participated in the meeting for the applicant, the current applicant's project or the neighboring
project is unclear. So I'm just requesting a continuance such that the applicant can post
the sign on Pennock Street, which is required under the Philadelphia City Code.
Mr. Chair, I have to object. My client posted in good faith. The large portion of the lot is on
the street in which it was posted wasn't hidden in plain sight. It was posted very high. Not only
was it posted with the poster, but also the refusal. In addition, 163 immediate households
were mailed notice of this hearing. In addition, 30 immediate neighbors showed up at the RCO meeting.
I think it's whether both sides of the property were posted or one of the larger side. I think
it's a distinction without a difference in this particular matter. There's absolutely no one in
that immediate area that wasn't made aware of not only the community meeting, but of the details of
the hearing today. So I'm going to go on with the hearing. A portion of the hearing will be going to
the audience, the virtual audience. Ms. Rivera, you can really testify then and respond, okay?
understood thank you all right mr anastasio could you identify your client to in a relationship to
the property one more time yep i represent the owner mr george shipp okay and our vice chair
has just a few questions great great good morning counsel do you agree to wave the reading of the
refusal and stipulate to its accuracy i do i do have you emailed in all the required documents
and exhibits that are needed and required to proceed with this case five days in advance
of this hearing? I have. Thank you. Please proceed and see your screen.
1224 Pennock Street. The application is for the relocation of lot lines. Two very small lots to make.
application is for the relocation of lot lines two very small lots to make one lot for a single
family residential home with a garage and this is the property this is the rendering of what
will be Mr. Shipp's home as you can see it's in complete compliance with the
the height requirements, the use is consistent. We do have two minor refusals, and I'll explain
to you what they are. We are offering off-street parking, and of course the parking is not
permitted unless it's on a rear access. The way the property is situated, obviously there can't
be a rear parking, but we do have it on the side as I showed you here in the rendering.
And it avoids a front loading garage situation, which is what the spirit of the code was designed
to do to avoid that. The other minor dimensional variance is for rear yard.
We are proposing a five foot rear yard and what is required is seven feet, but yes, it is only five
feet deep but it's 22 feet long so uh it's plenty of of open air space and of course it meets
that requirement with 124 square feet of open air space um and because this these two lots are so
narrow uh they we actually need the two additional uh feet in order to make the interior uh livable
but this permits uh ample outdoor space uh deep enough to also make sure that the trash is stored
correctly but in fact have additional outdoor space uh for outdoor seating and and uh passive
recreation. Here's a photo of the lot. It was overwhelmingly supported by just about everybody
in attendance. Some folks were sad that they would be losing their illegal parking. Other folks,
just like the idea of a vacant lot, we did ensure that when trees are removed, we're going to do
what we can to replace those trees on sidewalk and there is an adjacent construction project
that's going on uh shortly and uh both uh that council and myself agreed to coordinate uh the
construction uh time frame here's proof of mailing to 163 individual households this was the two
page notice that went out to all individuals and we do have a letter of support i believe it's on
file from the juniana uh civic association return right say it again what's brewery town am i right
i'm sorry brewery town sharswood sure okay that's my that's my other case today well that's good
here's the garage it's a double wide even though this has shows two cars here the application was
for a one car but he does want the extra wide garage for storage on one half as you can see
that above the garage there'll be a kitchen living room dining area
and then we've got uh three modest size bedrooms and then a master suite at the top
again all within compliance of the height requirements and with that i'd like to call
mr ship to raise his virtual hand i believe he is in the audience by the way this is the
The posting, as you can see, pretty hard to miss.
Good morning, Mr. Schiff.
Could you state your name and spell, please, for the court stenographer?
Chair, I see no hands at this time.
He may have been on, but perhaps he did not stick around.
You're an officer of the court.
We will accept your testimony.
Thank you.
I have no things further.
Questions from the board?
No, Chair.
No, Mr. Chairman.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
Chair, we have Ashley Rivera, please unmute.
Chair, we have Ashley Rivera. Please unmute. Wait for the chair.
Good morning. You've already been sworn. Could you just state your name again for the record?
Good morning. My name is Ashley Rivera.
Okay. Are you a neighbor?
I am, yes.
Proceed.
So I'd just like to address a couple of points made by Office of Counsel.
First, he specifically noted that the sign that he posted, sorry, that is posted is posted high as required, you know, as he alleges it's required.
The Philadelphia Code actually requires that the sign be posted at eye level.
So by his own admission, it is posted higher than that.
It is obstructed by the, as he noted, illegally parked cars.
And as you can see in the photo that he provided, it is not actually easily easy to view for anyone who's passing through, but not otherwise would have any reason to poke around in between people's vehicles to see if perhaps development might be going on on that property.
The other thing that I would like to mention is that the board is required under the city code to delay action unless required posting began as required and made a good faith effort to keep the sign notices posted.
Applicant's counsel does not even contend that it posted those signs.
As I mentioned, this is a Penrock Street address, and there is no sign whatsoever on Penrock Street.
The one sign that was posted is not actually easy to view, and it is not on the side of the property that is actually the subject of the appeal.
So, like I said, I am not interested in trying to, you know, cause any big problems here. I'm just requesting a continuance, a delay such that the applicant can come into compliance, because as we've seen so far today, a number of other applicants have had no problem complying with the requirement that signage be posted on all frontages of their property.
why this particular applicant failed to make any effort to post any sign at all on the one side of
the property that is not obstructed by vehicles. It's not entirely clear to me, but I don't think
that it is that the city code permits the board to act on this variance when the required signage
required by law. No, you know, hey, good faith, you sent something in the mail. Hey, you posted
one sign, the law is two signs must be posted on each frontage. And in this instance, there is not
even a sign posted on literally the named street for this property. So I don't think that it is
appropriate for the board to grant the variance at this time. I'd also like to mention that
applicant's counsel indicated on page nine of his submission that that was an image of the
subject property. It is not. That is a completely different property, which actually has been built
on since then. And if you look at that page, you will see that actually the subject property is in
the background on the right-hand side of that image. So it's just not even correct that that
image actually reflects what applicant council says that it does. Mr. Chair, you'll have your
chance. Thank you. Mr. Rivera, I hear your issues with the sign. Are you against the project?
I am not inherently. I think that there's been, there have been some issues with
the proposed development that applicants counsel said would be addressed, which I've not heard
anything to indicate they have. For example, changing the frontage of the home from Pennock
Street to Stile Street. In the renderings he provided, the front of the home is actually on
the side, not on Pennock Street. It's on West Stile Street. Another home on the street has done
something similar and did not go through the whatever process is required to have the frontage
changed and that has become a hassle for me because people go looking for an address that
doesn't where there's no door it doesn't exist the same kind of problem is likely to to occur
in this situation if the building is not oriented in the way that that you know the city has it
oriented. I'm also concerned that the garage renderings, those will impede potentially my
front garage. So I have a number of concerns that counsel has not, as far as I can tell,
made any effort to address. And they quite simply, as I said, have not complied with the law. And
I'm concerned that if they are disregarding the code's requirements at this stage of the proceedings,
disregarding the code's requirement at this stage of the proceedings,
I'm not
I'm not real confident that they will, you know, honor it as the project progresses.
Ms. Rivera, did you attend the RCO meeting?
Yes, sir, I did.
Did you raise the issues there?
Yes, I did.
Okay. All right. Thank you very much. We appreciate it.
I have a cross, Ms. Rivera.
Sure, sure.
Ms. Rivera, please put your address on the record, please.
My address is 1215-1215, North Pannock Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 19121.
Okay, and you state that, you allege that the posting wasn't placed on Pannock Street, is that correct?
Yep, that's right.
Okay, and that somehow would disadvantage people on Pannock Street?
Is that correct?
Anyone passing through the.
okay yeah it would disadvantage anyone how would how did you community how did you learn about the
today's hearing then um actually the adjacent prop the nearby property that we were talking
about they do have their signs properly posted on how did you learn about today's i'm responding
to your question right so i saw on their notice that it had a date and a hearing and i thought
hmm that's odd why isn't a similar sign posted on the other property let me go and look and i went
and i looked at the style street sign right and then i said oh this one is supposed to be posted
on both sides too and there is a hearing date and so okay so you were able to see the style
street sign is it yeah one thing you have to go and look for it it is about five feet off the
ground so that is eye level for most short folks right
Um, I am five foot five and it is higher than I am, but I did not measure it.
Um, you know, that was not a concern that I raised.
It's the fact that there was no sign whatsoever posted on Pennock street.
Right.
But a very large one posted on, on the, the larger width.
So it's a normal sized piece of paper.
On a large board.
Is that correct?
That's a relative question.
What is large?
Very good. I have nothing further. This is just a nuisance sort of complaint.
All right. Okay. That's okay. Mr. Rivera, thank you for your interest in the case. Is there anyone else in the virtual audience?
Chair, I see no hands at this time.
Planning Commission.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and good morning, David Fecto with the City Planning Commission.
the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the residential single-family zoning at this
location the appellant requests variances for rear yard depth which is approximately 30 percent
smaller than it's allowed and for off-street parking the appellant has shown the proposed
lot presents a unique physical condition necessitating the dimensional variance however
the city planning commission recommends the board grant the dimensional variance for rear yard depth
but deny the proposed variance for off-street parking.
Thank you, David.
MI 2023, 00947, 1234, Pennock Street, I vote yes.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
Thank you, counsel.
Also, number 13, MI 2023-00925-1230 South 26th Street, Brandon Saverin is the attorney.
Letter of support from residents organized for advocacy and direction.
Morning, counsel. Good morning, Mr. Chairman. Could you state your name, please, and spell for
the court stenographer? Yes, my name is Brandon Saverin. That's B-R-A-N-D-O-N. Last name is S
as in Sam. A-V as in Victor. I'm sorry. S as in Sam. A-V as in Victor. R-A-N as in Nancy.
Do you swear, Fern, to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do. Do you identify your client in a relationship to this property?
Yes, my client is Paramount Property Investments, LLC, which is the owner of the property.
Our vice chair has just a few questions.
Good morning, counsel. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Good morning, Mr. Vice Chairman. So I agree to waive the reading of the refusal. I do not agree to stipulate to its accuracy. I'll detail that during my presentation.
Understood. Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that are needed and required to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Understood.
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that are needed?
Yes, I have. And I just want to add that yesterday, so the only exhibit that came to the board after the five-day mark was a letter of non-opposition we received from the Office of Council Member Johnson.
Understood. Please proceed and share your screen.
Thank you.
Mr. Saverin, this is Hillary. We did not receive the letter from Councilmember Johnson, so if you could please forward that to us so it can be included in the record, that would be great.
The second we're done here, absolutely.
I just want to thank you in advance for bearing with me. I have a little bit of a cold here.
Well, good morning, members of the board. So the property I'm here to present to you about today is 1230 South 26th Street. This property is at the northwest corner of South 26th Street and Oakford Street in the Grays Ferry neighborhood.
This in Exhibit 7 is what I'll start with.
This is a series of the photos of the posting of notices for this hearing.
It's a good opportunity to show you what the existing building looks like.
It's a two-story building on a lot that is a bit wider than your typical building in South Philadelphia, perhaps because it's a corner lot.
It's 18 feet wide, and then it has a significantly deep frontage on Oakford Street.
side street. I'll just scroll through these photos a bit. This property was purchased by
my client in 2019. It has a history during the prior decade before my client's ownership of
L&I violations. You know, just sort of looking at the interior hadn't been really meaningfully
renovated in a very long time. Further, the neighboring property to the right here at 1228
South 26th Street, was issued an unsafe structure violation by L&I in 2021. One of the consequences
of whatever is going on with that neighboring building is that it sort of structurally shifted
into our building, which means that we need to sort of fix the party wall and, you know,
make sure that there is no structural impacts on our building. It is vacant right now, our
building, to ensure the safety of, you know, anybody that would occupy it. So for all of those
reasons, we need to undertake a rehabilitation and renovation of our building. And because the
cost of doing so is so substantial, we're going to add a third story to this building, because as
I'll show you in a moment, this block of 26th Street has other three-story buildings. So that's
not at all out of context. And the addition in terms of its height will be by right. And we're
going to put the building back in service as three dwelling units, one per floor, which as I'll show