any other hands up yes chair cameron murphy has been allowed to speak how many more hands do you
have after that this is the last hand here thank you hi hi could you please hi could you state your
name and spell for the court stenographer cameron murphy c-a-m-e-r-o-n-m-u-r-p-h-y do you swear
for him to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth yes are you a neighbor
i am not but i am someone who grew up in that neighborhood uh my grandmother lived at 50
persons so so so let me let me say this you've heard a lot of the testimony today are you for
this project or against i am i actually helped the owner jamar footton with canvassing the
neighborhood to get community buy-in for the project i helped gather those signatures i spoke
I helped gather those signatures. I spoke to people within the community who all seemed unopposed to this project going on as a government for units in that neighborhood.
to people.
Thank you very much, Mr. Murphy. We appreciate your time.
Planning Commission.
I'm sorry, Vern.
That's okay. I know you want to get to it, but this is very briefly.
I opened up our presentation with saying that work had begun unpermitted.
When my client found about it, he fired the contractor, shut it down, hired my office to legalize what was intended.
Again, despite what anyone is mentioning about other properties being sold,
four of the five homes directly adjacent to this property are three, four, and five family dwellings.
The only real single family homes are right here where my cursor is.
They are a small fraction of the size of the homes over here.
Over here, they're all multifamily, and they're multifamily for a reason.
Because when my client had this property listed for sale, no one wanted it.
It's just not a viable option to now rehab an entire huge Victorian
on a 4,000 square foot lot, and then expect someone to pay what the cost of that construction
would be. He did try to sell it in his current condition. No one even bought. There was not
one offer on the property. So I want to make sure that that's clear as well. The unpermitted work
was stopped as soon as he was made notice of it. The property was listed for sale, hoping
to at least stem his losses.
No one was interested.
The basement unit, that doesn't exist.
So we are interested in coming closer to compliance
with just one unit per floor.
And the number of immediate neighbors
who signed that petition in our campus
far outweigh and outnumber
the number of neighbors who logged on to a Zoom.
Thank you.
Planning Commission.
Thank you, Chair Bergman, and good evening, David Fecta with the City Planning Commission.
Chairman and board members, the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the RSA3,
Residential Single-Family Zoning at this location.
There is no unique physical condition or circumstance of this property that will prevent it from being used in conformance with the zoning code.
However, the configuration of the lot and the existing residential building preclude the inclusion of accessory off-street parking.
So the City Planning Commission recommends that the board deny the proposed use variants for three dwelling units, but grant the use variants for accessory off-street parking.
MI 2023, 005-911-4601 Springfield Avenue, I vote no.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is no.
Michael Johns, my vote is no.
James Snell, my vote is no.
it's not a grant my vote is no
thank you counsel thank you sir gaston my vote is no thank you thank you sorry miss gaston
okay number six mi 2023 006 161 4012 wells street mark danak is the attorney there's a
letter of the anonymous opposition for a Taconi
Civic Association. The applicant did
provide two form letters of support from the neighbors on the block.
Mark has been promoted to
penalist. Good evening, sir. Could you please
state your name and spell it for the court stenographer?
Sorry, there's a bit of delay once you're promoted.
No, sure, sure, sure.
Mark Danek, M-A-R-K, D-A-N-E-K, Esquire, on behalf of Founder of Knowledge LLC and Ms. Stacey Thompson, the applicant in this matter.
You swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Our vice chair has a few questions for you, sir.
Good evening, Counsel. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
I do as to the amended note of the refusal, which is Exhibit 11 in our packet, dated July 2, 2024, but was received by my office on July 6, 2024.
for. Understood. Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed
to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing? Yes. Thank you, Counselor. Please
Yes. Thank you, Counselor. Please proceed and share your screen.
proceed and share your screen.
Let me do.
Green button on the bottom. Here you go. You're up. You're coming up.
Yeah. Got it. So you see the map? Yes, I do. Thank you.
um so the the property is 4012 well street um on the opa website you can see this is the property
highlighted here um it is uh located one it's one half of a twin and one door away from a mexican
restaurant and a td bank on this corner the property is owned rsa3
and what i'm going to do is i'm going to roll through a lot of the procedural history and
documents and i'm going to call miss thompson to discuss more about the proposal okay so
from our uh exhibit lists starting with exhibit one this is miss thompson's original application
submitted in October 2023. She initially sought relief as a group childcare. And that's a much
larger scale childcare zoning designation than Ms. Thompson actually intended. When I was brought
on board, we reviewed everything and we decided to amend her application to allow for family
childcare. And our request was made for up to 10 children. Today, Ms. Thompson's only seeking
relief to allow for up to six children in a residence under the family child care designation.
It's important to note under the zoning code section 146035A.2, family child care with children
up to with the maximum of six children is allowed by right. However, because Ms. Thompson's property
is in the 55th Ward, there's an exception where she's can only allow to have four or fewer
children, hence the reason for the variance request today. And this is her original application
email. This is the original notice of refusal dated October 12th. Here's the project information
sheet. Here's Ms. Thompson's deed for the real estate. She took title June 12, 2015.
Exhibit 5 is the tax clearance certificate from October 2023, as well as July 10, 2024.
October 6 is the original notice that Ms. Thompson had sent out to the RCO and the neighbors.
and Exhibit 7. So
there should be, I apologize, there should be a letter in here that I submitted and you could
see it referenced here on this document dated February 23rd, 2024, which was in advance of
march 6th um hearing requesting a continuance as well as leave to amend um this letter came out may
6th 2024 authorizing the amendment i then forwarded everything to mr de donato with updated plans
as well as the um you know the request from the board so the i made a request may 7th and may
28th, I did not get a response until, as I mentioned, July 2nd, 2024. This is the we're at
Exhibit 9. So this is your zoning notice placard for the for today's hearing. This was after the
contingence request came out. This is the notice of continued hearing. At Exhibit 11. Now this is
the amended refusal that i referred to earlier in which i stipulated to and this um this is where he
has the note as far as um no more than four children in the area in the um in the property
exhibit 12 um this is the proof of mailing of the original um notice to neighbors and then this
photo here is the subsequent notice that Ms. Thompson had sent out on July 11th,
including the updated notice of refusal from July 2nd. Exhibit 13, this is the zoning placard.
Ms. Thompson had posted it in the front of her property. This is the front door of her house.
This is her neighbor and the twin. And the Mexican restaurant I referenced from the OPA map is to,
from the OPA map is to, I guess, the right of this photo.
I guess, the right of this photo.
Another photo of Ms. Thompson's property with placard, June 19th.
Third photo.
Now, Exhibit 14.
This is an existing site plan of the property.
This shows the existing house.
This is Well Street up here, and this is her rear yard.
Exhibit 15, which maybe I can try to blow up.
this is her proposal I believe Wells Street is on this side of the drawing so the people would
enter into the living room she has a she's having a bathroom installed and then this is the rest of
her first floor this is where she intends to provide the daycare services for the up to six
children um exhibit 16 this is a letter of support from um immediate neighbors
or zero one zero well street and i believe four oh one four wells um that's documents miss thompson
secured uh exhibit 17 this is a photo uh taken in front of miss thompson's house february 14th
421 p.m. This is approximate time that parents would be coming to pick up their children from
daycare. In this area here, these are cars parked for the Mexican restaurant. Over here is T.D.
Bank. And you can see standing from in front of or a little further down in front of Ms. Thompson's
house. T.D. Bank is over here, but this is the parking area. And then this is the street parking.
and this is also at 4 21 p.m and again this shows the parking right in front of on miss thompson's
side of the property that's february 14th 4 21 p.m and this is taken in the center of the road
february 15th 5 30 p.m again you could see the the td bank here the mexican restaurant is on this
side and this is the parking available on the street and this is from miss thompson's front
porch um where you know again you can see the td bank better the on-street parking this is february
16th 6 35 a.m uh more on-street parking february 19th 5 0 6 p.m uh again more on-street parking
february 21st at 4 40 p.m uh and then this is from her porch february 21st 4 43 p.m
um now this is the this is from february 22nd 6 40 council council i think we understand your
point okay we understand your point okay so those are the photos and then um and miss thompson will
speak to this a little bit more um there was uh initial rco meeting that she attended um the rcos
are not in favor um and if anything was submitted today through the the the new tool you know the
filing system i didn't receive any anything in writing from the rcos regarding it um we did
send out i believe miss thompson sent out the the notices july 11th um and when i uploaded everything
i also courtesy copied on email everybody um and then it included you know the the notice
of refusal uh exhibit 20 this is our request to mayfair and then from to coney this is a text
message i received from mr lavavitz uh i guess reiterating the rco's position um that they're
not in favor um and again you know we had explained well miss thompson will explain that
when we reduce the request and then um and this is another email i received from mr lavowitz this
was march 25th uh and then so the last thing i want to show if i can move something here the
zoom things in the way um these are interior photos of mrs thompson's first floor
um and this is the the front door where you come into the living room this is the the bathroom that
she's having installed on the first floor um this is further into her house
i guess this might be the dining room area um and then there's your stairwell and then this
is more towards the back where the kitchen's back here and um with that i would like to call
Ms. Thompson as the witness. Sure.
Stacey Thompson has been allowed to speak.
Hi, could you please state your name as spelled for the court's
sonographer?
Stacey, please unmute yourself.
Hello, my name is Stacy Thompson spelled S T A C.
Hello, my name is Stacey Thompson, spelled S-T-A-C-I Thompson, T-H-O-M-P-S-O-N.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, counsel.
Hey, Ms. Thompson, you heard me talk extensively about the procedural history of your zoning application.
If you were called to testify, would you agree with what I said?
And do you adopt that, my testimony as your own?
Okay, thank you.
And now can we go to, I want to go back to, let me get to.
Okay, Ms. Thompson, let's discuss.
So presently on your property, you're just a half of a twin, correct?
Correct.
And for the board, can you please describe your proposal and how you intend to use the property?
So my first floor, you walk in and that'll be the first classroom, the main classroom.
Is that the living room area?
Yes, the living room area.
In the pictures, it was with the brown floor.
Well, all of them have brown floor, but it was painted, freshly painted floor.
Then the second room was the, well, it would be a smaller classroom.
And then the back room with the purple wall, we saw in the picture with the purple wall, that'll be where the refrigerator is and the food is kept for the center.
Not necessarily a kitchen, but, you know, where the food is stored.
Hey, and Ms. Thompson, what are your, well, strike that.
Ms. Thompson, do you currently run a daycare service?
Yes, at a commercial facility, a group center.
Okay, and so what, so then you, how long have you been in business?
A year and a half.
Okay, and can you just describe for the board, if they're inclined to grant the variance,
what your days and hours of operation would be at your at 412 wells the same as it is currently
monday through friday 6 30 a.m to 6 30 p.m and um how much can you just describe for the board then
when do parents drop off when do they pick up they normally now they drop off between
8 a.m. and 9.30 a.m., and they pick up between 4.30 and 6.30.
So just so I understand your testimony correctly, then, parents really drop off once and pick up
once during the day, correct? That's correct. And is it, say, regular for your parents to
come in and out all day long, taking kids in and out all day long? No, just pick up time and drop
all time. Thank you. And Ms. Thompson, are there any specific challenges or constraints on your
property that led you to decide to locate the family child care in your residence?
Well, yes, my current business is in a commercial space and I need to downsize to allow for my
business to continue because I can't afford the overhead. So moving into my residence allows me
to focus on providing the best child care possible, while at the same time maintaining
the cost for families that is, you know, maintaining the cost, basically.
Thank you. And Ms. Thompson, do you believe that the requested variance is necessary to allow you