Thank you.
Okay, Chair, we have 27 attendees and we can start it when you're ready.
Thank you.
Good morning.
My name is Bill Bergman and I will be chairing this morning's ZBA hearings.
With me is our Vice Chair, Carol Tenere.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Our board secretary, Ismail Shahid.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Our board member, Thomas Holliman.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you.
Also here is Hillary Emerson, our attorney, and Lakeisha Dandy, our ZBA hearing supervisor.
Before we begin, here is our virtual format.
Be advised the proceedings are being recorded.
by participating in your knowledge agreement to be recorded.
A video will be available by contacting tonyasunkett at phil.gov.
For the benefit of our court sonographer,
we ask attorneys and witnesses to identify themselves before testifying.
If you are participating by phone and you wish to testify,
press star 9 to raise your hand and star 6 to unmute.
to enter an appearance statement, call 267-270-5548. Leave your email and the address
of the property in question. And lastly, the question answer box on the screen is not for
comments or testimony. All comments should be directed to our Executive Director, Tanya Sunkett.
so let's look at our continuance continuances for this morning
number two mi 2022 004 360 10960 dunton road that case is continued number five
M.I. 2022, 004352, 3743 North 18th Street, that case is continued.
Number seven, M.I. 2022, 004258, 3959 North Fairhill Street, that case is continued.
Number 8, MI 2021-005-316, 1631 Church Lane. That case is continued, Attorney Moving Party.
Number 9, MI 2022-004-261-2807, Nightingale Road. That case is continued.
And number 12, MI 2022, 004353, 1208 Daly Street, that case is continued.
and number 14, MI 2022-004-357-1429, Fanshawe Street. That case is continued.
Any comments relative to the cases that have been continued?
Good morning, Mr. Chair. This is Jason Hand. I do not see any hands at this time.
Okay. Are there any other requests for continuances?
Once again, sir, I do not see any hands.
Thank you. And I also have two cases that we have no exhibits for.
Number one, MI-2022-004-260-5306 North Fish Street.
We have no exhibits for that.
Solange Hippolyte is the applicant.
Mr. Chairman, what number is that?
That number, it's number one.
Jason, any hands?
I'm sorry. I do not see any hands in that case.
I'm sorry, I do not see any hands.
Okay, so that's the first listing.
So that's the first listing, MI-2022-004-260-5306 North 5th Street.
That case is continued, the first listing.
And number six, MI-2022-004-355-1231-33 Walnut Street.
I have no exhibits, first listing.
Empire Building Partners is the listed owner.
I did not see any hints, Mr. Chair.
Thank you.
So MI 2022-004-355, 1231 to 33 Walnut Street, that case is continued.
We're going to go to our regular list, and we're going to start with number three.
MI-2022-006-689-1007 Brandywine Street.
Jessica Diaz is the owner applicant.
We have a letter of support from the 14th Ward Democratic Executive Committee, RCO.
And we also have a petition of support from 13 neighbors.
Good morning, Ms. Diaz.
I'll allow Ms. Diaz to speak, sir.
Ms. Diaz, please unmute and wait to be.
Good morning, Chair.
Good morning.
Could you state your name spelt, please, for the court reporter?
Yes, my name is Jessica, J-E-S-S-I-C-A, D-S-D-I-A-Z.
Right.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, sir.
Could you turn your camera on so we can see you, please?
I'm trying to look to see where I can do that.
I'm going to promote it to panelists.
please hold okay thank you
Ms. Diaz will be coming back in as a panelist
okay sure
good morning to Ms. Diaz
there we go
that's it
you're fine now
so our vice chair
has a few questions for you hi good morning have you emailed the exhibit packet with the required
documents consisting of proof of ownership tax compliance refusal referral photos under plans
of the property five days in advance of this hearing and have you met with the rco and do
you have a letter uh yes ma'am okay this is an application for the erection of a fourth floor
addition on an existing attached structure and roof deck accessed from the fourth floor for use
as two-family household living size and location as shown in the application plans there are there's
one use refusal two-family household living is expressly prohibited in the rsa5 zoning district
the other refusal is the maximum building height is 38 feet in the rsa5 residential zoning district
and 42.16 feet
is proposed.
It's a letter of support from the 14th Ward
Democratic Executive Committee
and you may proceed
and begin by sharing your screen.
And there's also a petition of support
signed by 13 neighbors.
That's it.
Got it.
Zoom came up.
so that's it we're good okay well good morning everyone good morning chair and um other members
of the board my name is jessica diaz um allow me to give you a brief introduction i guess i am
i was born and raised in brooklyn new york um came to philadelphia in the mid-90s to attend
law school here at temple university and fell in love with the city um i purchased the home
and I was the first one in my family to purchase a home in 2003 and so I've been a long time
resident here for over 20 years now and have seen the renaissance and while
while the neighborhood has still maintained its character and diversity over the years.
the neighborhood has still maintained its character and diversity.
So we are a family here.
I have neighbors, I guess, that are here with me, along with my architect, if you have any questions.
Allow me to just show you a little talk about the pictures, show you the current condition of the house.
Oh, here we go.
So, I have, when I first purchased the house, you know, I was in love.
It had character.
It was very unique.
um but as you can see like my basement um ceiling height is a little low so I was never able to
really kind of do anything down there um I also get water at times during hard storms um
I have these windows as you can see let me see if I can zoom it in a little bit
I have radiator heat. I have no central AC. And so my cost of maintaining the house,
you know, is pretty expensive. You see these windows back here?
um what they did um the previous owner blew out the back so i have no backyard
and they made this an extension and it goes all the way up to the third floor
um but these are single pane windows and so my heating bill um during the winter months
is almost like a thousand dollars um so i lose a lot a lot a lot of heat and energy
um that's a hatch I guess to get down to the basement the staircase basically is in the
middle of the house and so I have no bedroom walls I have the basically the staircase kind
of separates um all the rooms in the house and the staircase is very narrow like I couldn't I
couldn't fit the couch that we're sitting on I couldn't bring it upstairs because it wouldn't
Yeah, I couldn't get it over the railings and to clear these kind of landings over here.
Let me go.
Also here, so you see my radiator heat.
These are on each and every floor.
It's very pretty.
But I lose basically about three feet of living space.
because underneath here and behind the radiators is all closet space but these like kind of um
landings are about three feet kind of deep and so that's on each and every floor of the house
great for a woman you know I don't complain about all the storage but
I lose a lot of living space on each of the floors so this is my main bathroom and as you
can see it has no again there's no walls and so now after 20 years and i have nephews that come
over you know um there's no privacy whatsoever when you come out of the shower or when you use
the restroom um here those window panes again again it's about at least three or more feet
that goes back um there's another thing i wanted to show you this is the bedroom so this is the
top floor again no doors no walls it's just all open space
this is the top floor where i would i usually just try to um uh do work is my desk kind of
library area but in the summertime so in the wintertime I freeze but in the summertime I
can't stay up here because all the heat rises and it's 150 degrees up here um I also have you can see
I have these skylights very pretty I loved them when I first came when I first bought the house
but almost every on the letter almost every five years because of the settling it's a very old
house i've had to redo all six of the skylights to get them resealed at a cost of like ten thousand
dollars because any little centimeter you know settlement i start to get water in the house
I start to get water in the house.
and you'll see i guess some of the pictures will show like
And you'll see, I guess some of the pictures will show, like I just get, over the years, I've just gotten water damage.
You can see the water damage kind of over here.
So I've had to do some.
So Jessica, I think I understand what you've just presented.
Why don't you show us like a drawing of what it's going to look like when you're done?
I think that was the next exhibit first so I have gotten preliminary plans my architect is here
oh sure oh and I have finished plans also um I just want to get an idea what it's going to look
like when you're done yep hold on you're going to put an extra floor on you want to go up for
a fourth floor am I right yes and it's not going to be a full like so you know typically you would
have like a um a pilot house right kind of up there a pilot door but because i'm i'm losing so
much storage space if i'm kind of going from you know a full house to basically a two-bedroom
apartment right because i will be living in the in the second unit the top unit right okay so
because i am losing so much i'm going to expand that top so that it's just not a pilot house
it'll have storage i can put my desk up there it'll be a work area basically for me
and that you'd be able to see i believe right here
oh wait
oops sorry
so okay okay it'll be kind of but it'll be set back you know so it's not gonna interfere with
my neighbor my immediate neighbors as far as their view you know to the to the city or anything like
that okay and and you're at the rco how did the rco vote go
yeah unanimously they voted in favor of the my request for the variance okay you know again
we've been i've been here you know initially i looked to sell um i was you know going to open
houses i was looking around but you know we kind of grown to be a little family over here
go out we shovel each other's property you know snow off each other's property
all right so if i'm going to invest three hundred thousand dollars i want to so jessica one other
one other question sure are there any other apartments when you're blocked yes so my
immediate neighbor um they are new to the area they came from delaware okay um um they built a
duplex and so when i saw what they did i was like well wait a minute then maybe i can do that and
i'll be able to afford you know the new mortgage that i would be good good good all right all right
So questions from the board? No, Mr. Chair. Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
Okay, Mr. Chair, I have Ms. Diane Munro with the hand raised. I have an order to speak at
time this time, sir. Okay, good morning. Hi, could you state your name, please,
and spell for the court reporter yes i am monroe e-i-a-n-e monroe m-o-n-r-o-e right do you swear
for him to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing about the truth yes i do pursue miss
Monroe. Okay, good morning. Good morning. I'm the chair of the 14th Ward RCL. We did have a
open community meeting on this project a couple of months ago. Right. And the community is in
support of this project. We did not receive any negative or any opposition about the proposed
project. And it was explained at the open community and everyone understood at the open
community that it was going to be higher than 38 feet. And even the drawings that were submitted
to, the 14th Ward demonstrated that it will be over 38 feet. So, you know, the community is not
in opposition. No one is in opposition. The people on that block, they are in total support. So we
give our 100% support of the proposed project. Thank you so much for calling in.
Thank you so much for calling in.