking available over here.
and to create larger lots, but the lots we're creating won't be that 1440 minimum under the
current code. Exhibit 9 is our zoning package. We present it to the community, showing the rendering
for the property. As you can see, my client's proposing various materials as part of this
design. Brick on the ground floor, metal panels, and the use of cement boards. Each house will have
interior balconies to provide light and air and outdoor space, in addition to that roof deck,
roof deck access structure to provide more outdoor space for each of these four houses.
I'm not going to go through all the floor plans. I'll quickly just summarize. We end up with
four units. The first parcel, which is parcel A on the left, ends up as a three-bedroom,
or strike that four bedroom, four bath unit house, approximately 3,100 square feet.
And the other homes end up at three bedrooms, 2.5 baths each. And there's, again, they're about
3,000 square foot houses. So these are sizable homes that are being constructed on these lots
that we're proposing. And we are bringing cars off the street, one car on each of the end units
and two cars on the middle unit.
And with that being said,
and I guess the last photo is page eight
is just the elevation and rendering
showing that it's code compliant 38 feet
with the roof deck
and how the unit will look once constructed.
With that, members of the board,
I'd submit that based off the unique characteristics
of this block and these parcels were increasing the size of the parcels to make them larger and
closer to code compliance and providing off-street parking. The size and location of the property
does create a unique hardship, and this is the minimum variance necessary to afford my client
relief and to benefit the neighborhood. Bringing these cars will not increase traffic or congestion.
It will actually bring cars off the street and will be a benefit to the neighborhood to provide
housing at this location and removing that industrial commercial building from what is
a RSA 5 residential block. With that, I would call my client, Matt Lynch, should be on the call
to raise his hand. Mr. Lynch, could you state your name, please, and spell for the court stenographer?
My name is Matthew Lynch, M-A-T-T-H-E-W-L-Y-N-C-H. Do you swear or affirm the whole truth
nothing but the truth yes i did mr lynn did you hear the presentation i just made to the board
regarding your project yes i did and were my statements true correct and accurate to the best
of your knowledge information and belief yes they were and would you adopt my statements as if they
were your own yes no further questions questions from the board no mr chairman no chair
no chair questions or comments from the virtual audience
no chair questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands chair planning commission uh ron bednar city planning the property is indicated
for residential use on the city plan or adopted district plan recommends no change to existing
zoning at this location the applicant's hardship is not supported with evidence of unique physical
circumstances or condition of the property that would prevent it from being used in conformity
with a code. Eliminating a sidewalk will significantly endanger pedestrian safety.
Therefore, we recommend the request of variance not be granted.
Number eight, MI 2023-002-195-2715-17 West Florida Street, I vote yes.
Thomas Holliman, my vote is yes.
James Snell, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
Thank you, counsel.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Let's see here.
Number 10, MI20230021307622Caster Avenue.
Stephen Pollack is the attorney.
Letter of support from Ron Hurst Civic
and letter of non-opposition from Council Member O'Neill.
Stephen Pollack is coming back as a panelist.
Hi, Mr. Pollack, how are you, sir?
How are you today, Mr. Chairman and members of the board?
Good to see you.
Could you state your name, please, and spell it for the court stenographer?
My name is Stephen Pollack.
That's Stephen with the old-fashioned way, S-T-E-P-H-E-N.
Pollock, P-O-L-L-O-C-K, like my Uncle Jackson, who never gave me a painting.
Here you go.
That's great.
Do you swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
I do, Mr. Chairman, members of the board.
Could you identify your client and the relationship to this property?
My client is Gan Habad, which is the licensee and operator of a child daycare center on behalf of the owner,
Mahni Israel of Philadelphia
Lubavitch Center and I have with me
Mrs. Riska Weber who will be here to
testify and adopt our testimony at the end
and as usual Mr. Chairman if I may
bring Nico on and our
vice chair has a few questions for him and please bring Mr.
Nico on. Good afternoon counsel do you
agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its
Let me just clarify that. We were able to get, the board granted us permission to get an amended review by the licenses and inspections to Hillary, and Hillary passed on it on Friday before, or Thursday before she left, I think Friday before she left on vacation.
so we have a revised refusal at a6 and nico if you could if nico's there we'll pull it up because
we went from a refusal to a referral so we're for a special exception because there was confusion in
the way the the initial review was made we're asking we have an existing daycare center at 7620
the adjacent property we want to use uh all owned by the libovitz center we want to be able to use
7622, which is the main Lebovitz Center, also for part-time use for the child daycare center.
So now we have a referral that says for use as a daycare center at the first floor with an outdoor
accessory play area on the same lot with all other uses as previously approved, no sign on the
application, and it's a referral. So we want to be clear that that is what the board will be granted.
There's an amended refusal, right?
Right. Well, it's now it's switched to a referral. So we don't have that the hardship requirement. We just have to. All right. Okay. So that just as long as we clarify that we're good to go. And that's at our A6 in our exhibit package.
Proceed.
All right. Mr. Chairman, members of the board, Nico, if you pull up those pictures.
Hold on a second, counsel.
Oh, yeah. You got to go through, right?
Email all the documents that were needed five days in advance of the use.
We did, Mr. Shahid. We did.
All right. Thank you.
I mean, we had obviously had the meeting with.
So this is the Lubavitch Center and the where we're going to expand in on the side at Caster and Nathalie.
We'll have some pictures. I'll show you. This is our outdoor play area to the left.