I did also, just for record-keeping purposes, include photographs of the updated posters that were timely posted as well, and that's at Exhibit 20.
Consequently, the Councilwoman did send a letter to this board, which is in the packet at Exhibit 22, expressing support for the project.
In light of the considerably changed circumstances stemming from the councilwoman's support of the project and in respect of judicial resources, we filed an uncontested motion to have the case remanded back to the board for another look at the merits of the project.
That request was granted, which brings the project back before this board this morning.
uh since mr chairman mentioned that the original case is is still fully before the board i did have
a five minute sort of refresher as to the details of the case i'm happy to go through it uh but i
i think i think we understand that we okay yeah and again just listen to me we spent some time
this morning going over this understood and and again the significant change circumstances before
the board today are reflected in the councilwoman's letter. Absolutely. Do you want to bring your
client on? Is there anything else besides the council person? Anything else you need to give us?
No, Mr. Chairman. Everything that was reflected in the councilwoman's letter in terms of changes
to the project, those changes had been made by that second CDR meeting and had also been presented
in front of this board. So we are confident that the details of the project that have ultimately
led to this letter of support were still very much in front of the board at the last hearing.
So why don't we do this? Bring your client on, have your testimony adopted, and then we'll open
it up. Understood. If the administrator could look for German Yakubov. Good morning. I have to
apologize. My camera is not working this morning, but my audio is. Sir, could you please state your
name and spell for the stenographer? German Jakubov, G-E-R-M-A-N-Y-A-K-U-B-O-V. Okay, thank you. Do you
swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? I do. Okay, counsel?
Thank you. German, have you heard all of the testimony and evidence that was offered in front
of the board this morning? I did. Do you agree that testimony was true and accurate, and would
you adopt it as if you had given it yourself? I do. And just to confirm, you personally worked
with the councilwoman's office over a fairly extensive period of time seeking to address
all outstanding concerns for the project. Is that correct? That is correct. We went through
That is correct. We went through great lengths to make sure that this was a win for everybody. And I think we've accomplished just that.
great lengths to make sure that this was a win for everybody.
Thank you.
Questions from the board.
Yes, it looks like in this letter that there's some references to changes in the project. Are these the same as the project that came before us? Or are there changes that we have not been privy to?
No, board member, those are changes that had already been made. And in fact, just to sort of reference, you can see in the letter that resulted from the final CDR meeting, you can see some of those changes had been reflected by the time the project came to the board.
So, for example, you'll see the design was well thought out, including incorporation of larger units, balconies, ample natural light.
I believe it also mentions the appreciation for the incorporation of the Mantua Greenway.
And you can see those exact changes that are now incorporated into the Councilwoman's letter.
So it was just sort of bringing everything back together.
Okay, but just to be clear, because you said we saw most of them, we saw all of the changes that are reflected in the letter.
so what they're okay yes yes you did are the questions from the board
questions or comments from our attorney not at this time mr chair questions or comments from
the virtual audience chair we have justin foster with their hand up they have been promoted to
panelists. Okay. Good morning. Hello, chair and panel. I'm sorry. It took me a minute to actually
Good morning, Justin. Could you please state your name and spell it for the stenographer?
Sure. It's Justin, J-U-S-T-I-N, Foster, F-O-S-T-E-R.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Please proceed, sir.
Yeah, sorry. I'm having trouble with my camera at the moment. I'm sitting at work.
But I did just wanted to ask whether or not the parking was addressed recently in this particular new proposal.
I don't see it, but as a neighbor, I was just wondering with 87 units and the requirement for 44 parking spaces and zero being proposed, is that something that has been addressed in the latest rendition?
Meredith, do you want to respond to that? I mean, we're only looking at, hello?
Do you want to respond to that?
Mr. Chairman, I'm happy to respond to that.
That particular facet of this particular project was something that was removed in response to the feedback that had been received during the civic design review process.
So just to sort of refresh the board's memory on this, originally, the original design of this project had 80 spaces.
Those spaces would have been underground and accessed from Ogden Street.
That was considerably objected to by many, many parties because of the intrusion into the planned Manchua Greenway that it would cause.
So as a result of that, the project was redesigned and brought back to CDR with a revised design that had just a few spots in the back with access from a now stricken portion of Sloan Street.
but again that particular access would have intruded into the greenway okay so so the planning
commission had strongly recommended to take advantage of having additional open space in
the back and the parking was removed as a result so that was really something that directly went
to feedback that had been received through the process thank you mr foster do you have any other
questions relative to the testimony today thank you mr foster is there anyone else in the virtual
audience i see no hands here planning commission do you want to change your uh position sure we
uh had a good uh good morning chairman and board members david effecto with the city planning
commission chairman and board members yes we had previously uh submitted a recommendation of denial
and i'd like to revise that if that's okay you're standing with that uh no i'd like to revise all
right go ahead okay uh so thank you so the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the
i2 medium industrial zoning at this location the city rezoned this neighborhood in 2017 and a
the city rezoned this neighborhood in 2017 and a community requested map change the appellant
community requested.
completed their civic design review in march of 2024 this property is split zoned between i2 and
rsa5 residential single family while the comprehensive plan does not recommend a zoning
change this parcel is not within one of the city's industrial preservation areas this is a 21 000
square foot lot if it were zoned rm1 like the adjacent block face the appellant would be
allowed 44 dwelling units but they would not be allowed ground floor commercial space which we
believe would not be appropriate and would be unnecessary in this residential block face so
the city planning commission recommends the board grant the proposed use variants for multi-family
residential dwellings with a maximum of 44 dwelling units grant the proposed dimensional
variance for maximum occupied area but deny the dimensional variances for height and floor area
ratio and deny the proposed use variance for vacant commercial space we also note that the
for the board the absent participation in a city state or federal program or a city zoning
incentive affordability mentioned in the appellant's testimony cannot be enforced by any city agency
mr chairman may i just briefly address this um if if you if you can do it briefly yes
i i can and i think it's extremely important here for a couple reasons number one i believe
the planning commission is not referring to the correct refusal there was an original refusal
that had many of the refusals that mr facto mentions floor area ratio occupied area things
of that nature that refusal had been amended by the time the project came before the board
so there is no refusal having to do with commercial space floor area ratio occupied
area or anything like that there are three refusals in this case multi-family use height
for 50 feet not 80 feet as it was originally proposed and then the parking spaces
And then second of all, and most importantly, this project is now in the MIN overlay. So the unit calculation that Mr. Fecteau has suggested is not accurate. Under the MIN, without the use of bonuses, this project would have been entitled to 66 units. And with bonuses, this project would be entitled to well over 100 units.
So this is still far less than would be permitted if this property were zoned RM1, as the Planning Commission has suggested.
Thank you.
This case dates back to July of 24.
So what we want to do is I want to make sure that board members who were not, we're going to show the video to the board members, and we're going to vote on this on 229 at 930 a.m.
understood thank you very much clarify 10 29 and 9 30 did i say that i'm sorry two 29
wow and she agreed it's a long delay i mean maridith you agreed to that all right thank you
i did thank you all right so thank you number six mi 2025 004 506 5969 ogons avenue
So, Samaj Johnson is the owner applicant.
This is a pro se.
Samaj Johnson is coming back in as a panelist now, Chair.
Hi, everyone.
Good morning.
Good morning.
Could you turn your video in, please?
There we go.
Good morning.
Could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
Samaj Johnson, S-E-M-A-J, Johnson, J-O-H-N-S-O-N.
You swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Our vice chair, Tanetta Graham, has a few questions for you.
Good morning.
have you submitted your documents and exhibits five days in advance of this hearing yes so
i submitted it i submitted through the portal but the portal was um it was like
giving me an error message so i called in and i emailed them to the email that was given to me
through zba but when i called today i spoke to someone and she told me that i was supposed to
send them to um a different email address but she forwarded over to that email address but um she
just told me to say that in the meeting to make sure i let you guys know that i submitted it
okay all right thank you and do you uh waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate
All right. Thank you. And do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes. I also have the, I can share my screen and show you.
Just for one point, this application is for change of use to a group child care in an existing attached structure, no change to height or area of structure, whereas the proposed use group child care is prohibited in the RM1 zoning district as the structure is not as attached.
building okay okay so you can start your presentation okay i'm going to share my screen
it's up it's not it's working now yeah okay so the daycare is called magnificent minds children's
academy mmca for short um so the goal is to i already got approved for a family daycare
so um i got the the permit for the family daycare i passed with the health department um but uh
when ellen i came they told me that um i couldn't be approved for a family daycare because it's
a commercial space, but it wasn't listed as commercial. So it was something that was
with zoning that I needed to go through this process to get it zoned properly.
This is just basically what I just said. So it's no construction or anything that needs to be done
to the property. Um, there's already a bathroom in unit with, uh, two stalls. Um, there's a sink
with, um, cabinets, a refrigerator, a microwave. Um, so, so I think you should start showing that
what you have inside so that when you're talking about it, we can see it. Okay. Okay. So this is
just the poster that I posted and here is the video. I'll be right down.
Stone. You know what I mean. It has a front and a back. That's it.
oh would you guys guys like to see my deed as well uh we we have a i believe we have a copy
the deed am i correct um i did send it over i sent all this over right so so let me ask you
Do you have plans besides the video?
Do you have plans of how it's laid out?
No, I was told that I didn't need the plans because I wasn't doing any
constructural work or adding anything to the property.
I just needed to take a video or a picture of it.
All right.
Is there anything else you want to show us?
No, that's all.
How was, how did you go to the RCO?
So no one.
What happened at the RCO?
Yeah, no one came.
um i did i extended my hand i um i sent out all the letters i even went and knocked on doors i
gave everybody you know daycare's coming um the posters that i posted um on my uh on the front
of my building i i gave them the letters um my neighbors and surrounding houses and everybody
were happy for me but no one came to the meeting still so all right is this in the middle of the
block no it's at the end of the block so it's it's on the corner yes correct it's a corner
you don't have any pictures of the outside am i correct no just from the video that i've showed
i think i have i can get one from online uh we could probably have questions from the board
yep i have a question so on your video uh could you show two rooms could you tell me what those
two rooms would be used for yeah so let me go i'll go back and show you so this front room right here
would be the entryway um so i would have the cubbies here along with um the like posters for
the families things like that like welcome packets what all would be in the daycare and
then this right here will be the actual daycare so it will be split right there where the wall
It will be split right there where the wall is into two classrooms and like right there between that wall and the sink.
into two classrooms and like
Yeah, so it's only will be two classrooms. It's going to be up to, I want to say, 10 kids.
I don't want to go higher than 10. The age ranges are from one to five.
So we're going to have the classroom for the one to two and a half and then three to five.
all the questions yes is the one bathroom going to service both your
kids or youth that are in your program as well as your teachers
yes so there's a divider there's two there's a bathroom with two um uh two stalls so there's
going to be a divider for um like the big stall and the little stall but the big stall will also
have the uh what is it called the um the stepping stool um potty like for the child this you know
stepping stool then it has the little seat on top so they can use that bathroom as well they can use
that toilet as well i know you mentioned that there's no construction that needs to be done
but it does seem like there's some fixture replacement or fixture modification as well
as walls that need to be built is your plan that all of these are going to be like freestanding
yeah wait walls yeah it's going to be like um so there's not going to be anything that needs
to be built what's going to divide the classrooms are cubbies the cubbies will be um like child
proofed to the wall so that way they can't like rock back and forth or if say if a child climbs
on it they can't tilt over with it and it falls on top of them okay all right i have a question
Is there a basement?
Oh, sorry.
Go ahead, Panetta.
No, I'm sorry.
I thought you were done.
So my other question is, what's your plan for a drop-off and meals?
So drop-off is that the first room that you've seen.
So that's where the security door is.
So parents are only, they can come in to observe, not observe.
They can come in like when they're doing the walkthroughs, they can see the daycare, but
all parents will be stopped at the door.
they'll put the child's things in the cubbies and so I live on top of the property so even