the variance by estoppel
and vested rights doctrines
as previously discussed
with the board council.
Thank you very much.
Have a great evening.
I'm sorry I took so long.
That's okay.
Number five, MI 2023
005 911
4601 Springfield Avenue.
Vern Anastasio is the attorney.
There's a letter of opposition
from Cedar Park neighbors.
There's a letter of opposition from Council Member Gauthier.
Vernon Anastasio is coming in as a panelist.
Mr. Chair, I'm sorry.
I was uploading when you were speaking.
So I see.
Yeah, I said there's a letter of opposition from Cedar Park neighbors.
Council Member Gauthier has also taken a position of opposition.
Okay, thank you.
Hold on.
um okay okay um mr anastasio could you just state your name for the record yeah it's vern
anastasio on behalf of uh mr jamal uh fulton could you wait uh thank you and our vice chair
has just a few questions thank you good good evening counsel do you agree to either reading
refuse or stipulate to attack
consent? I do.
Have you emailed them all the required documents
and exhibits that is needed to proceed
with this case? Stop these in advance of
this hearing. I have.
All right.
Counsel,
645, we want to get out of here,
so please do.
I got an RCO in
45 minutes, so I got to
get moving.
Springfield Avenue.
a 65-page exhibit. We initially had asked for, submitted for an application for a four-family
dwelling. We met with the RCO, and I think it's important for me to give you a little bit of
backstory briefly. My client purchased this property in 2022. It is a massive, old, beautiful,
on the outside, Victorian home on a lot that's close to 4,000 square feet.
on a lot that's close to 4,000 square feet. It is in terrible disrepair. It has been for quite
some time. He hired a contractor to start renovating it. He learned that the contractor
hadn't been doing it properly for the permits, not that he got very far. He shut it down,
contacted me, and we've been going through this process. Through this process,
When we met with the RCO, we decided to reduce the number of units to three, so it would simply be one unit per floor, first, second, and third floor.
We would not have a basement unit as previously planned, so this basement unit here would be gone.
This first floor unit is a large two-bedroom apartment with really good ample living space and a kitchen with a laundry room attached.
The second floor and the third floor would be the same for all intents and purposes.
Two large bedrooms, a nice size open concept living dining kitchen area, as you can see here.
These are nicely sized units.
Here is a corner shot of the property.
As I said, it is a very large, old Victorian.
There are five homes adjacent to this corner property.
Four of the five are multifamily, three, four, and five bedroom dwellings, including the house right next door.
a three-family dwelling. House next door to that, a five-family dwelling. Also, within 50 feet of
this property, right down, right on the block, it changes from RSA3 to RM1. And those RM1 lots
are exactly the same size as this 4,000 square foot that we're looking at today. If this lot
were zoned rm1 like the other lots just 50 feet away we would be able to get three units by right
so that's why we've landed on the three units the trash is all stored on the side of the property
with a corral that will be placed there for each of the units here's the interior
As you can see, the whole work has stopped, but they began to frame it out.
There's a beautiful old curved stair, center stair, that we would like to maintain, which also would be helpful in having one unit per floor.
There's the rest of it.
We did meet with the community group.
There's the two-page letter of notification, the addresses that were mailed, 89 individual households.
Here's the poster and the proof of posting.
And although the RCO did send a letter of opposition, it was not very well attended as compared to the 45 signatures that we collected for the three-family dwelling.
of the 45 33 are immediate neighbors and others are not but there's still 33 immediate neighbors
of the 45 who signed the petition all of this has been submitted to you by the way
in full support of the three-family dwelling
because this property is on the street with all other adjacent multifamily dwellings
because it's on a lot that is close to 4,000 square feet and if it were RM1 which these here
on Springfield and there's a whole row of them that you can't see across the street on Springfield
For RM1 like those properties, this three-family dwelling would be a buy-right over-the-counter use because it's on a corner where multifamily dwellings and multi-use like this CMX1 property right here is encouraged by the Planning Commission for all those reasons, in addition to the 45 signatures and support, 33 of which from immediate neighbors.
I respectfully request the granting of this variance to breathe new life into this long,
neglected, boarded-up beauty. Thank you. With that, I'd like Mr. Fulton to raise his hand.
Mr. Fulton?
Fulton?
Jamar Fulton has been allowed to speak.
Sir, could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
Yes, Jamar Fulton, J-A-M-A-R-F-U-L-T-O-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, counsel.
Thank you.
Mr. Fulton, did you hear my presentation to the board today?
Is it true and accurate to the best of your knowledge?
Yes, it is.
Do you adopt it as your own testimony?
One quick question.
If you were to force by code to somehow develop this large built family dwelling, would it be marketably viable?
It would not.
Thank you.
I have nothing further.
Questions from the board.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson.
Not at this time, Mr. Chair.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
Yes, Chair. I have a hand up by the name of Susan McCullough. She has been allowed to speak.
Good evening. Ms. McCullough, could you please state your name and spell it for the court stenographer?
Yeah, I'm not on this particular case.
Okay, thank you.
I want to spell three cases. I don't know why I'm on there.
Thank you very much. Is there any other hands up?
yes sir kathy dowell has been allowed to speak hi could you state your name please and spell for
the stenographer yes hello my name is kathy dowell k-a-t-h-y-d-o-w-d-e-l-l all right you
swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth yes i do are you a
neighbor i am a neighbor and i'm also the co-chair of the cedar park neighbors zoning committee oh
Thank you. Please proceed with your testimony.
I hope that you all had a chance to read the voluminous letter that we sent in.
Mr. Anastasio's version of what occurred is somewhat different from our version.
This property had unpermitted work going on actively for over a year.
when the owner decided to obey the rules and applied for a zoning variance.
They did do the mailing. They sent out the letters.
I thought our community meeting was well attended.
We had 32 people there, all near neighbors.
I think that there is absolutely no hardship here.
There's a very strong market for single family homes of this size in this neighborhood.
and so there's not an economic hardship any economic hardship in this case the owner has
brought on himself i would also like to say that the things submitted today we did see submitted
today at 2 30 for a 3 30 hearing the request for three units and we also saw the petition that the
owner's attorney submitted if the owner would like us as a community to consider a three-unit
building. That's his prerogative. He should withdraw this application and reapply with a
three unit building. The plans that he submitted clearly are for a four unit building. I'd also
like to say that we take a dim view of these kinds of petitions. A lot of the people on the
petition are near neighbors. That's correct. Many of them are not near neighbors. And how one defines
a mere neighbor. I would probably differ from Mr. Anastasio's definition, but we don't know who
these people are. We don't know what they were told about the project. We don't know if they
were shown any plans. There is a pretty clear public process. This meeting was well advertised
both online and in person. We had 32 people at the RCO meeting. So I would encourage you to
to listen harder to those people who came to our meeting and voiced their opinions rather than
people who signed a petition who knows what they think they were signing um i i just want to
reiterate there's absolutely no hardship here and i hope you will oppose this project thank you very
much thank you uh mr anastasia i'm going to see if there's anybody else in the audience and you'll
have a chance to respond to all of it okay anyone else anyone else in the audience yes chair i have
four hands remaining showing markovitch has been allowed to speak i'm mr markovitch could you please
state your name and spell for the court stenographer yes my name is sean markovitch
that's s-h-a-w-n last name m-a-r-k-o-v-i-c-h you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth
nothing but the truth that is correct are you a neighbor i am i'm a notified near neighbor i live
on Farragut Terrace, so right around the property.
Please proceed with your comments.
Sure. I did send in a letter both for this most recent hearing and then one also
Sure. I did send in a letter both for this most recent hearing and then one also for March 3rd.
I'd like to directly respond to Mr. Anastasio's points that he brought up specifically about the this building is next to RM1 properties.
If you look at a wider map, those RM1 properties are on a commercial corridor and they border a gas station where it makes sense that those few properties and they are all single.
they're all homes. It makes sense that homes that border a gas station and commercial property would
be RM1. This property does not border any commercial properties. This is a completely
residential. It does not make sense. So his saying, well, there's RM1 just down the street,
that is not applicable in this case. I'd also like to talk about the property brought up as CMX
that is directly across. That was CMX. It has been a single family home for over 30 years.
Again, I don't believe that's applicable to his case here.
That is not operated as a commercial property.
It is operated as a single family home.
The one other item I'd like to bring up is that there was extensive work done with no
permits, including turning the basement into an illegal unit.
And there were multiple, multiple stop worker order violations showing that the owner continued
to willfully violate the rules.
I don't believe at all that this statement that Mr. Anastasio said that a single family home in this area is not viable.
There are in my letter that was dated to you on March 3rd, I include a list of comparable homes of single family homes in the area that sold after the applicant bought the property well over into a million dollars, $900,000.
So let me say this.
You're against this project.
I'm very much against it.
And there's no reason that this property cannot be returned as a viable single-family home and sold for a profit.
All right.
Thank you very much for taking the time.
I know you waited around.
We appreciate your comments.
Next hand, please.
Andrew Goodman has been allowed to speak.
Mr. Goodman, could you please state your name as spelled for the courts?
Good evening, Andrew Goodman.
G-O-O-D-M-A-N, here representing the office of Third District City Councilmember Jamie Gaudier,
room 316 City Hall. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth? The whole truth is nothing but
the truth, Mr. Goodman. Yes, I do. Please proceed. Thank you. Good evening, members of the board. I
won't duplicate other testimony that's already been given, though I certainly agree with a lot
of what has been said by the coordinating RCO reps. Councilmember Gaudier is asking that the
this does not, not only is there no hardship, it does not fit any of the kind of extenuating
circumstances that the board or frankly, the community will often look kindly upon.
This isn't a situation where the property was recently remapped. This isn't a property that
had a multifamily permit on it some time ago and then lapsed. In fact, this property has been
occupied as a single family home since it was built and only has been vacant less than a year
before this current owner bought it, so the idea that it was some long-neglected abandoned shell
is a misrepresentation as well. No historical non-conforming use, and it wasn't some long-ago
owner that did unpermitted work. It was this owner who willfully destroyed the inside of this home.
I myself tried calling the owner directly in spring 2023 while this illegal work was going on,
hoping that I could stem the tide of it. Obviously, I was not successful, as evidenced by all the
photos of the illegal work in the exhibit packet. And even since his original hearing date,
we've seen the property listed for sale on Zillow, as well as for sale signs outside the property,
even though he told the coordinating RCO at the RCO meeting that he was planning on moving into
the property himself with his family. There's a lot more, but I'll leave it there. We ask that
the board deny this variance. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Mr. Goodman. Another hand,