Just to clarify even more, as you see the definition for the Schuylkill Yards development,
area. You'll notice the footnote. The footnote as you click here will explain to you and the footnote
is right here. It actually discusses or tells you the bill that created this portion of the code.
Now I just so happen to have a copy of that bill and as you can see here that bill is 190250
and it discussed and increased the Schuylkill Yard's development area and what is interesting
about it, it makes reference to a map as to what Schuylkill Yard is.
And if I can just rotate.
this is the schuylkill yards development area and if i could bring this closer for the board
to see as you can see this is 30th street excuse me sir we don't see that we don't see oh you can't
can you see the map yes okay so this is the schuylkill yards development area
and as you can see where my cursor is it defines 30th street jfk boulevard market street
And it goes as far west.
And at the time of drafting, nobody could define this boundary.
So at the time, they said, well, for now, we'll just call it 32nd Street.
Because this actually is JFK.
And because of this misnomer, we're now finding ourselves stuck in L&I saying that this is part of Schuylkill Yards.
And we respectfully disagree.
But nonetheless, we are willing to show you what we have attempted to create for that area.
Excuse me, Counselor.
That's not Scoop Kill Yard, but how do you prove it's not?
Because I showed the board the ordinance, the reference to the code, and with the ordinance,
the map that actually describes what the boundaries were. And those boundaries
were on the other side of the rail yard and not on our side of the rail yard.
So I understand that, you know, it's almost a catch-22.
that, you know, it's almost a catch-22
because you can look at the language of what the code says,
but the bill actually shows the map.
And I say that's part of our hardship
because clearly the map shows something different
than what the verbiage is explaining.
But nonetheless, our hardship is even further
because of the limitations we have with the FDA and what we are suggesting,
because it's not that we're disregarding the spirit and what the code should have,
which is why I want the board's attention to our exhibit 10.
We're looking at what this wall is.
I'm sorry.
So we're looking at what the wall is because we have this. And let me show you a side view. This wall, even though it is, it is in front of our building, it's considered a garage facade by L&I.
And even though we've argued with Ellen and I explaining that this is more for structural integrity, this is not necessarily, you know, because the parking is further down as well as below, but be that as it may, they're insisting that this is a garage for thought.
What we have attempted to do is enliven. We're making it green. And the reason why we're seeking this variant is because they believe that it should have more commercial uses going on there.
And we're respectfully saying, because this is an R&D lab, it's in the middle of campus, there's already other active uses going along at Drexel, this could be different.
And we're asking the board to support us because when you look at our Exhibit 13, which clearly they're saying we cannot build more than what we're allowed to build.
And when you look at this map that suggests that Schuylkill Yards should have been on the other side of the rail yard and not on this side.
And then, frankly, we have tried to mitigate by putting greenery, and we believe that the board can see that we're creating the least minimal impact, and with that, we should be granted our variances.
this i understand i understand counselor would you agree that 32nd street should have more commercial
to no be available to drexel no no um and you can look at that i'm sorry um uh darwin this is
this is richard hayden can i address that issue the question from the board member
Good question. So Drexel, and Darwin has shown that. That's a dormitory right next to our site. And down from the dormitory is yet another Drexel building.
Directly across the street from us on this site is the, now it's the Arnold Inspector Squash Center where they converted an armory.
That building you're looking at there, right on that corner, that's the Drexel Police Department.
So we actually met with Drexel at the beginning, as well as meeting with the community group.
And Drexel had two requests for us.
They said, look, we don't want a pizza shop or anything, you know, street-level retail here.
It doesn't fit.
It doesn't work.
We said it actually didn't work for our uses upstairs.
We don't want food handling when we're, you know, trying to do CGMP manufacturing upstairs.
The second question they asked for us was, could you give us a street-level lobby entrance?
And we said, let's work with SEPTA to see if we can move the SEPTA occupancy north on our site to accommodate a street-level nice-looking lobby, which is a commercial use, you know, the street-level lobby.
And we were able to achieve that.
And Darwin, our architect, Kenneth Dubois, is also on the call.
on the um on the call but they actually drexel said we really don't want any commercial here
But they actually, Drexel said,
it doesn't fit we don't want another pizza parlor and if you go north and darn if you if you go back
to your photos there's nothing that see as you see that um black broad iron fence that's pretty
much the end of our parcel anything north of that is just a big wall that's a drop off down to the
railroad tracks. So there really isn't any room. We're going to be the last developed parcel on
32nd Street. So unlike other areas like, frankly, the facing on Market Street, where you want to
activate, you know, commercial, ground-level retail, whatever, that's really incompatible
with the rest of 32nd Street. Yes. I'm somewhat familiar with that neighborhood.
Market Street doesn't have any commercial space for the Drexel students?
With all due respect, I've spent probably 40 different visits.
I live in the city.
I've probably been to this site and around the corner of Market Street 40 times.
As soon as you get to 32nd Street and you go north on 32nd Street, that's where you begin to see some of the commercial activity on 32nd Street.
I admit, and you're right, if you go from 30th Street up to 32nd and all those parcels are controlled by Drexel and are now controlled under the Schuylkill Yards Development Area by Brandywine, you're right.
There's no retail or street-level activity from 30th to 32nd, but once you start north of 32nd, you begin to pick up both Drexel-related dorms and, frankly, some retail activity.
We use a restaurant that's for some of our meetings at 34th Street, and there's the beginnings of doing activation, but it's all right on the market.
It's really not on these side streets.
and and and with that we and maybe i can show the board additional renderings
why are you doing that uh as it relates to the lobby is that just for uh ingress and egress for
employees and workers is there is there is there any uh has there been any thought about any coffee
shop or something i'm not i'm not promoting that i'm just curious will be just be a a pedestrian
means of ingress and egress into the towers or will there be something like a coffee shop in there
so um i would and again i'm not promoting that i'm not saying you should i'm just trying to
understood this is this is a facility for uh uh principle for tenant use so um and we have i think
Darwin, I think this would be a good point for the architect to explain to the board
what's going on with the lobby and the facade.
That's Kenneth Dubois.
Yeah, if we can promote him, that'll be great.
Who am I promoting?
Kenneth Dubois.
He might be another person under my name.
I don't know.
henneth identify himself spell his full name henneth dubois k-e-n-n-e-t-h-d-u-b-o-i-s
you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth
i do thank you mr bouvet okay hang on hang on darwin i think for for um it'd be quicker if you
went right back to that rendering which showed the lobby because that's what ken can address
the lobby there you go and the facade all right so ken why don't you start there sure so um as
was stated earlier the septa quarters got moved north which allowed us to put an entry level to
the south corner of the building um we also need to provide access for materials coming into the
site um which so we we have a very limited corner so the entry piece is not um significant it is a
it's a tall space it's a nice space with the continuation of stone that we're putting on
the outside but it is for tenant ingress and egress um there's no additional space within
the footprint in order to get all the other amenities not amenities but functional space
in to put a coffee shop or other amenity. Now, I want to point out that although the
septic facility is north, it is not a hundred percent below the surface of a J.
it is not 100% below the surface of adjacent grade.
That septic area does extend up
beyond the adjacent surface of grade.
So when you look at the elevation
that was shown earlier,
it actually, the parking level is,
go to the elevation that you showed with vegetation.
Yeah, keep scrolling down.
I'm getting there.
uh that go to the next one it's a little bit easier to see so if you look there you'll see
the dashed line at the bottom that's the lower level where septic quarter sits but the volume
of that space extends up beyond the sidewalk level as it goes to the south as it goes to the
north it starts to be more buried so the actual parking level is not at the top of that green
wall you're seeing it's actually down another few feet and then septa comes right up to it so it's
occupied space behind that wall it's not volume that we could put parking in without raising the
building and then causing additional issues with access to the parking from grade as well as
vibration um being amplified by um a taller structure that's not braced by a floor level
in the middle um but so we've activated this wall back to the main entry where we've continued
the materials into the main lobby but it is not activated for public use
so with all of that said all is not lost because we did some of the issues that we're discussing
right now we did discuss with the community we did meet with the coordinating rco powellton
village civic association and they raised concerns and we actually negotiated to the point that it
wasn't until around two after two o'clock today that that that we reached a an agreed decision
on how to make this more active.
So we are pleased to be in partnership
with the Powhatan Civic Association
to actually create a 6x10 veteran window
to play art that we will hopefully work with local artists
and Drexel or through some sort of art coordinator
and have that wall area enlivened so with that we also negotiated other community benefits with
with Powhatan Village they've agreed to support us and with that I think we're because we're going
to be around for a long time Powhatan Village is our intention is to be their their friends
and partners as we sit on 127 north 32nd street um with with that said i believe um
they should have sent you an email with a support letter and so darwin let me ask you this uh it's
not a proviso it's a community benefits agreement that's correct okay no provisos correct no
provide okay thank you so this is the letter that we were sent um that should have been sent to the
board um showing support for the project um they uh agreed that we will do this veteran window
the the other point earlier is part of the community benefits agreement
So it can't be part of this because the street trees and the raw iron fencing is beyond our property.
But nonetheless, I think they definitely showed us how much they love their neighborhood and we showed them how much we're willing to work with them.
So with that said, I believe during the two o'clock lifts, I also got an email from Andrew Goodman, who said he couldn't be here today, but that the councilman also supports this project.
and and we are happy and pleased to allow this new company this new developer to come in even
though they they've known about philadelphia for quite some time from their predecessor i i and
I and I will love it if this board could grant our variances to welcome them here in into the city
and i would love it if this board could grant our variances
with that said if there's any questions we're more than happy to answer them we also have our
engineers here as well as the architect thank you any questions from the board no mr chairman no
Thank you. Would anyone else like to testify in this case? If so, please raise your hand.
Ms. Deborah McCarty. McCarty with her hand raised. I will allow her to speak at this time, sir.
Deborah, please spell your full name and I'll swear you in.
good evening deborah mccarty d-e-b-r-a m-c-c-a-r-t-y we're a firm to tell the truth
the whole truth nothing but the truth i do thank you please proceed so uh we apologize for getting
the letter hopefully you all did actually receive it we did send it to you um and uh you know while
PBCA was concerned that the plan doesn't meet the requirements of the code that Darwin cited
in Code 14 or that it would result in a good design where the building meets the street.
We do, however, after some negotiation, PBCA does support the project based on the improvements
outlined in our letter to the board to which the developer has committed. We believe these
improvements should improve the corridor to the developers and the community's benefit.
And I actually just want to add one other thing that there is actually residential just north
of this site on the west side of the street. There's the view which is an apartment building
And there's also a Drexel dorm just south, but north of there on the west side is all residential.
On the east side at Palnton Avenue is a Drexel facility.
But, you know, that's just because I have a thing for details.
It really doesn't probably make much difference here.
So the bottom line is we support the project as stated.
Thank you.
Anyone else to testify in this case?
No other hands Mr. Chair. Thank you. Planning Commission.
Ryan Bednar, City Planning. The property is indicated for industrial use on the city plan
given the unique physical site conditions we recommend that the requested parents be granted.
Thank you. MI 2021-003193. 127 North 32nd Street, my vote is yes.
my vote is yes professor plaza my vote is yes
thomas holloman my vote is yes
go to case number four mi 2021 that's zero zero two eight three zero two one five six north 21st
Street. This is a pro se case. SAUD, S-A-U-D, Clark. There's a letter from the 32nd Ward RCO
in support of this application.
Mr. Clark has been promoted to panelists.
Please identify yourself, spell your full name, and I'll swear you in.
Saoul Clark, S-A-U-D, C-L-A-R-K.
You swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
So you're the owner?
Thank you.
And you're not a nonprofit or an LLC, correct?
Thank you.
Ms. Tenere has some questions for you.
Sir, have you emailed the exhibit packet in with proof of ownership, tax compliance,
a copy of the refusal or 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