Good morning, everyone.
My name is Bill Bergman, and I will be chairing this morning.
Hold on, Mr. Chair.
The attendees are just coming in.
I thought you said they were on.
I'm sorry, Chair.
No, it's okay.
All right. We're at 40 attendees, Chair. You can proceed as you wish.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. My name is Bill Bergman, and I will be chairing this morning's EBA hearings.
With me is our Vice Chair, Ismail Shahid.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Our Board Member, Thomas Holloman, is struggling to get in.
Mr. Holloman.
And our alternate Board Member, Emily Persico, from Development Services.
Present, Mr. Chair.
Also present is Hillary Emerson, our attorney, and our executive director, Tanya Sunkett.
Here's our virtual format.
Be advised, the proceedings are being recorded.
Video will be available by contacting tanyasunkett at phil.gov.
For the benefit of our court stenographer, we ask attorneys and witnesses to identify themselves before testifying.
If you're 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 address the property question.
And finally, the question answer box on the screen is not for comments or testimony.
All comments should be directed to our executive director, Tanya Sunkett.
let's look at this morning's schedule number eight mi 2023 000 901 1402 wharton street
that case is continued are there any comments relative to that case
good morning chair this is jevette benton i'll be your co-host for today
We have a caller with the last four digits, nine, one, seven, six.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
This is Tanya Yvette.
I hate to interrupt, but that's Mr. Holloman.
All righty.
I'll change the name.
Chair, we have no one else's hand up at this time.
Are there any other requests for continuances?
chair we have uh Leonard Reuter with his hand up okay good morning Mr. Reuter
good morning why could you state your name for the record please
for the court reporter sure Leonard F. Reuter R-E-U-T-E-R senior attorney for the city of
Philadelphia right do you swear for him to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
I do. Is this about case number 11? I believe so. 2940 East Tioga.
Let's see here. Yes. Is Mr. DeMarco on the line?
Chair, I have a mute. Mr. DeMarco. Thank you. Mr. DeMarco, could you state your name,
please, and spell for the court stenographer? Sure. Good morning. Richard DeMarco,
last name d-e-m-a-r-c-o right do you swear for him to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing
but the truth i do leonard why don't you go first sure um this uh morning i discovered that there
was a problem uh with this this is an appeal from a zoning violation so it's a an appeal against l
and i um what i had discovered and it's it's it's my fault entirely that i didn't learn
discover it sooner is the violation at issue in this that that's the subject of this appeal was
actually marked complied but that was we believe that was done in error and in fact the very same
day it was marked complied a new violation was issued I'm not sure that Mr. DeMarco's client
got that but I just provided them with copies of the new violation that was not appealed
uh technically it's too late to file that appeal but i would leave it to the discussion of the
board whether they would accept i wouldn't oppose a a non-protunk appeal uh the question i have is
whether because this violation was marked complied uh i don't because the way the eclipse system
works i don't know that if the regardless of which way the board goes on the underlying facts
I don't know what impact, if any, it would have on this actual violation in the Eclipse system. I think they actually have to file the appeal under the new violation, and we would have to proceed with that at a later date.
under the new violation and we would have to proceed with that at a later date i'm kind of
not i'll be honest with you i just want to present this to the board because um i and i would leave
it up to uh the board or or miss sunk uh mrs sunk ms sunk and ms uh emerson to determine what would
be the best way forward um and again i apologize to everybody uh but it's just it's just a weird
situation. Normally, I would say, let's just go forward with this appeal, and then we'll just
apply whatever the decision is to the new violation. I just don't think that's possible
the way the system is set up, but I could be wrong. So I had a quick conversation earlier
with Hillary about this, and we think we should continue this case and try to work it out and
see where we stand with it. Mr. DeMarco? I mean, I'll do whatever the board wants.
i i i from what i can see in the few minutes that i had to look at the new violation that
we were not served um i guess a continuance is i'm not going to be upset about it but
yeah it seems to be identical so i'm very confused yeah again i i like i said i i it
i don't want to here's if i may let len if i may i don't want to i don't know why i'd have to file
another make the client pay another fee for an appeal when it's the identical violation that
is under appeal i mean if there's a way to do it let me let me say this why don't we do this why
don't we figure this out we don't have to debate this yeah i don't know why don't we just continue
yeah that's what i was gonna say yeah because the the current appeal is tied to the violation
that has now been closed so we need to we we need to address that and we can discuss issues related
to fees and such um you know off offline so why don't we continue this and we can work it out
yeah i'm just going to just let everybody know i'm going to ask that the fee the appeal fee be
waived in light of the mistake by the city okay so thank you yeah mi 2023 003050 2940 east
Tioga Street, the cases continue. Thank you. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Thank you, everyone.
Thank you. All right, so we're going to go to cases that we do not have exhibits for.
Number one, MI 2023-000966-2943-45 Ridge Avenue. Akbar Brown is the listed owner.
Ambrose Chukwana is the listed applicant. No exhibits first listing.
Chair, I see no hands at this time. MI 2023-000-966-2943-45 Ridge Avenue. That case is
discontinued. Mark must be tried. Number two, MI 2022-007-379-3695 Kensington Avenue. No exhibit,
second listing. Louis Garcia is the listed applicant. Paul Strauss is the listed owner.
chair i see no hands at this time okay um mi 2022 007 379 3695 kensington avenue
this is the second listing i vote to dismiss
ishmael shaheed my vote is to dismiss
Emily Persego, my vote is to dismiss.
Thank you.
Number four.
MI 2022-004-030-9311, Voight Slane.
Yannick Patel, Bhaskar Patel, Amala Patel are the owners.
Pro se. No exhibits. Third listing.
Chair, we have someone by the last name O'Hara with their hand up.
They've been unmuted and allowed to speak.
Could you state your name, please, and spell for the court stenographer?
Yes, sir, Mr. Chairman. Jack O'Hara, O-H-A-R-A.
I am the president of the RCO, the Greater Boston Civic League.
All right. Do you swear or firm to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Proceed, sir.
The notice I received, there's not a posting on the property for this hearing.
This is the third continuance, I believe.
A lot of back and forth between the applicant and the RCO regarding their presentation to us.
A letter I sent yesterday explaining the history is a little bit confusing, but they began a presentation and then withdrew it, saying that they would come back with revised plans.
A letter I sent yesterday explaining the history is a little bit
A lot of back and forth between the applicant and the RCO. None of that occurred. New plans were never received. A presentation and vote never occurred at the RCO.
Thank you very much. Hold on one minute. Janak Patel, Vaskar Patel, Mala Patel, the owner's applicants, are they present?
Chair, I see someone with the last name Patel. They just put their hand up.
They've been unmuted, Chair.
Hi, could you state your name, please, as well for the court sonographer?
Yes. My name is Bharat Patel.
Please spell your name for the court reporter.
B-H-A-R-A-T.
You swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, sir, I do.
You're a neighbor in this case, am I correct?
That is correct.
So I still need to see if the owners are here.
Janak Patel, Bhaskar Patel, or Mahala Patel, are they present?
i'm sorry cheer this is tanya that was patel it appears yeah but he's the neighbor okay
iraq patel is a neighbor am i right mr patel
okay so mi 2022 004 030 93 11 voids lane this is the third listen we should not have exhibits
I vote to dismiss.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is to dismiss.
Emily Persico, my vote is to dismiss.
Thank you.
Number six.
MI 2022-007-383-1440 Hellerman Street.
Enaldo Valentino is the owner pro se.
No exhibits, second listing.
Do we see an owner?
I'm unmuting them now, Chair.
Pardon me?
I'm unmuting them now.
Good morning.
This is Enaldo Valentino.
Hi, could you spell your name, please, for the court report?
Sure. First name, E-N-E-L-I-D-O. Last name, Valentin, V-A-L-E-N-T-I-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Sir, we do not have any exhibits from you, and there's no record of an RCO meeting. Am I correct?
I do have an exhibit. I located a permit which was issued in the 1940s, which is so-
Yeah, but I mean, what I'm saying, sir, we have not received anything from you.
Okay, that's correct, yes.
All right.
And you have not had RCO meetings as of yet, right?
Am I right?
Yes, that's correct.
Because somebody came over my house, my property, and they inspected it, and they saw that it was properly divided into two units.
So here's where we are.
I'm going to continue this case.
You have to be ready for the next hearing.
And you have to have an RCO meeting, et cetera.
If not, we're going to dismiss it.
So MI 2022-007-383-1440 Hellerman Street.
Case is continued.
Mark must be tried.
Okay, sir?
May I ask you a question?
How do I submit an exhibit?
I'm sorry, Chair.
Go ahead.
Mr. Valentin, if you can reach out to our office where the documents came to you in the mail, we'll assist.
Thank you so much, Chair.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you, sir. All right. Is Thomas Holloman on?
Chair, I'm not sure if he's on or not. I see his name, but I don't know if his phone number is here.
Okay. Mr. Holloman?
Mr. Holloman, if you're on, could you please raise your virtual hand, please?
chair there are no hands up at this moment okay so what we're going to do is we'll hold off on
the add-ons we're going to go to our regular list first okay okay all right number seven
OK. All right. Number seven. We're going to start with number seven.
we're going to start with number seven
MI 2023-000970-4200 North Street.
Ken Ong is the owner applicant.
Mr. Ong? He's coming back in as a panelist now, Chair.
Thank you.
chair if i may this is tanya just a wee bit of housekeeping at the moment
you most certainly and mr holliman i'm going to unmute you and see how it works
good morning mr holliman
patina could you check and see if you have a hand for
mr halliman yeah i see no hands at this time on panelists or attendees wait a minute something
just came up that would be him okay unmute and make sure he works sure mr halliman are you able
to hear and speak yep perfect okay we will mute you until it's time for you to speak
chair thank you very kindly so why why don't we do this let's go back to tell mr
Mr. Ong will be with him shortly. Let's go back to our admins and take care of them, okay?