he's on he's on zoom but on his iphone so it may be the last four numbers of his cell phone
yeah the last four of the cell phone three four one five
no i don't i have someone with your name raising their hand i don't know
well maybe that that may be him if he maybe he maybe he linked in under my link
try if not we'll we'll stipulate
can anyone hear me yes good afternoon sir please state your name and address for the record spell
your name sure my name is robert welch and that's robert r-o-b-e-r-t and that's welch
just like the grape juice w-e-l-c-h and the address we're talking about today is 242 to 244
south a street thank you mr oh sure yep thank you mr welsh i'm sorry i got ahead of myself do you
swear and affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth yes sir thank you please
proceed mr welsh um you heard my uh testimony that i previously provided to the board did you not
Yes, ma'am, I did.
And do you adopt that testimony as your own?
Yes, I do.
And do you have anything that you'd like to say to supplement the testimony that I previously provided?
I do not.
Thank you.
If there's anyone else, please raise your hand now, and I'm going to go to the board.
Does the board have any questions?
No questions.
Anyone else have their hand raised, Tanya?
No chair. We can move forward. Okay. So for the record, there is a letter of support from Wash West Civic, I believe, and a letter of non-opposition from Councilman Mark Squilla.
That's correct.
Correct. Okay. Calendar number 39334. 2424 South 8th Street. My vote is yes.
My vote is yes.
My vote is yes.
do you want the planning commission's recommendation oh i'm sorry ronnie i
apologize ron planning commission okay thank you the first time in a long time i forgot you give
me a break well this property is uh zoned for residential use on the city plan given the history
of the mixed juice in this building we have no objection to the granting of variance all right
so i'll do the vote one more time calendar number 39334 242 south 8th street my vote is yes
my vote is yes my vote is yes my vote is yes thank you all thank you
okay i'm sorry um before we continue um could i just mention that we are having technical
difficulties with zoom i thought it was me okay cannot um come forward on the video zoom so i
would ask that any attorneys or applicants who have witnesses please have them call into the zoom
while our um technical staff is working on trying to fix the problem thank you
Thank you. Calendar number 39525, 3875 Kensington Avenue.
3875 Kensington Avenue.
Augusta O'Neill, you have been promoted to a panelist, and you can share your screen and speak now as you wish.
and is mr grigos uh testifying as well is he putting on this case with you
i think augusta you can unmute yourself
i'm sorry can you hear me now yes we can uh great do you agree to waive the reading of
its refusal to stipulate to its accuracy i do please state your name and address for
the record? Augusta O'Neill. My address is 1835 Market Street, Suite 1400, Philadelphia, PA 19103.
I'm with the law firm of Claire Harrison Harvey Brandsburg. You swear to testify to tell the
truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? I do. I asked, is Herc Gregos on this call?
No, this is a matter I have with Brett Feldman of my firm. Okay, no, it has his name,
your name and then slash his name. Okay, so please proceed. Thank you. Can everyone see my screen?
I can now. Okay, great. Today I'm here with an application for the addition of a vehicle paint
booth as part of an existing repair and auto sales shop. The paint booth is going to be added to
an auto repair shop known as Auto Technology, which is located at the back of Best Buy in
auto sales. This property is located in the Harrow Gate section of Philadelphia.
I'm just going to pull up a zoning map just for context. It is currently zoned
CMX 3. It is bordered by Buckeus Street to the west and Jasper Street to the
north, aerial. It is zoned as CMX 3, which prohibits auto paint shops. As you
can see from this aerial picture, the property is not located in a
residential neighborhood. There are multiple auto complexes surrounding it.
The property itself occupies an entire city block. There's a paint shop over
here and over here. So adding a paint booth to this location would be consistent with the
character of the neighborhood. The property has previously been approved for personal vehicle
repair and maintenance. My client, Auto Technology, currently has a shop where it does body work for
vehicles, and so it would like to be able to paint the vehicles that it does repair work on.
Having the paint booth would therefore be a natural continuation of the type of work it
already does. And just for context, I have pictures of the paint booth for you to
look at. So this is what the paint booth looks like. As I said before, the paint
booth is going to be in the back of a shop called Best Buy in Town Auto. This
is looking at Best Buy in Town Auto from Kensington Avenue. The paint shop is
going to be, if you go down this street, which is Buckeyes Street, in the back of
this building there is a shop where my clients are currently doing auto body
work. And for context, this would be the garage door and through this garage door
would be where the paint booth is going to be.
An additional picture for context. So these five bays, currently the auto body
work is being done here, so having the paint booth over here would just, as I
said before, be a natural continuation of the work they're already doing at the
shop. My client has done extensive research on the type of paint it's going
to use to make sure it says noiseless and odorless as technology permits. They're going to use what
is called a low VOC type of paint, which is environmentally friendly. They have two employees
who are currently trained on how to use the paint system, and if they are allowed to complete
installation of their paint booth, their hours of operation will be from 830 to 530.
On February 6th of this year, we met with the Harrogate Civic Association and presented this
project to them. We received the support of every single member of the association
of the association that was in the room that night and received 20 votes in favor of letting this paint shop open.
that was in the room that night and received 20 votes in favor of letting
With me this afternoon is Kim Kaplan from Best Buy in Town Auto, which has the auto sales in front.
And just for additional context, I'm going to show members of the board a site plan.
I can see that it's taking a minute to download.
Actually, I'll go two different.
I'm sorry.
Okay. Just one second. Just trying to pull up the picture of the site plan. I'm sorry, the plan, so that you can get an idea for context.
Can everyone see that plan?
Okay, great.
So right here is the showroom where vehicles are sold which is operated by
Best Buy in Town Auto. If you go to the back of the facility this is where cars
are worked on as part of the auto body work and this is where the vehicle paint
booth would be. As I said before Kim Kaplan is here this afternoon with me
from Best Buy in Town Auto. If you would like to promote her to be a speaker. Kim, could you raise
your hand? Kim, you can unmute yourself. Yes, I am here. Hi, Kim. Have you heard my testimony
you this afternoon and do you adopt it as your own yes excuse me oh i'm sorry i have to swear
ma'am i'm sorry please state your name and address spell your name for the record
my name is kimberly kaplan k-i-m-b-e-r-l-y and my last name c-a-p like peter l-a-n my home address
is 516 Delaware Drive, Sellersville, Pennsylvania, 18960.
Chaplain, do you swear and affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Thank you. Please proceed, Augusta.
Kim, have you heard my testimony this afternoon?
Yes, I did, Augie.
Was it accurate?
Yes, it was.
And do you adopt it as your own?
Yes, I do.
Thank you.
Thank you.
thank you uh if anyone else wishes to testify please raise your hand we'll we'll put you in
the queue in the meantime there are any questions from the board yes uh councilman did you uh do a
phase one environmental study uh we did not do an environmental study as part of our application
okay thank you but the type of paint as i said before the type of paint that
my client has invested in is what's called low VOC. So low voluntary organic compounds,
which is environmentally friendly. And so, as I said before, there's none of the people in
neighboring businesses, because as you can see from the pictures, this is not a residential
neighborhood. This is a mostly, there's quite a few auto repair and auto sales businesses in the
area, no one is going to hear anything or smell anything due to the technology they've invested
in? Well, the report would give us evidence of that or some evidence of that. I'm sorry,
I couldn't actually hear what you said. The report, the environmental report, phase one,
would give us some evidence of what it'll do to the neighborhood.
Would they not be required to have certain EPA standards?
That I am not aware of. That was not something that we submitted as part of our application.
If there are EPA standards that they are required to meet, they'll be required to do this to
show that they met them prior to the issuance of the building they're the
guard dogs all right any any other questions no anyone testify there's no
one with their hands up chair thank you planning Commission so this property is
owned for commercial mixed use on the city plan we have no objection to the
granny of the parents thank you ron count calendar number three nine five two five
three eight seven five kensington avenue my vote is yes my vote is yes
my vote is yes thank you
okay okay uh did confessor leave jim yeah yeah i got this last one you'll call the next one okay
thank you okay calendar number thank you nine yes
he said thank you oh okay i'm sorry okay here let me do that again scratch that
all right uh calendar number 39480 4739 duffield street
Rachel you have been promoted to panelists you can thank you counselor do you agree to waive
the reading of the refusal stipulate to its accuracy yes name and address for the record
So Rachel Pritzker, R-A-C-H-A-E-L, Pritzker, P-R-I-T-Z-K-E-R, Pritzker Law Group, 1635 Market, Suite 1600, Philadelphia, PA, 19103.
You swear to the firm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
Thank you.
Please proceed, Rachel.
So we have this project at 47, 31, 35, and 39 Duffield.
This is in collaboration with the Philadelphia Land Bank.
So one of the lots is owned by my client, who is on the line as well.
I believe him and our architect were experiencing some of those technical difficulties and did
call in.
So after I get through this, I will bring them up and we can swear them in.
31 and 35 are under contract with the land bank.
We have a letter authorizing us to seek these permits signed by Angel Rodriguez, who's
their executive director, and we already own 4739 Duffield Street. This application is for
consolidating these three vacant parcels and providing a surface parking lot for the expansion
of the business located at the top corner called Arway Linen and Uniform Rentals. Although the
parcel is on RSA 5, the immediate area contains a mix of industrial and residential zoning
and reflecting sort of the long-standing light industry in the neighborhood.
ROA Linning, for example, is on I2. The three refusals that were generated and I
can bring up the our plans really quick so you can see screen this kind of gives
you a view of the site the plans are here if you can see that provide for 23
accessory off-street parking spaces to be utilized by the expanding business, a commercial business,
again, that employs over 130 individuals, local residents, and those who've been there for many
years. And again, there's a landscape buffer, things of that nature to protect from the
neighboring RSA 5 properties. Just to go into, this is the letter from the land bank, again,
authorizing our ability to seek permits and licenses and their support of us
doing that for this project. Again this is for an expansion of the property
located at 1696 Fulcron. I can sort of just show you what that
site looks like based on our aerials.
So this is the zoning map of the site. The existing
business is here. These are the lots. They've been vacant for a very long time.
businesses here. These are the lots. They've been vacant for a very long time.
As you can see, these have been demolished. The structure was unsafe. It's been demolished.
It looks like there's a boat on this lot. I don't think that's still there, but
sort of this is the parcel we're looking at. And again, this is our way. As you can see,
they have a really small parking lot here. So this is going to be utilized to help expand
both from truck parking and car parking for employees and visitors. This is, again,
the visual of the site. I'm going to bring up the refusal and RSA 5 as I'm sure the board is aware
you're not allowed to have accessory off-street parking access by a front street and they also
give requirements as to how many the bicycle spaces you have to provide. In this case I believe
it's four. We're not providing the bicycle spaces because this is supposed to be utilized for
the expansion of this business and adding bicycle parking will make it difficult to maximize
the use of the lot and also would have to take away some of the buffering with the landscaping,
which we thought was important given the residential mixed nature of this area.
Again, the only way to access the site would be front loaded. So an accessory service parking is
also not permitted in RSA 5. However, again, this is a collaboration with the land bank
and this business so that they continue to operate and create jobs in our city.
We met with the RCO, which was Frankfurt CDC.
This is the letter that we sent out.
We were lucky to have met with them January 29th, right before the pandemic.
And we received a letter of support from them as they did understand that they are very
familiar with the business and all the community work that they did.
And even the owners had mentioned that we would be happy to provide the parking lot on
weekends and stuff for community related activities as permitted by the city.
So they were really excited about that.
and also to get some of the cars off the street from the employees that have been parking there
given the congestion. We also have a letter of support from the Councilwoman's office,
Councilwoman Maria Canona-Sanchez, which is here again in your packet,
our certificate of mailing, sent it to 81 people, and again, I already provided the plans.