Thank you.
Would you like me to stay on camera or off?
It's up to you, Ms. Deweyra.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
Okay, Chair, we have 46 attendees.
You can proceed as you wish.
Morning, everyone.
My name is Bill Bergman, and I will be chairing this morning's EBA hearings.
I want to tell everyone we're sorry we're starting a little later, but we have some unfortunate issues arise.
With me is our Vice Chair, Ismail Shahid.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Our board member, Thomas Holloman.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
And our board member, James Snow, will be joining us for.
Also present is Hillary Emerson, our attorney, and our executive director, Tanya Sunket.
Here's our virtual format.
The advice of proceedings are being recorded.
The video will be available by contacting TanyaSunket 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 address and the address of the property in 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 Sunken.
Let's look at our schedule for today. I have a few cases that are going to be continued. Number three, MI 2023-005-998-1813 East Somerset Street. Delbis Tavares is the applicant. We do not have all the exhibits. Is Delbis in the audience?
good morning chair this is Nadia I'll be your co-host today we have a
dots design with their hand up okay they have been allowed to speak
good morning could you state your name please hi this is David Tavares good morning could you spell
your name for the court sonographer d-e-l-b-i-s t-a-b-e-r-a-s right do you swear a firm to tell
the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth yes sir we're missing several uh items in
your package okay we also believe uh that this is an llc that applied yeah with the applicant we are
the applicant all right so uh you need an attorney to represent you when you're an llc
oh okay this is my i mean that's okay that's okay so we're going to wind up continuing your case
but you're going to need an attorney and also the rest of your documents have to be turned in okay
i tried to send the photos but i think in one of the savings was the photos exterior interior
photos right yeah we need photos too and the d i think it is yeah okay tax compliance too
and proof of posting okay okay so why don't you do this call the office and they'll explain to
you everything you need to have okay okay so number three mi 2023 005 998 1813 east somerset street
This case is continued. Number four, MI 2023, 006253, 2848 South Tall Street. That case is continued. Number nine, MI 2023, 006038, 615 Alberger Street. That case is continued.
And number 12, MI 2023-005-977-5310 Haverford Avenue, that case is also continued.
Is there anyone in the virtual audience who has comments relative to the cases that have been continued?
I see no hands.
Are there any other requests for continuance?
uh we have dots design with their hands up and a gazelle wilkins
well dot design we've already handled them they've been informed
Well, Dr. Zayn, we've already handled them.
They've been reformed.
Please give me the other person.
Giselle Wilkins has been allowed to speak.
Good morning.
Can you hear me?
Could you state your name and spell, please, for the court stenographer?
Giselle Wilkins, G-I-S-E-L-L-E-W-I-L-K-I-N-S.
Do you swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
What case are you calling about?
5310 Haberford Avenue.
Let's see here.
You said number 12.
Yeah, that case is continued.
So this is my first time.
When you say continue, what does that mean?
Are you the applicant or just a neighbor?
A neighbor.
So what's going to happen is there'll be another date set for this hearing, and you'll be notified, okay?
I appreciate that.
Thank you very much.
Great.
Is there anyone else in the audience?
No hands.
We have several cases that we do not have exhibits.
Number one, MI 2023, 005-982-6233 Chelwin Avenue.
Prince Dennis is the listed applicant.
We have no exhibits.
This is the first listing.
Chair, we have Ivan Ferreira and Craig Melodosa.
Ivan has been allowed to speak.
good morning sir could you please state your name and spell for the court sonographer
yes my name is ivorne ferreira like i-v um i-v-i-n-e ferreira f-e-r-r-e-i-r-a
do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
Sir, are you involved in this case?
I am the interpreter on this case.
I'm here to facilitate communication.
My name is Amanda Miranda.
No, no, but is he involved in this case?
He is the owner of the residence in question, yes.
First of all, we have to have an interpreter for him.
This is the first listing.
There's been no RCL meeting.
This case is going to be continued.
It's been continued like three times already.
We've attended this meeting three times before.
Are you the owner too, ma'am?
I am the interpreter.
Are we still talking about, I was going to say, are we still talking about 6233 Shellwind Avenue?
Yeah, ma'am, that's the case I called.
Oh, no, it's 2908 Cornwall Street.
No, we're on Cheltenham Avenue.
Oh, okay.
I just wanted to make sure that we were going to be heard because, like I said, this is the fourth time we're attending the hearing.
When we get to that case, I will make sure.
Mr. Chair, let me get this clarification on that.
So, you know, the property owner in that case is represented by Mr. Sherman Toppin.
That case has already been heard and will be voted this afternoon on the 2 p.m. list.
Do we need to attend this meeting for that?
You can if you'd like, but there's no testimony or anything being taken.
The only thing that is occurring is that the board is voting on the matter.
I'm going to interpret that.
well is it yeah you can explain that to to him but if somebody needs an interpreter we have to
have an official interpreter um for that you know from this for this that the city provides
um so you you're entitled to you know interpret for the property owner but if if he wants to
participate in proceedings going forward then we need a request for an interpreter so that we can
provide one does that make sense yes but for the voting we don't you guys can go ahead with the
voting right right exactly there's no there's no additional participation from any of the parties
in the voting it's just the board voting okay should we just leave the meeting now then yes
because we're not going to vote till 2 p.m
craig maladosa has been allowed to speak
Hi, Craig. Please state your name and spell for the court stenographer.
Craig, C-R-A-I-G, last name Melodosian, M-E-L-I-D-O-S-I-A-N.
Right. Do you swear a friend to tell the truth, told truth, nothing but the truth?
Are you involved in Shellwood Avenue, sir?
Yes, Chair, 6233 Shellwood.
And we had sent out a request to both the applicants.
We had sent out a request to both the applicant and Council President Johnson's office yesterday, a request for continuance.
We've had no communications with the applicant or received a template to notice.
All right. I'm going to call his name again, and then we're going to wind up continuing this.
Prince Dennis, Amazing Heights, LLC.
No hands, Chair.
Thank you.
So MI 2023-005-982-6233 Chelwin Avenue, cases continued, marked must be heard.
Number eight, MI 2023-005-975-2000 East Cambria Street.
Augustina Marina is the listed applicant, and Debra Prez is the listed owner.
No exhibits.
This is the first listing.
I see no hands.
Thank you.
So MI 2023-005-975-2000 East Cambria Street.
Case is continued.
Mark must be heard.
And number 10, MI-2023-005-986-7250 Woodland Avenue. Charles Nana, a two, is the applicant, and Arcu Martin is the listed owner. No exhibits, first listing.
We have Craig Melodosian with their hand up again. They have been allowed to speak.
Craig, you've already been sworn.
Just mention, state your name for the record.
Craig Melodosian.
Please proceed.
This is a similar situation.
We sent out a request to Council President Johnson's office, as well as the email address we have for the applicant,
suggesting that there be a continuance since we received no template team notice, no meeting with them.
uh it was also an issue uh with this and the last application they were both for assembly and
entertainment uh and the uh ellen i had treated them uh two different ways so we wanted to seek
direction from board council as well as to send them back to their plans examiner to get a
clarification as to what was the referral and which was the refusal since they appeared to be
exactly the same. Thank you. Let me see if I can. So, Charles, Nana, a two, or our coup, Martin?
No hands, Chair. So, MI 2023-005-986-7250 Woodland Avenue. Cases continued. Mark must be heard.
We have three add-on cases that we're going to hear at the end of the hearing.
We're going to go to our regular list and start with number seven.
MI 2023-005-923-3603 Spring Garden Street.
Van Vu and Lu Vu are the owner applicants.
The application is for use as a visitor accommodation in an existing structure.
The proposed use visitor accommodation is prohibited in the RM1 zoning district.
Mr. Vu.
good morning sir i'm present hi could you state your name and spell please for the court stenographer
boule spell v-u-l-e okay do you swear or firm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing
but the truth i do our vice chair has a few questions
good morning sir have you emailed then all the required documents and exhibits that is needed
to proceed with this case five days in advance of the hearing thank you please proceed and share
your screen and i will also uh state there's a recommendation of support from the mantua
civic association please proceed thank you i'm going to set a screen
mr chair did you read the refusal into the record i did okay thank you
Hi. Good morning. And I want to thank you again, Mr. Chairman, the ZBA board for allowing
us an opportunity to present our proposal. My name is Vu Le. My wife and I own this property
since 2017. At that time, our family just moved here from Boston and we decided to put
At that time, our family just moved here from Boston, and we decided to put together our life savings to purchase this home so it can be close to my work.
My wife just had the second baby, so we needed a supplemental income to support our family, and that's when we came across Airbnb platform.
So today I would like to share how we have operated our short-term rentals in the past seven years and hope that the ZBA and the city would give us positive considerations.
Since we were new to Airbnb, my son was just in kindergarten at the time.
We wanted to be selective of whom we would welcome into our home.
In our listing description, we do not shy away from emphasizing that our play is preferentially
offered to those who are young professionals and who are in medical and academic fields,
traveling for related purposes.
And by doing so, we have essentially turned away the bad apples who were just looking
for a cheap place to crash and cause disturbances through the neighborhood.
And this has been our core business model since 2017.
Later on, I'm going to share with you our services and amenities and details, but let
me first show you whom we have served in the past seven years.
So we're located near the corner of 36th and Spring Garden.
So we're just about five minutes away from Presbyterian Hospital, 10, 15 minutes away
from Drexel, as well as 25 minutes away from the University of Pennsylvania, Penn Medicine
Hospital and Children's Hospital.
Our guests come for academic reasons, such as lab visits, attending conferences, attending
classes.
But the majority of our customers are in the medical field as they are either nurses or
doctors working night shift at the hospitals.
take uh also they they are medical students who come to philadelphia to take
one of the most important boy exams which happen to take place in the city
so as i have mentioned briefly in the introduction we advertised that our place
is for guests traveling for professional and academic purposes and that we constantly strive
to serve these core needs.
Please note that these are not the typical glamorous
staycation Airbnb where people come to host loud parties,
blast music, and cause disturbance throughout the neighborhood
because prompting the police to come multiple times,
like even a week.
In contrast, our professional guests are very courteous.
They are only here for meetings, to study for exams,
and they need a really, really quiet place.
Our guests also mainly utilize public transportation,
and therefore we do not contribute to the issue of lacking parking space in the neighborhood.
Additionally, my guests typically do not have time to go to the supermarket to buy groceries and cook meals.
In fact, they would much rather enjoy dining out at a nearby local restaurant,
And therefore, we produce very little trash after they departed.
Those are some of the concerns that the neighborhood had at the local meeting.
And now we have full support of the local community.
Besides being a homeowner, I'm also a scientist during my day job.
And I wanted to make my home not always feel comfortable, but also an environmental and eco-friendly place.
For example, we utilize a technology to monitor and prevent water leak.
In 2019, a colleague introduced us to City Solarize Fielding Program, and we now have
solar panels on the roof.
We also use high-quality linens that can last longer to minimize waste, and they are made
from materials that are faster to dry.
We use high-efficiency laundry detergent to help cut down water and energy usage for laundry.
And most recently, we replaced our water heater with a tankless water heater, which only heat up hot water on demand.
And this has helped us saving as much as 20% on natural gases.
These are our commitments to sustainable living.
And actually, some of these improvements have been suggested by our former customers who use science, engineering, and technology in their daily works.
I also want to very quickly share with you a few testimonials from former guests.
I also want to very quickly share with you a few testimonials from former
Dr. Eric is a pediatrician, and he has stayed with us many, many months during COVID-19
to help with the training of a startup clinic nearby.
And because he works in pediatric respiratory field, he was actually the one that suggests
us to have an indoor air quality system for the health benefits of our guests.
Lauren is a nurse working night shift at HUB, and she stays with us regularly because of her work schedule.
She likes our place because we implement the quiet hours, which ensure all guests remain quiet during the nighttime between 10 p.m. and 8 a.m.
Katya and Nabilak, they are medical, they're foreign, I need to say, medical graduates who come to Philadelphia to take abort exams.
They came early for a week to get acclimated to the weather, the culture.
They met each other at my place.
They practiced with each other for a vote.
We have been proud and blessed to serve this community since 2017, and we continue to foster communication with them even after they have left our place.
They usually share their experiences with their friends and colleagues, so we mainly get new customers by word of mouth.
Please note that these medical graduates will go on to be board certified and coming back to the region and even our local hospitals in Philadelphia to serve as our medical providers.
If you recently need to see a doctor, you might have felt frustrated for having to wait a week or two at least before there is an opening to see you.
And this is because the U.S. has been experiencing a physician shortage problem, and the latest number is close to 40,000 shortage.
And this number is expected to quadruple in the next 10 years.
These gaps can only be filled by bringing in foreign medical graduates who have been very well trained in their home country, and often they are already practicing physicians.
We have proudly provided over 10,000 of those accommodations in the past seven years to these medical graduates, and we believe that we play a small part in helping the U.S. to alleviate this physician shortage in the coming years.
In the end, I want to thank Mr. Chair, the Z Bayer board, the CD, and I hope for positive consideration from you.
I'm happy to answer any questions.
Questions from the board?
No, Chair.
No, Mr. Chairman.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
Not at this time, Mr. Chair.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
I see no hands. Planning Commission. Thank you Chair Bergman and good morning David Fecteau
F-E-C-T-E-A-U with the City Planning Commission. Do you swear or firm to tell the truth the whole
truth and nothing but the truth? Yes sir I do. Please proceed. Thank you sir. Chairman and
board members the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the residential multi-family zoning
at this location. There is no unique physical condition or circumstance of this property that
would prevent it from being used in conformance with the zoning code. The City Planning Commission
recommends that the Board deny the proposed use variance for visitor accommodations. Thank you.
MI 2023-005-923-3603 Spring Garden Street. I vote yes for temporary variance. That expires 3-13-27.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
Thank you, sir. You have your votes.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
Thank you. Mr. Chairman, Jim Snell on the call now.
Thank you, Jim. We're going to go to number 16.
MI 2023-005-963-816 South A Street.
Quinton Campbell and Reena Schenker are the owner applicants.
This application is for the addition of a roof deck above the rear accessory garage structure, roof deck accessory to existing single-family living, whereas the proposed roof deck would be located above the accessory garage structure, which is prohibited.
Mr. Campbell.
Mr. Campbell.
Hi there. Can you hear me okay?
I can. Could you? Good. Great.
So, do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
And please state your name and spell for the court stenographer.
My name is spelled Quentin Campbell, Q-U-I-N-T-O-N, last name Campbell, C-A-M-P-B-E-L-O,
and I do swear to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
Thank you. Our vice chair has a few questions for you.
Okay. Good morning. Good morning, sir. Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits? Yes. Yes, I have. All right. Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen. All right. Okay.
all right can everybody see that okay we can okay so um my wife and i we're the uh property owners
at 816 south 8th street um we have hopes of constructing a deck on our property um but due
to some limitations that i'll get into as i present um we we felt as though the the most
realistic way to achieve this is by doing it on our rear accessory garage the image on the screen
now is sort of a schematic of our of our property sort of a site plan this is the view of our house
facing west from the front of the house you can see that the garage is in the rear it is detached
from the home but that was the intended goal of where we'd like to hopefully construct our deck
if if approved um trying to just get an idea of want to show us some photos first yeah that's
what i'm trying to do the screen is a little tricky um here okay so this is um sort of a view
from mildred front facing east um this is the yeah the property from the rear of the lot um this is
the garage itself it's hard to i guess see but this is a view from a second floor window um
that provides a view from our back patio uh these are this is the view of the garage in question
um if you look on the right of this picture where those potted plants are our hopeful
access would be a spiral staircase in that corner um any questions about these photos or anything
about the plan so far so i know you i i noticed the bellavissa neighbors are not in opposition
as well as a council person but they also talked about providing a two-foot setback from the rear
lot line yes yeah so we we've we've been going through um multiple some issues and you know
putting our plans together. I had an engineer put together plans and I requested that they
include setbacks. They mentioned that they were questionable as whether they needed it because it
is not the front part of the lot. I requested that we include setbacks. However, they didn't
in the initial plans that they provided. I personally am more than amenable in having
plans modified to include a setback, regardless of whatever that setback would be recommended.
But, yeah, because the plans did not include a setback, that was one caveat that the Bella Vista Neighborhood Association included in their recommendation just because the initial plans did not include that.
Personally, I am more than happy to, you know, make sure there's a setback that's in alignment with regulations and zoning.
Hillary, can we handle that with a proviso?
Yes, Mr. Chair. So, Mr. Campbell, what we would just need to do is we would need a revised site plan. I think these are building plans and we don't stamp building plans because we don't handle things at the building permit stage.
So, yes, we need a revised site plan that would show the setback and then a proviso plans form to accompany it that explains the change that's been made since the site plan was reviewed by L&I.
so um and you can you know we'll finish up today if the board approves you can send that information
to me afterwards and it can be stamped and it will be included as part of the notice of decision
okay so just so i understand um on the screen now is is a draft of a site plan that i had put together
um yeah would it would we need a modification to this plan here exactly yes what what the plan i
I assume this is the one that was reviewed by L&I,
whatever the site plan that was reviewed by L&I,
that's the one that you would want to update.
So I believe this was the one that was,
I think I looked it up.
I believe this was the one that they saw.
Okay, yeah.
Questions from the board?
No, Chair.
No, Mr. Chairman.
no mr chairman questions or comments additional comments from our attorney hillary emerson
Questions or comments, additional comments?
we handled everything thank you mr okay thank you questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands planning commission thank you chairman and good morning david fecto with the
city planning commission chair and commissioners the comprehensive plan recommends no change
to the residential single-family zoning at this location.
The proposed roof deck built above a garage
will not injure the use of adjacent properties.
The City Planning Commission recommends
that the board grant the proposed roof deck variance.
Thank you.
So MI 2023-005-963-816 South H Street,
I vote yes with proviso,
two-foot setback from rear property line.
I'm sorry. Hold on one second. Let's we'll revote this with one page of revised plans and that will include the setback.
OK. Yes. The revised plans, they'll be stamped today, March 13th.
So. With proviso revised plans stamped 31324.
And one page. And one page.
Thomas Holloman my vote is yes with proviso
James Snell my vote is yes with proviso
Ishmael Shaheed my vote is yes with proviso
thank you sir you have your votes
all right thank you
so we're going to go to the top of our list here we're going to go to number two
MI-2023-005-930-9456 Woodbridge Road.
Lee Elsie is the attorney for the owner.
There was a meeting held 12-2023.
We do not have a RCO letter at this point.
There are five form letters of support from neighbors.
Lee Elsie is in as a panelist.
Thank you.
Good morning.
Could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
Good morning, Mr. Chair.
Lee Elsie, L-E-E-E-L-S-E-Y.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client in relationship to this property?
I apologize.
I was just jumping in from a phone call.
We are on 9456 Woodbridge, correct?
My client is Mr. Jonathan O.
He is the owner of the property.
And our voice chair has a few questions.
Good morning, counsel.
Do you agree to weigh the reading of the refusal or stipulate to exact proceed?
Have you emailed them all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case
five days in advance of this hearing. I did. Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen.
Thank you. All right. Good morning, Mr. Chair and members of the board. We are at 9456 Woodbridge
Road. I'll be doing double duty today both as architect and legal counsel. As you can see
existing structure located here three stories formerly with a garage in the front. No longer
a garage. This property was purchased in 2020 in July of 2020 and there was a violation on the
property in June of 2023 for related to the conversion of this lower garage area to living
area. Now that was done by the previous owner and there is actually a zoning application from March
of 2020 which was not completed. So this is a legalization of an as-built living area. Now
I'll take you real quick to the refusal. I might jump around just a little bit on this one.
We're in an RTA1 zoning district, and the duplex use, which we are proposing, is existing and by right.
But in order to convert the garage into living space, we eliminated an interior parking space, and there is parking required in this zone.
in this zone so we have proposed surface parking in front of the building and there is a required
So we have proposed surface parking in front of the building.
front yard so our refusal is for the proposed surface parking which is located in the required
front yard so let me within the packet you'll find all of these exhibits we are missing
a letter from the RCO we did meet with the RCO we have not received a letter although
So we were told after the meeting that we did receive support.
So I'll address that later on.
Let me pull up some aerials.
So we are within Woodbridge Road is sort of a little curve off here, kind of a standard model built duplex, semi-attached or fully attached building.
they're essentially all identical this is the existing look at the right-of-way plus front yard
setback in front of the building this is the rear of the building I'll jump back to the first one so
they are essentially a semi-detached unit so this fence line that stretches along here is the border
of the property they are set back from it we're not changing anything about the building we're
just converting a garage to a living space to be used by the existing first floor, kind of first
floor, first two floors, I guess, bi-level unit. Within the structure, there's already two meters,
there's three, two gas meters, there's three electrical meters, one for the common area,
one for the upper unit one for the lower unit. Now the part where this gets a little bit
complicated is there's a the entrance shares a common fire rated stairwell that takes you up
to the second floor to enter into the lower unit and the third floor to enter into the upper unit.
Now, because there's no direct passageway between the garage conversion and the second floor, which is the lowest of the previously permitting existing units, L&I will not issue us a by-right transfer without adding in an interior stair, which we're proposing to do in order to resolve this violation.
So here is the existing lowest unit.
This was previously a garage space,
which has been converted to additional living space
for the lower unit.
Here is the lower unit on the second floor.
It's got its own laundry.
It's got full kitchen, full bathroom.
Here is an aerial kind of close up on the street.
Now we've got a few sections within that little carve out.
one of the things that came up in the community meeting in which we had neighbors come out to
support as well as sign a petition of support is that most everybody sort of parks two cars
in front of the building in these front yards. You'll see a lot of houses with one car as well
as some with two car. Now, we kind of scroll down a little bit. This blue dot designates
our subject property. You can see all through this, we've got the same sort of configuration
A fair number of these have converted garage spaces to interior space.
I'm not sure how many of those were done legally, but it is not an uncommon practice here.
And the parking in front is not particularly a concern that any of the neighbors had.
Now, the hardship we're seeking here has to do with this physical configuration where,
although these spaces in front of this are used for parking,
and we believe always have been used for parking.
They don't match the current definitions within the zoning board,
sorry, within the zoning code that requires a front yard
and does not allow parking within that front yard.
Here are our zoning posters.
All photographs on this page are timestamped on February 20th
by the owner, Mr. Jonathan O.
Here's a copy of the deed from July 2020.
Here is the zoning plan which shows our, sorry, I'm going to zoom in here a little bit, essentially
just calls out for an existing three-story duplex.
We're extending household living for the lower unit throughout the first floor and we're
converting this garage into household living.
and here's our sort of designation of where those two parking spots
And here's our sort of designation of where those two parking spots fit within the right-of-way.
Although, as you've seen from the picture, it's a little difficult to distinguish between where this right-of-way is and the curb.
It's sort of all sort of paved as the same thing, somewhat uniformly through that neighborhood.
Here's the refusal again.
Can I ask a question? Can you actually fit two cars in front of there?
Well, it's a little bit tight, but like a lot of areas in Philadelphia, it's what the tenants or the residents have done and always sort of have done.
There were no real concerns about parking from the community. And I think with a little bit of consideration for other tenants, I think it's perfectly possible to fit two cars there without issue.
Now, we are showing the width of these is the actual width required for a parking spot.
So it's eight foot six and a half of two spots fit between the property line and this stair.
And the actual required spot depth, sorry, width is eight foot six.
Now, the depth is a little bit tight, but as seen, the way these are configured, there's plenty of room to sort of walk past.
And that was not a concern of the neighbor, especially as we're considering these spaces is somewhat existing, not as newly converted.
Here's a plan of the units as proposed.
Now, the first floor is three bed. Sorry, the lower unit, which consists of the first and second floor is three bed, three bedroom, two bathroom, roughly two thousand three hundred square feet.
You can see we're following up this zoning plan, assuming the variance is granted with a building permit to extend an interior stair, which is something that L&I is sort of requiring in this type of situation.
And the second floor, sorry, bungling that, the third floor upper unit is a two-bedroom, one-bath, 1,100 square foot unit, which will not undergo any alteration within this process.
Now, here's a zoning section. Now, there is one additional alteration, which is the addition of an egress well in the back so that this lower area, which there's a sort of change in grade from the front to the rear, becomes a viable bedroom with the legally required egress.
Now, we are missing a letter from the RCO. We did have a meeting on December 20th of 2023. I followed up with Mr. Thomas Neville on January 25th, March 5th, and March 12th.
Now, after the meeting, they did have a voting in private. They did follow up with us and express kind of in the parking lot after the vote that they they did support the meeting.
We don't know exactly how the vote went, but based on the discussions, we had neighbors in support.
And, you know, there were concerns about potential illegal use of the building, but nothing concerning our proposed duplex with parking in the front.
And there was an expression, generally, that they didn't realize that they weren't allowed to park in the front.
Everyone parks in the front as is.
Here is the notification that was mailed on November 21st.
Here is our certification that 111 letters were mailed out.
Uh, we, the owner did go sort of door to door also with a petition to direct neighbors. We have one from, uh, 9442 Woodbridge, one from 9487 Woodbridge, uh, one from 9467 Woodbridge, I think one from 9489 Woodbridge, uh, 9446 Woodbridge as well.
Now, this is not a neighborhood that has seen a whole lot of zoning activity.
When we did look for zoning precedents, this is our subject.
We did have one up here, I think 9487, in which a variance was granted actually for a triplex,
but it looks like they actually got it permitted as a duplex.
got it permitted as a duplex.
So essentially, we're seeking this.
Essentially, we're seeking the same configuration they have.
Duplexes are by right here again, so we're not increasing.
And it is an existing duplex.
We're not increasing the density.
We're merely seeking to legalize the configuration with exterior parking.
This is from that.
This is the zoning file from that precedent.
Here's our application.
Here's our project information.
And here is our tax clearance.
Thank you.
Is your client here?
Mr. O, are you present?
I believe he is on the meeting.
Jonathan O has been allowed to speak.
Sir, could you state your name, please, and spell it for the court stenographer?
Yes, my name is Jonathan O.
First name spelled J-O-N-A-T-H-A-N.
Last name spelled O-H.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Proceed, counsel.
Good morning, Mr. O.
Do you hear my testimony, and are you willing to adopt it?
Thank you.
Questions from the board.
No, Mr. Chairman.
No, Chair.
No, Chair.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
Not at this time, Mr. Chair.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
I see no hands.
Planning Commission?
Thank you, Chair, and good morning, David Fecto.
With the City Planning Commission Board and Chairman, the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the residential two-family zoning at this location.
The previous owner appears to have converted the garage into living space without the benefit of permits.
The City Planning Commission recommends the board deny the proposed variance for a parking space in the required front yard.
Hillary, I want to hold the vote on this and see if we can't see where the RCO stands.
So let's hold this for two weeks.
And I have an attempt for the council to hear what I'm saying, an attempt to have a letter produced from the RCO.
I understand.
everything else is closed other than what we have from the rco and when we receive that we
will vote okay so that will be voted then on the 27th of march at 9 30 a.m yep okay thank you mr
counsel you okay yes we will continue to follow up and make additional attempts we will document them
And all right. Thank you very much. We're going to go to number five. MI 2023-005-983-4501
Whitaker Avenue. Jermaine Harris is the attorney. There is a letter of support from the 42nd Ward
and also a letter of non-opposition from Councilperson Lozada.
mr harris yes good morning mr harris good morning good morning say your name please
and spell for the court stenographer uh sure my name is jermaine harris i am counsel i am counsel
for the applicant. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the
truth? I do. Could you identify your client in a relationship to this property? Sure. My client
is Juan Gonzalez, and he is the owner of this particular parcel, 4501 Whitaker Avenue. Okay,
and our vice chair has just a few questions for you, sir. Yes. Good morning, council. Do you agree
to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate by
yes i do have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is
needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing
i have thank you please proceed and share your screen
Okay, this is for the legalization of a fence along the, on a property.
And let me pull up the exhibits with a roof deck, with a deck as well.
Okay. So, this is a picture of the actual posting of the notice, the hearing notice.
Okay, so...
So, this is what, this is, again, this is for legalization of this particular, of this particular deck.
Let me see if I can get clearer pictures so you guys can see, get a better sense.
So this is a rear of it.
Get a frontal image.
this is a frontal image and this is the subject property and
And. Side view. All right. I think this is the best side view that we have.
But essentially, again, what my client seeks to do is legalize this deck that was constructed.
When he constructed it, he didn't know that permits was needed and zoning was needed.
The reason why he did this is because this is a corner property, as you can see.
And there was a lot of loitering, a lot of drug sales that was happening in the area in front of, on the side of this particular building.
And so he wanted to put that structure there to deter the loitering that was happening.
so let me these are the plans of the particular property of this particular
fencing it's eight foot tall and it's the length of the building so it's 99 feet
It's 99 feet long.
And let's see here.
We have the letter of support.
This was presented in front of the 42nd Democratic Board.
This was presented on January the 18th.
It was a total of 10 participants, 10 participants from the community.
And they took no issue with this particular deck that was, and they commented that they thought that it was aesthetically pleasing to the area.
So they didn't have any issues with the particular, with this particular deck.
We also have here the summary of vote.
then we have the license uh the tax clearance as well as uh the refusal
of this this is an rsa5 yes it's an rsa5 zoning district
and this is evidence of the uh ownership by mr gonzalez but essentially
Actually, again, the reason why my client erected this is because he was just concerned about the loitering.
And since that has been erected, there has been no issues regarding that.
So I also have my client here, Mr. Gonzalez, that would be prepared to testify and offer any insight that this board may have or any questions that the board may have about the reasons why this was erected.
But with that, I would just rest.
I would ask that in light of the community support of this, we would ask that this that this be granted.
So why don't you bring your client on and have your testimony adopted?
OK. OK, sure. Mr. Gonzalez, could you please raise your hand?
Press the raise your hand so you can be promoted.
press the raise your hand so you can be promoted
Thank you.
we have a joshua horvitz with their hand raised do you think that may be your client
it may be on someone else's it may be him i mean he did call me before the hearing
so it may be it may be him on someone else's
on someone else's name it says i was saying mr horvitz is an attorney on another case
sorry so i don't know if it would be i hit the button inadvertently my apologies
okay so he did say he was on yeah he said gonzalez mr gonzalez
yeah he's calling me now and so i don't know if he's having trouble
all right so mr gonzalez has been allowed to speak hi mr gonzalez could you state your name
please and spell for the court stenographer hello hi mr gonzalez state your name and spell
for the court stenographer yes my name is juan g-o-n-z-e-a-l-e-z right do you swear or firm
to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth i do please proceed counsel
Yes, Mr. Gonzalez, were you able to hear the testimony that I provided to this board?
Yes, yes, I'm here.
And do you agree with the testimony that I provided concerning this particular property, 4501 River to Kerr Avenue?
Yeah, I do.
do you have anything that you wish to add uh do you have anything that you wish to add it's not
necessary but do you have anything you wish to add yes uh the reason that i built this because uh
i didn't want to have my kids saved with all these things was going on next to that because i have a
corner house so everything was going around the property and stuff like that so i try to keep them
safe above it like uh my baby mom every time she goes to the deck with the kids that they
so i make you feel safe and everything and without them to be out there she should be out there with
them at the same time and whatever's going on they go back inside i mean everything is
back to normal it's not that whatever it used to be
okay all right questions for me go ahead no no no and that's that that's all that's all that you
would like to uh say to the board correct yes yes okay questions from the board no chair no mr
chair questions or comments from our attorney hillary emerson not at this time mr chair
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
I see no hands.
Planning Commission.
Thank you, Chairman, and good morning, David Fecta with the City Planning Commission.
The comprehensive plan recommends a change in zoning at this location from residential single family to residential multifamily.
The appellant appears to have built a roof deck without the benefit of permits.
The City Planning Commission recommends the board deny the proposed dimensional variance for a roof deck setback.
Thank you.
MI 2023-005-983-4501 Whittaker Avenue, I vote yes.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
James Snell, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is no.
Thank you.
You have your votes, counsel.
Thank you.
May I be excused?
All right.
See you.
Number six, MI 2023-005-991-427-Moore Street.
Vito Canuso is the attorney.
There's a letter of opposition from Council Member Squilla.
There's no RCO letter, but there was a meeting held 11-13-23 by East Passion Crossing Civic Association.
Mr. Canuso.
Vito is coming in as a panelist.
Mr. Chairman, I'm sorry, I'm not familiar with this property.
Would you repeat that address?
So, 427 Moistre.
Yes, okay. I'm sorry.
I refer to a RCO, which was not the I said I said there's no RCO letter at this point, but we know there wasn't me.
I said, I said, there's no RCO letter at this point, but we know there was a meeting 1123.
Right.
Why don't we do this?
Why don't we, for the record, state your name and let me swear you in first.
You know, B-I-T-O, Canuso, C-A-N-U-S-O, attorney for the owners of the property, Anthony Mulgarry and Hugo Pellella.
Right.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Our vice chair has just a few questions for you, sir.
Good morning, counsel.
Do you agree to weigh the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits?
Yes, sir.
Excuse me.
Please continue and share your screen.
May I share the screen, please?
Please.
Please.
I have presented a PowerPoint for 427 Moore Street, which consists of various items, and I will hopefully expedite this proceeding by going down.
The first picture is a picture of the vacant lot, which is the subject property today.
My clients were negotiating with the former owners of the property when there was an existing property, an existing building on this property.
And if we go down to the first set of pictures, you will see the lot in the center after the city demolition of the existing property and on either side and to the right is property 425 Moore Street and to the left is the property 429 Moore Street.
Both are which typical row home residential properties.
Now, the picture to the left, you will see is a picture of the then existing building on that slot, which was, again, another typical looking residential building,
which, to the best of our knowledge, was always occupied as a residential building.
To the right, you'll see other pictures of the building when it existed prior to the purchase by my client during the negotiations.
During negotiations to purchase the building, the city demolished the property and then resulted in the vacant lot.
We are proposing a single-family residence, and I have submitted the renderings prepared by the architect, Toner, along with, you'll see later in the presentation, the plans for the individual floors and the layout for what I consider a typical
three-story residential property building, which would be consistent with RSA 5 zoning.
I'm sorry, RSA 5 zoning is the plans as presented by the architect.
You will see that we sent notices of the hearing that was held in December before the RCO. We mailed the necessary documents.
You'll see, like I said, here's the architectural plans for the proposed single-family residence, which I believe are all consistent with the zoning requirements for a property in a RSA-5 zoning classification.
Unfortunately, this property is zoned as a CXM2, which would not permit only residential property use on this property.
And this would be totally new construction we're proposing, which would be consistent with the majority of the properties, buildings on that block of 400 block of.
properties, buildings on that block of 400 block of Moore Street. I have presented the copy of the
deed as required. Here's a copy of the application for the original plans, the tax certification that
is required, and here is the application for appeal before this board. And there's the zoning
notice, the notice of the hearing, and here is the picture of the posting at the property
of this scheduled hearing. This is my entry of appearance. Now, I'm presenting pictures of the
various properties, various buildings on that 400 block of Moore Street, and the vast majority
of those buildings on that block are used for residential purposes. Now, the property,
as you saw at 425 and the property at 429, are zoned commercial as this lot, though obviously
they're only being utilized as residential, and there is no commercial use of either of those
two adjoining properties. We have determined as a result of a survey of all the uses along
the south side of Moore Street, which would be the even number side of the block, that all of
those properties are zoned for residential use, are occupied as residents. And I have various
pictures of the properties on the south side of the street attached. And the one property located
at 416, and that's a double lot, I believe it's 416 and 418 on the south side, is an open patio
utilized by the property owner of 412 Moor Street.
As we indicated, we had attended a meeting with the Dickinson Square residents.
At that meeting, there were no immediate area residents,
But the residents from that community group that were present did have various questions of myself and the owner who was present at the meeting.
And those questions were primarily directed in the area of how the construction would take place.
They were concerned that the construction would be done in a safe and proper manner and that they were concerned about the fact that none of the construction process would in any way damage or in any way conflict with the neighbors.
And we made representations to them that we had. My client has been involved in construction for numerous time period, is capable and has never had any problem with the construction process of his previous endeavors to construct property, residential property in the city of Philadelphia.
Council, just for the record, you mentioned Dickinson Square, but our records show that East Pachonk's Crossing Civic Association is the RCO. Is that correct?
No, we were notified, and Dickinson Square, I think geographically, has control over this.
That's the meeting we attended on, I believe the date was December 19th.
I couldn't be mistaken.
Mr. Chair, this is Hillier. I just verified that Dickinson Square is the assigned RCO. And we just got from the council office the meeting summary form. And their vote was in opposition. There was not an explanation. And the vote was, I'm sorry, I'm going to give you the vote, 12 in opposition and two in non-opposition.
Okay, thank you.
And Mr. Canuso, I can forward that to you if you have not received it.
And like I said, none of the discussion that evening involved any questions about the fact that we were proposing this residential use of this lot, though it had a commercial zoning classification.
The questions were, and justifiably,
And justifiably, they were concerned about the construction process and how it would affect the neighborhood.
they were concerned about the construction process
and how it would affect the construction process.
And I think we properly addressed all their concerns.
We were asked to excuse ourselves and were not invited to return.
They said that the executive board would take a vote and then, well, that's the result of the executive board, I believe, voting on our application.
Well, we have also submitted and I can share with you, we sought the support of the immediate neighbors and we have presented signatures and there's a copy of the three petitions that were circulated.
And I would ask them to be included in this record today, which consists of 14 signatures in favor of this proposed residential use of the property, and they were all occupants of that block.
There are also on the two corners, one on the southwest corner of 4th and Moore Street, that is a bistro, cafe, and a residential on the second level.
And there's a signature from the occupant of the second floor on our petition.
Also, there is a signature from a resident on Pierce Street, which is the
street which is just north of this Moore Street and runs parallel east-west to Moore Street
in support of our application.
And there is one signature from a resident on Dudley Street,
which is a residential street.
Mr. Canoes, so why don't you want to make sure
that we have copies of those?
And if you would, would you forward that to our council?
They were sent on March 7th to council and to the board.
I have a copy of them here.
Can you see this?
And then this is the one where I'm addressing right now.
There are signatures from residents on the 1,800 block of South 4th Street and from the 600 block of Moore Street in favor.
I think I can get
there's two other documents
I'm not sure how
I transfer them but they have
all been submitted and as I
said they are the
residents of the immediate
area most of them are
signatures of people that live on the
400 block of
Moor Street
I can't explain why this property that has obviously been utilized as residents in the past and has adjoining properties, both of which are residential, is classified other than as a RSA 5, which is consistent with all of the properties located on the south side of Moore Street.
And as a result of that, we believe that our request to utilize this lot for continued residential use is consistent with the other zoning in the neighborhood.
It does not seem practical that you would put a commercial in the middle of two existing residential on a lot that of this size, which is a typical row home lot, which would permit the construction of a single family residence, which is consistent with the other majority uses of the lots on this block.
Okay, and just for the record, I noticed that Council Member Squilla wrote,
we do not typically oppose single-family proposals, but will support the community and their opposition.
Why don't you bring your client on?
There's a Mr. Mulgari, I believe, is present.
I'm not sure Mr. Palello is available.
Mr. Mulgari, would you make yourself available, please?
Mr. Mulgarry, would you make yourself available, please?
Anthony Mulgarry has been allowed to speak.
Good morning, sir. Could you state your name and spell, please, for the court's stenography?
Certainly. Anthony Mulgarry, A-N-T-H-O-N-Y-M-A-U-G-E-R-I.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Please proceed, counsel.
So, Mr. Mulgarry, you are the owner of the property located at 427 Moore Street.
That is correct.
And you began negotiations for the purchase of this property prior to any demolition and a building existing at that location.
Am I correct, sir?
That is correct also.
so. And what was the building or structure that was at that building during those negotiations?
It was a residential building. And that is shown in the pictures that we previously presented to
the board and addressed at my initial presentation to the board. Am I correct, sir? That is correct.
Now, Mr. Mogheri, did you hear the other representations I made to the board today
and describe the various exhibits that have been presented?
Yes, I do.
And do you adopt those representations and those documents
as those that should be considered by the board
in considering this application favorably?
Thank you.
Counsel, I don't have the board ask questions,
but just for point of information,
the only reason we have one refusal,
that's the cmx2 zoning district am i correct correct okay thank you questions from the board
no mr chair no chair questions or comments from our attorney hillary emerson
mr canuso did you receive a copy of the meeting summary form from the rco
no okay i will forward it to you thank you questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands planning commission thank you chair bergman and good morning david fechta with
the city planning commission chairman and board members the comprehensive plan recommends a change
in zoning at this location from commercial mixed use to residential multifamily the zoning on this
block dates to 1979 under the proposed zoning the use would be allowed by right the city planning
commission recommends the board grant the proposed use variants for not providing a commercial
Thank you. MI 2023-005-991-427 Moore Street, I vote yes.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
James Snell, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
Thank you, counsel.
Thank you, man. We be excused.
You can.
Thank you, sir.
Number 11, MI 2023, 005-928-1238 Bucknell Street. Lee Esley is the attorney for the owner. There's a letter of support from Point Breeze Community Development Coalition and a letter of support from Council President Johnson.
Good morning, Mr. Esley. You were already sworn once today. Could you just state your name for
the record? Yes. Good morning, Mr. Chair. Lee Elsie. Right. And could you also identify your
client and the relationship to this property? Yes, my client for the property is Miss Trin
Nguyen. She's actually not able to attend, but her spouse, Mr. Hugh Duong, who is her husband,
but is not on the deed, I believe is in attendance. Our vice chair has a few questions.
good morning council do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy
i do have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed
and required to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing
yes we have thank you please proceed and share your screen
good morning again mr chair and members of the board
1238 South Bucknell Street I'm again acting as both architect and attorney for this representation
the property was purchased in 2020 as an existing two-story single-family structure
as an existing two-story single-family structure.
The owners attempted to undertake a single-family rebuild in 2021,
but there were all sorts of difficulties.
Looking back at that time period, I think it was difficult for everyone to successfully complete projects.
There was more damage to the structure in its existing state than was anticipated.
There were violations for an unsafe structure issued in 2022, and as of this month, I believe
the property has been demolished, which caused them to sort of alter their plans for the
project.
The refusal within the RSA 5 district is for multifamily household living.
We are proposing three units within this structure.
there are no dimensional variances requested. Again, here's a list of our exhibits starting
with an aerial. We are on Bucknell, South Bucknell Street between Federal and Oakford off of South
24th. Now we are a RSA 5 block, but the adjacent corner property off the rear side is a vacant
CMX1 and a lot of the corner properties along Oakford do allow for multi-family living.
Here is an exit here was the structure prior to demolition.
These are other kind of corners right in that area which have had taken advantage of the fact
that it is a by-right proposal for three stories within that once you're on the corner or separated
from two-story buildings on both sides. Here is a posting of the zoning poster on both frontages.
Now since it's been demolished those have been relocated to the construction fences.
Here is a copy of the deed from 2020, and here is our zoning plan.
Now, as proposed, it is a, let me zoom in a little bit, three-story structure with an
occupied cellar.
There's a proposed roof deck set back from both frontages accessed by a pilot house.
We are within all of the required dimensional setbacks and height allowance.
Here's our refusal for multifamily use.
Here are the proposed building plans.
Now, the unit one is a bi-level unit, both cellar and first floor.
It enters right off the street.
It's approximately 1,200 square feet, three bedrooms, two bathrooms.
Unit 2 is located on the second floor by a common entry.
It is a one-bedroom, one-bathroom.
It's the tightest one.
It's a little bit under 550 square feet.
And the top floor, which has a private roof deck, is another one-bedroom, one-bathroom.
It's about 820 square feet.
Now, we have been through a little bit of back and forth with the community.
They wanted us to engage in bringing the existing brick.
Now, it's a little grayed out, but this is actually a proposed wood look, like this sort of not actual wood,
but a wood-look decking project that's made for an exterior facade use, as well as a hardy board or ACM panel.
Here's the view of the property along Oakford Street.
Here is an elevation detailing some of the material selection.
Now, of course, there's a little bit of flexibility moving forward with this.
were willing to incorporate further suggestions from the community, but I believe we did address
their concerns during the meeting. Here's a look at the lower unit, which shares two floors. The
two upper units were fitting within the 38 feet height requirement. Now, we did meet with the
community on March 13th. We had a fair amount of engagement. There were a number of concerns
brought by the community and we had a pre-meeting
And we had a pre-meeting with the RCO.
We addressed some of their concerns.
Now, one of the things that we are proposing with this structure, the owner is willing to work with financial assistance.
He already has several buildings in which he accepts it.
the community is seeking to solve an affordability concern, and many members were kind of open to
the fact of additional density here if they're open to financial assistance and housing choice
vouchers. Of course, there were some concerns with the overbill and with it not being a single
family. Our expressed hardship is based on the blighted nature of the neighborhood. The fact
that the existing proposed single family rebuild was not financially viable and that we are seeking
to incorporate affordable housing in a way that is addressing one of the main concerns of this
community. Now, as RSA 5, there is no mixed income density bonus available. If this were a comparable
RM 1 lot, which many lots in this area are, we would be two units by right and three units
with a mixed income bonus. That's sort of the equivalency that we're seeking to draw with
this application. So we did end up with community support. We also have support from Council
Person Johnson, and we have also been in touch with his office. And we're in the process
of engaging with Ms. Lynn Wilkins in the housing department to help identify suitable residents
that are in need of affordable housing so we can coordinate with the district and satisfy
by their concerns for affordability.
I'd also like to, and this is a recent addition
which I supplied this morning.
This is a letter from a current landlord,
or sorry, from a current tenant of the building owners
actually located in New Jersey,
but it's sort of attesting that they owned
a well-maintained building that accepts housing vouchers
of which she is a recipient.
Here is our notice. We provided certified mailing to 227 houses, quite a big list of properties for this one.
Here is a sort of map. We are in red. The properties in blue have received variances, many of them for multifamily uses.
some of them of a pretty similar nature I think this 2356 Garrett Street is a pretty similar
model to what we're looking at although it has slightly different conditions here's our application
for appeal our project information and there we are having some issues pulling a tax clearance
there's some sort of confusion in the system I think there might have been a mistake with the
social security number that was logged in initially. But we are able to provide a print
out that the balance, current balance on the property is zero. At this time, I would ask that
Mr. Duong is... So, Hillary, my understanding is the husband's name is not on the property. Am I
correct that is correct mr chair so so counsel we will take your testimony you're an officer
of the court you can testify your client for your client okay okay all right questions from the
board no mr chairman no chair questions or comments from our attorney hillary emerson
i just wanted to note mr chair um as mr lc is showing um he did provide uh proof of tax
compliance that we can put on this matter today. Thank you. Questions or comments from the virtual
audience? I see no hands. Planning Commission. Thank you, Chair Bergman, and good morning,
David Fecto. With the City Planning Commission, Chairman and Board Members, the comprehensive
plan recommends no change to the residential single-family zoning at this location.
There is no unique physical condition or circumstance of this property that would
prevent it from being used in conformance with the zoning code. The majority of row homes on
this block face our single family. The City Planning Commission recommends the Board deny
the proposed use variants for three dwelling units. Thank you. MI 2023-005-928-12
MI 2023-005-928-1238 Bucknell Street, I vote yes.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
James Snell, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
Thank you, counsel.
Thank you.
We will now hear four cases together.
MI 2023-005-970-2216, Nordane Street, number A.
Number 14, MI 2023-005-971-2216, Nordane Street, number B.
MI 2023-005-970-2216, Nordane Street, number C.
and MI 2023-005-973-2216
Nordane Street, number D.
And we have counsel as Adam Laver.
There is a letter of opposition
from the Center City Residence Association.
No explanation.
The applicant provided a letter
from an adjacent neighbor
and the ZBA has received two letters
from individuals who personally
whose family members have used the property.
Mr. Laver.
Good morning, Chairman Bergman, members of the board.
Mr. Laver, could you state your name, please, and spell for the court stenographer?
Yes, Mr. Chairman. Adam Laver, Blank Rome, 1 Logan Square.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Could you identify your client, a relationship to the property?
Certainly. Blank Rome represents 2221-2225 South Street Associates LP, which is the owner of each of the four subject properties.
And our Vice Chair has just a few questions for you.
Thank you.
Good morning, Counsel. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
Good morning, Mr. Vice Chairman. Yes, I do.
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, Mr. Shahid, we have.
Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen.
Thank you.
Mr. Chairman and members of the board, as stated, Adam Laver of Blank Rome on behalf of 2221-2225 South Street Associates LP, which owns the subject properties at 2216 Nordane Street.
The special purpose entity that owns these properties is known in the neighborhood as City Living Philly, and its principal, Jason Nussbaum, who's with us today, owns and manages the properties, and he lives with his wife and two daughters within close walking distance of the properties.
He works and lives within yards, essentially.
On the screen before you, you can see just a sampling of City Living Philly's portfolio, and a couple of these photos may look familiar to you.
The one in the top center is 2000 Spruce Street, which was reviewed by this board for conversion of a historic Philadelphia mansion into visitor accommodations.
In the lower right-hand corner, just before most of the current board members were on this board, the zoning board had approved the conversion of a very old garage that had been in the neighborhood into what is now a bustling Goddard school.
City Living Philly has been recognized for its stewardship and award-winning adaptive reuse of neighborhood treasures.
And their reputation is truly stellar, which is why I beg your pardon.
I've taken an extra moment to just put this into context.
Now moving to the subject properties.
The addresses, as Chairman Bergman stated, are 2216 Naudane Street, A, B, C, and D.
What's quite unique, however, about the existing configurations and what poses a hardship is the existing configuration.
Although each of the properties has an address of Nordane Street, none of the properties actually fronts on Nordane Street, which is where my cursor is or the hand.
One has to walk along a easement to get to each of the four properties.
And I'll show you that more closely in a moment.
Each of the four properties contains one visitor accommodations unit each.
contains one visitor accommodations unit each, and I should say that Jason asked that we
document and confirm these uses due to the L&I records not being complete.
There have not been any violations issued or anything like that.
On the screen now, you can see a site plan, and the four properties are here towards the bottom of the site plan.
Noa Dane Street is at the top, and once again, you'll recall there's no actual frontage of those properties on Noa Dane.
But one coming in off of Noa Dane into this gray area would access one garage parking space for each of the units.
And if one is walking in, there is a concrete walkway, which you'll see in a moment, that takes one back.
There's a uniqueness to these parcels in that the access to each of the units is solely from that easement, not from the public right-of-way.
The zoning map exemplifies the situation in the hardship post. The underlying zoning is CMX2
neighborhood commercial mixed use, not residential. As the board is aware, CMX2
promotes ground floor business use, which certainly is not practicable due to the constraints of the
site being removed from the public right of way fronting on an easement.
The notices of refusal for each of the four are the same aside from the addresses, so
I'm only going to bring one up onto the screen.
There's one use refusal per property, which I've taken the liberty of highlighting.
Visitor accommodations is prohibited within the zoning district.
The documentation and confirmation of the existing visitor accommodations at this location
requires variance relief, which would represent the minimum variance to afford relief due to the
unique characteristics of these properties with access only through an easement. And it truly is
the minimum necessary in that only one visitor accommodations unit is being thought as to be
confirmed per property. I'd like to run through seven pages of photos rather quickly. Here's the
view from Nordane Street. Through the larger entrance is that access to the garage parking
that I had shown at the outset, and the pedestrian-scaled entrance, which would be to the east, is that
walkway that I had mentioned. The lower photograph is showing similar conditions. Here's another
photograph that gives you the same sense, one curb cut in. Each of these residential-scaled
garages would accommodate one parking space each for A, B, C, D. Pedestrians entering the visitor
accommodations would walk along this walkway or get out of their cars which are parked off of the
street out of the public way to walk into the units. Here is A, this is the closest one to
Audain Street followed by BCD as you progress south towards South Street. That's the walkway.
You get a sense of how difficult it would be to have the normal commercial mixed use contemplated
by CMX2. B, C, D. The Center City Residents Association issued a policy regarding limited
lodging variants in January 1st of, effective January 1st of 2023. And as a matter of policy,
it opposes all variants requests for visitor accommodations. In this instance, the unique
circumstances of the layout and the structures that exist warrant the granting of variants
relief. And that's attested to by the nearest near neighbor, for example, Cindy Edinger,
and I believe Ms. Edinger is with us today, who writes to support this. She recognizes and notes
that the units are somewhat secluded, that many neighbors don't even know they are there.
She further goes on to state that as visitor accommodations, the owner has on hand a maintenance
crew that manages all the properties, she is the most affected neighbor. Another member of Center
City Residents Association who lives on Delancey Place calls it a needed amenity in the neighborhood
And there is additional support as well that's been submitted.
and there is additional support as well that's been submitted.
Here's a typical floor plan.
Once again, one unit for each entire structure showing on, we'll start with the actual living spaces,
being living area on the first floor and bedrooms on the second floor and third floor.
here uh are the exterior photos this photo in the left hand corner is looking um in this case
towards naudaine street along that walkway from the b unit and you can see just uh what nice
outdoor space that uh you have and how city living philly keeps it up uh interior photos
for each property, A, B, C, and D. City Living has been headquartered in the neighborhood since
1990, with the management offices close by. There are touch points with City Living staff
on a regular basis. Operations are very important to Jason in his reputation and that of his company.
Booking requests are vetted and identities are verified prior to accepting a booking. No same-day bookings or one-night stays are permitted. There are house rules that exceed what's standard and customary, including quiet hours. And there is private trash hauler that has operated for these visitor accommodations.
I should note, Mr. Chairman and members of the board, that Jason shared with me that he has had some instances of neighbors occasionally saying that they've seen trash close to his property.
And as a good neighbor, he has been on top of it always. However, as is common with living in an urban environment, the trash doesn't appear to actually be related to these properties.
But for perception's sake alone and good neighborliness, Jason has addressed that in addition to his commercial trash hiccup, which he has.
The reviews for the use are very favorable.
Many of the users are visiting family members in the neighborhood, have family members who are ill at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia or University of Pennsylvania, health systems, which is a short walk away.
And in this instance, there truly is something unique about this property, as I hope I've demonstrated.
The proposal fits into the surrounding neighborhood. It is used by neighbors and families. This represents an appropriate transition, if you will, or a buffer between the bustle of South Street to the south and the residential to the north.
We did see in the map that I shared with you that surrounding the CMX2 buffer that there is residential. And what's nice about this particular use is that it is off the street. It has the parking. It's quiet.
The proposed variance would represent the minimum variance to afford relief, one unit per property, and the least modification possible of the regulations at issue.
The grant of variance relief will not substantially increase congestion in the public streets, increase the danger of fire or otherwise endanger the public health, safety, or general welfare.
This will not adversely affect transportation or unduly burdened water, a sewer, school park, or other public facilities.
there are no environmental issues.
Mr. Nussbaum is here to adopt and affirm at the appropriate time.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the board.
Why don't we bring your client on and adopt your testimony?
Mr. Nussbaum, would you please raise your virtual hand
to be recognized by Chairman Bergman?
I see no hands.
Jason Nussbaum or Tom Hallinan of City Living Philly, please try once more, I know you're present, to raise your virtual hand.
There he is, Mr. Nussbaum.
Good morning, sir. Could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
Jason, please unmute.
I'm sorry about that
I've been watching all the hearings since the beginning
Mr. Nussbaum
please state your name and spell for the court stenographer
Jason Nussbaum
J-A-S-O-N
N-U-S-B-A-U-M
N-U-S-B-A-U-M.
do you swear or affirm to tell the
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, counsel.
Thank you.
Good morning, Mr. Nussbaum.
You have already stated on record that you've been present during the pendency of these virtual hearings.
Would you adopt and affirm the testimony that I've offered as your own?
I will.
Thank you.
Questions or comments from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
no chair no chair questions or comments uh from our attorney hillary emerson
not at this time mr chair questions or comments from the virtual audience
yes chair we have wade albert they have been allowed to speak
morning mr albert could you just state your name and spell for the court stenographer
good morning uh my name is wade w-a-d-e my last name is albert a-l-b-e-r-t
Do you swear or firm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
I do, Mr. Chair.
Please proceed, sir.
Thank you. So I am counsel for the Center City Residents Association, and I'm here to explain the basis for our opposition to this proposal.
In the outset, Mr. Laver, who I respect very much, referenced a policy that CCRA has. And that policy where CCRA is generally opposed to visitor accommodation variances is multifold.
One is that there are many hotels in Center City and around Center City, and our organization supports them and supports the workers that they employ and the business that they bring to our communities.
That being said, because there are so many hotels that we do not want to see the residential corridors of our neighborhood transformed to other uses, and particularly at a time when housing costs continue to increase and housing stock is diminished as more and more properties are being used for visitor accommodations, that is what encouraged us to adopt that policy.
That being said, we believe that this, the property that is before the board today, this use is out of context for the character of the block and for this neighborhood.
Number one, this is the Fittler Square area of Center City, which is primarily residential.
And the block from which ingress and egress to this property is located on Naudene is a residential block.
I also note that there are no other hotels in this vicinity, which makes this very different from some of the other visitor accommodation issues that have come before this board.
And that being another point that's important to raise is that while I appreciate the arguments that the particular ground floor uses and how difficult that would be to occupy them, I note that this is not a situation where the applicant has brought a request to use them for residential, which would be in line with the other uses in this block.
They have brought us a request to use these for visitor accommodations, and we just believe that there are other more appropriate uses than visitor accommodations, and so we oppose this and respectfully ask the board to deny the variance.
Thank you, Mr. Albert.
Mr. Laver, do you have any questions, or do you want to save this?
I'll give you a chance before we end to comment.
comment i'll save my comment for summations thank you chairman sure is there any um anyone else in
the virtual audience yes chair we have two more hands terry gillen has been allowed to speak
hi could you state your name please and spell for the court sonographer
um yes can you hear me i can it's teresa t-e-r-e-s-a gillen g-i-l-l-e-n you swear or
firm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth yes i do hi please proceed are you
a neighbor i am a neighbor i live directly across from the entrance to this property so
i am probably the most directly affected neighbor thank you thank you very much please proceed
just want the board to know that we did submit a petition of um about 40 names um to councilman
johnson's office and to the ccra we can make that available to you if that's helpful every one of
the neighbors on my block except for one person i couldn't find um did sign the petition opposing
this variant i've lived on the block for 35 years and for 35 years these
I've lived on the block for 35 years, and for 35 years, these properties have been for owner-occupied properties.
For many, many years, for the pandemic, we had great neighbors in there.
They were people that would sweep the street.
They would come out for block parties.
Two of the neighbors I would leave my keys with when they would look out for my house.
All the sorts of things that you want from a neighbor.
And this, as I said, is a completely residential street with owner-occupied properties.
The applicants started buying up these properties during the pandemic, and it has substantially changed the nature of the block.
I mean, it means that there's a lot of absence during the week.
On weekends, people pile in in cars for the Airbnb experience.
But during the week, there's nobody there.
There's nobody looking out for the law. I've seen people urinating across the street for me, all kinds of stuff that happens when people aren't there. And it has substantially affected the quality of life. And that's why all of my neighbors, I want to repeat, all of them have signed a petition in opposition to this.
Okay, that's fine. So we don't understand why this can't go back to being for rental properties. They are very desirable properties. They have parking, as you saw, and it would be easy to find people to rent these properties and to get people in there all week.
So we respectfully ask that the zoning board turn down this request and acknowledge the
hardship that the neighbors are suggesting exists on this problem.
Thank you.
Thank you for your comments.
Is there anyone else in the virtual audience?
Cindy has been allowed to speak.
Hi, could you state your name, please, and spell for the court stenographer?
Ms. Edinger, would you please unmute yourself?
Cindy?
It seems like they may be having trouble unmuting themselves, Chair.
Cindy, could you try one more time, please?
Okay. Is there anyone else in the virtual audience?
I see no hands.
Mr. Laver.
Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the board.
Perhaps I can work backwards.
Cindy Edinger, I know, was on the virtual hearing with us through the entirety, and it's regrettable that she was not able to testify.
However, there is a letter of support on record, which you mentioned, Mr. Chairman.
She is the immediately adjacent neighbor.
And as an officer of the court, I would proffer that her testimony would be in line with her letter of support.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Regarding Ms. Gillen, and I thank her for being here.
It's regrettable that Ms. Gillen was not interested in engaging in actual direct dialogue with us because we would be interested in that, and I must object to an unverified petition, which has not been seen.
I would like to state, however, on the public record that I know that Jason Nussbaum and the team at City Living are always open to ongoing discussions, even though there's a difference of opinion.
So on the position of CCRA, we respect CCRA's position as a matter of policy.
Statements were made that this is a residential corridor, that it's a residential block, that
residential should be permitted.
The city plan has these properties as CMX2, mixed-use commercial.
They are adjacent to the bustling South Street.
We completely understand and recognize that we are up against that high intensity busyness of supermarkets and retail commercial and single family residential.
And I would submit that actually for CMX2 with this configuration, this is the perfect transition between the two and that the zoning code itself on its face promotes the ground floor commercial and generally within the CMX2, as the code states, the residential would require.
as the code states uh the residential would require relief with that and in light of all
of the circumstances we believe that the request before the board is the minimum necessary
pardon me to afford relief thank you questions or comments from planning commission
thank you chair bergman and good morning david fecto with the city planning commission
And, Chairman, I'm going to testify for all four units, if that's okay.
All right.
So, Chairman and Board members, the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the commercial mixed-use zoning at this location.
The appellant has shown that a hardship would exist if they were seeking to establish a residential use.
But since this use has already been established, commission staff do not believe there is a unique circumstance that will prevent these properties from being used for long-term rental use.
The City Planning Commission recommends that the board deny the proposed use variances for visitor accommodations.
Thank you. I'm going to vote all four of these at one time.
So 13 MI 2023-005-970-2216-Nordain, number A, MI 2023-005-971-2216-Nordain, number B, 15 MI 2023-005-970-2216-Nordain, C.
and MI-2023-005973-2216-Nordain-D.
I vote yes for all four with proviso.
Temporary variants will expire 3-13-27.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes to all four with proviso for all four.
James Snell, my vote is yes to all four, with provisos to all four.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes to all four, with provisos to all four.
Thank you, counsel.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the board.
Number 18, MI 2023-005-915-117-21 Cater Street.
Joshua Horowitz is the attorney for the owners.
There's a letter of support from the Queen Village neighbors and a letter of non-opposition from Council Member Squill.
Good morning, Mr. Horowitz. Please state your name and spell for the court stenographer.
Good morning, Joshua Horowitz, J-O-S-H-U-A-H-O-R-V-E-A-V-E-R-I-T-Z of Armstrong Teasdale.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client and the relationship to the property?
My clients are the owners of the property, Jack Levin and Susan Jass.
Jack had to travel today, but Susan should be here in the room.
Our vice chair has just a few questions.
Good morning, counsel.
Do you agree to waive the reading of the refuse or stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes, to both.
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, I did.
Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the board.
I'm here to discuss 117 Cater Street.
This property is requesting one variance for two parking spaces.
My clients have owned this property since 2001. It's in the rear of their family home at 114 South Street. You can see here on the aerial photo. It's on a dead end road. Cater Street dead ends and then Howard Street dead ends here.
And as I'll show you in photos, all people do back here is park cars. There's individual parking, individual parcels that are behind these homes, which I'll show you on the zoning map on the next page. And they each have either been approved for parking or park anyway. And some of them are owned by the houses in front of them or next to them or adjacent to them.
And this is the reason why this was supported and there were no objectors at the community room meeting and the council person issued a letter of non-opposition because everybody recognizes that this is what is to be done with this, basically an alleyway, even though they're officially city streets.
So here's a zoning map, and you'll see here that just to the south of the subject property, there are these individual parcels along Howard Street and then also along Cater Street, which are...
along Cater Street, which are also just used to park cars. So here's the subject property
where the two cars are parked. Now, my clients did a lot to beautify this lot and to create a
pathway down to their house, which is behind here. Their house is not the one that's brown,
but to the right with the white stucco. And here's the lot straight back from the city's
website. And here's what it looked like before they did the beautification. It was just a plain
kind of ugly lot. So just to show you the neighboring properties coming in here off of
Hancock Street, you make a right here on Decatur Street, and there's already parking use that's
been approved right here on your right on Cater. It's just standalone parcel for parking. And
actually behind that silver car on the right is a garage. That's here now on the left of this
picture. That's also a standalone parcel that's been approved for parking. And the zoning permits
approving these variances are included in my packet. Here's the Street View car pulling in,
and we see on the left here is the subject property. But there's a car that parks right
to the left here of the street view there's also cars that park straight ahead and moving down we
see here's the cars that park on the adjacent lot and then as you make a right here onto Howard all
that you do back here is park cars on the left there were three garages but even further down
there's more parking and on the right there's just outdoor parking so here are the garages
these all fill up with cars every day and they're all approved for the most part for parking as far
as I've seen, there's 14 total lots back here. And I looked at the zoning on all of them and
everybody parks. Here's on the left, here's a parked car. I believe it's for the front street
lots in front of it. And on the left here, there's more parking. It's a garage spot for
a front street house at 620 front on the left. And that property actually also owns a parking
spot on the right over here, which the zoning board approved for parking for the house on the
left of this street here. And here's some of these older zoning permits. This one's 609 Hancock,
where you first pull in. And here's a page from the one for 620 Howard Street, which 620 Front
parks at. And here's a third one from 618 Howard next to it, which is an approved
variance for a standalone parking spot. So we met with community group, Queens Village
Neighbors Association. And there were a few people that spoke in support of the application
that they were pleased with the work that my clients have done to beautify it a lot.
Everybody recognized that there's really nothing else that can be done with these lots back there.
And just because the zoning code defines it as a street, even though it's very narrow,
rather than an alley, that everybody needs a variance back there to use these lots as parking.
So, the QVNA recognized that there were city approvals of several similarly used lots along the same block of Cater and Howard Street. And like I said, nobody objected at the meeting, and Councilman Squill's office issued a letter of non-opposition as well.
um so um with that being said i'll just summarize um that my clients um have owned this lot for a
long time um we're here because a violation was issued um which which um we're seeking to remove
um there are other lots back there that park that probably you know should also need to get
permitted um but we're happy to bring it into compliance and legalize it there's no work being
proposed and nobody seems to be objecting. So we respectfully request that the board grant a vary.
Why don't you bring your client on and adopt your testimony?
Thank you. Susan, can you please raise your hand virtually?
Susan has been allowed to speak.
Susan, could you please state your name and spell for the court's stenographer?
Susan, could you please unmute yourself?
Can you hear me now?
Yeah, we can.
Please state your name and spell for the court's sonographer.
Susan Jass, S-U-S-A-N-J-A-S-S.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Please proceed, counsel.
Thank you.
Susan, have you heard my testimony today?
Yes. And do you adopt it as your own? Yes, I do.
And do you adopt it as your own?
Yes, I do.
Thank you. That's all, Mr. Chairman. Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman. No, Chair.
No, no, Chair. Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
Not at this time, Mr. Chair. Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
I see no hands. Planning Commission?
Thank you, Chair Bergman, and good afternoon. David Fecto with the City Planning Commission.
Chair and board members, the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the residential
multifamily zoning at this location. The appellant seeks to legalize a parking lot that has existed
for more than 20 years. The City Planning Commission recommends the board grant a
proposed use variance for a non-accessory parking lot. Thank you. MI 2023-005-915-117-21 Cater Street,
I vote yes. Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes. James Snell, my vote is yes.
Dishko Fahim, my vote is yes. Thank you.
I'm going to go to our add-on list that we from this morning.
Let's see here.
Okay, so MI 2022-000485-7137 Woodland Avenue, I vote yes with proviso.
This approval is for the personal vehicle repair and maintenance use only, hours of operation Monday through Saturday, 8A to 6P.
Mr. Holliman, could you please certify that you watched the video in this case?
Yes, Mr. Chairman.
I did view the video on 7137 Woodland Avenue, and my vote is yes with proviso.
James Snell, my vote is yes with proviso.
Ishmael Shahid, my vote is yes with proviso.
Thank you.
Number two.
Number two, Mr. Shaheed, could you please have this?
I wasn't present for this case.
I'll read it in the document for you.
So number two is MI 2023-002-760-4720 Richmond Street.
voting on this is ishmael um james snell and thomas holland
and i just want to note that um regardless of the vote there is a proviso for an amended refusal
thank you yes uh so my vote is going to be yes with the proviso of the minute with it's one page
right hillary no it's just an amended refusal dated february 27th 2024
so my vote is yes with proviso amended refusal dated uh february 2024 27 2024
mrs halliman my vote is yes with proviso james snell my vote is yes with proviso
And number three, MI 2022-004-443-3445 Keem Street, I vote no. Mr. Holloman and Mr. Snell have to certify that they watch the video.
Mr. Chair, Mr. Holloman has recused himself on this matter.
Okay, I'm sorry, you're right.
Thank you. So just Mr. Snell has to certify. Thank you.
Okay. Yes, I can attest that I did watch this video in regards to this address, and I'm ready to make a decision. And my vote is no.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is no.
Is there anyone in the morning group whose case has not been called?
No hands.
Thank you, everyone. See everyone at 2 p.m.
Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Bill Bergman, and I will be chairing this afternoon's EBA hearings.
With me is our vice chair, Ishmael Shahid.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Our board member, Thomas Holloman.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
And our board member, James Snell.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Also present is Hillary Emerson, our attorney, and our executive director, Tanya Sunkett.
and our Executive Director, Tanya Sunkett.
Here's our virtual format.
Here's our virtual format, be advised to pursue...
Be advised if proceedings are being recorded.
The video will be available by contacting
tanyasunkett at phila.gov.
For the benefit of our court stenographer,
we ask attorneys and witnesses
to identify themselves before testify.
If you're participating by phone
and you wish to testify,
press star nine to raise your hand
and star six to unmute.
To enter an appearance statement,
call 267-270-5548. Leave your email and the address of the property in question.
And finally, the question and answer box on the screen is not for comments or testimony.
All comments should be directed to our Executive Director, Tanya Sunken.
Let's look at our schedule this afternoon. Number one, MI 2023-006-951-3521 North 21st Street.
That case is continued.
Number five, MI 2023-006-953-2122 West Estha Street.
That case is continued.
Number 10, MI 2023-007-282-67 West Queen Lane.
That case is continued.
And number 13, MI 2023-007-096-743 North Capitol Street, that case is continued.
Are there any comments relative to the case is continued or any additional requests for continuances?
Good afternoon, Chair. This is Nadia. I'll be your co-host today, and I see no hands.
all right thank you let's see here i have one more let's see
okay uh all right let's go let me just check one more time here
are we going to go to our add-on list
Number one, MI 2023-006-619-1214 South 22nd Street, I vote no.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is no.
James Snell, my vote is no.
H. Mel Shaheed, my vote is no.
Number two, MI 2023-004-440-2117 North 7th Street.
I vote yes with provisos.
Her amended refusal dated 3-4-24, maximum 10, that's 10 dwelling units.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes with provisos.
James Snell, my vote is yes with provisos.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes with provisos.
Number three, MI 2023-005-619-2908 Karnwath Street.
i vote yes with provisos this approval is for the lack of the required setback
for the garage only the side yard with variance for the canopy is denied
thomas thomas holliman my vote is yes with provisos ishmael shaheed my vote is yes with
proviso is your next case is yours to hear number let me see here number wasn't on that one james
all right number four mi-2023-004-373-2242-52 north 9th street
my vote is yes with proviso provides plans two pages stamped by zba march 13th 2024
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes with proviso.
James Snell, my vote is yes with proviso.
Thank you.
Here's your number five, too.
Number five, MI-2023-006565.
6435-45, Media Street.
My vote is yes.
My vote is yes.
My vote is yes.
My vote is yes.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
James Snell, my vote is yes.
Number six, MI 2023-006-949-933 Lindley Avenue.
The vote on this matter has been rescheduled to Wednesday, March 20th at 2 p.m.
Here's your number seven.
Number 7, MI-2023-001537-10829, Academy Road. My vote is no.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is no.
James Snell, my vote is no.
Number eight, MI 2023-005-887, 1818 North 54th Street.
My vote is yes, with proviso.
Three-year temporary variance to expire 3-13-27.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes, with proviso.
It's Mel Shagin, my vote.
I don't think you're on that one, James.
That's right. You're right.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes with Proviso.
And number nine, MI 2024-007-82-2815, Bowden-Onton Street.
My vote is yes.
and James Snell has to certify
that he watched video.
Tom is recusing
himself on this, right?
Just to clarify, Tom just
wasn't, hasn't voted on this case
previously, so that's why he's not voting
on it.
James Snell, I do
to attest that I saw the video and I'm ready to vote on this case. And my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
Thank you all. Thank you all for the out-of-the-owns. We're going to go to our regular list.
Number two, MI 2023-007-206-5719 Ray Street. Jermaine Harris is the attorney. There is a
letter of support from HMC Squared RCO.
Mr. Harris, you've already been sworn. Just for the record, could you state your name?
Sure. Jermaine Harris.
Could you identify your client and relationship to the property?
Sure. My client is Lisa Howard. She is the record owner of the particular property, the subject property, which is 5719 Race Street.
Our vice chair has a few questions for you.
Good afternoon, counsel. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this
case five days in advance of this hearing? I have. Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen.
Okay, so this is, hold on, okay, so this is, again, for the subject property that sits 5719 Gray Street.
This is to make this property as for a use variance for a duplex.
It is currently in an RSA 5 area.
So here's a picture of the property that we're talking about, which is this property.
It's a corner property.
This is the rear of the property.
it's the side of the property
and this is the second floor of the property currently my client uh miss howard is uh this
and this is
is owner occupied property my client lives on the second uh the first floor and the reason why she
wishes to do the second floor make that as a uh additional unit is because her son
just uh got out of the armed services the arm i'm sorry just got out of college
it's my understanding and he doesn't have a place uh he's having difficulty with finding a place to
live so she is uh she wants to help out her son and basically have a separate living quarters
for him so these like i said these were the second floor she had started it but then she realized that
she needed to she was informed that she needed to uh get zoning in order to do this so she stopped
in the middle of it these pictures were taken uh recently and she has no longer she's not doing any
further work until unless and until uh she would get approval from this board uh this is the
still a second floor and then we get into the first floor this is the living quarters of my
client, which is the first floor. And these are the stairs that would be leading up to the second
floor from her unit. Now, let's see. The plans are, so this would be the first floor.
living room living room you walk in living room kitchen the bathroom and then the uh then a
bedroom that's the first floor and then we have the second floor take the stairs up and then you
open up into the living room bathroom and then you have a bedroom that's in a rear
and so that's what it so we're talking about a one plus one so to speak for this now this uh
property we have gotten support this was presented in front of uh the coordinating rco
which is for that area is called the hmc square community association uh they it was
a total of nine votes and it met the approval of the community organization so there was support
as a result there is uh the supporting not only the votes listed but also the reasons
uh for their support so again they didn't have any objections to it there was only one that was
opposed to it out of the nine that were present at the community meeting. Also, I have a note that
this particular property, my client owns, she's a co-owner with her sister for the property that's
next door which is 5721 and that property is a legalized duplex of uh additionally uh down the
street uh 5700 there's a nine unit and also so basically my client was seeking to do a duplex
which is consistent with the property that she currently owns next door.
And that's what she was seeking to do,
in addition to the reason of having a safe living quarters for her adult son.
We have the deed that evidences the ownership of the property.
Also, we have the refusal.
It is an RSA five, which only permits by right single family.
And then we have the tax clearance.
So essentially, we would ask that this petition, that this application be granted for.
This petition that this application be granted for the reasons that we that I've just presented and I have I do have my client available to testify to affirm and confirm the testimony that I've just given.
Mr. Harris, did I notice this was an end unit?
This is an end unit. This is a corner property.
Could you could you please bring your client on?
Okay, Ms. Howard, could you please raise your hand so you can be promoted?
Lisa, Howard has been allowed to speak.
Can you hear me?
Hi, could you please state your name?
It's spelled for the court stenographer.
Okay, my name is Lisa, L-I-S-A, Howard, H-O-W-A-R-D.
I didn't realize my picture was not there.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Please proceed, counsel.
Okay. So, Ms. Howard, did you hear the testimony that I just gave to the zoning board?
Yes, I did.
Okay. Do you adopt the testimony that I've given? Meaning, do you agree with the testimony that I have given?
Okay. Is there anything, this is your chance, if you want, you don't have to, but if you wanted to add anything,
you can certainly add anything to what I state or you can just say you don't have anything else to
add other than what I have presented. I would like to add that there is a 48 unit apartment
building right across the street from me. And also on the other side, there is the church on
the corner. And also there are multiple duplexes already in my area. Of course, it's 5719 in which
Tricona with my sister, but it's also 5727 and also 5731, which is a funeral home. And then on
top of it, there are apartments. And then, as you said, 5700, but also there's a duplex there
and a storefront. But on 5800, there's also a duplex. Well, it's more like a quadplex and a
business on the first floor. And there are two apartments above them. And if you keep on going
on 5819, there's also a duplex. I mean, that's a triplex. That's a basement and the first floor
and second floor. So there's multiple duplexes or apartment buildings in the area.
Okay. That's all that you would like to testify to in front of this board?
Okay. Thank you.
Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
No, Chair.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
Not at this time, Mr. Chair.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
i see no hands planning commission
thank you chair bergman sarah bond philadelphia city planning commission s-a-r-h-b-a-n-h
you swear affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
yes sir please proceed thank you uh the comprehensive plan recommends no change to
existing RSA 5 residential single family zoning the appellant has not supported their hardship
claim with evidence of unique physical circumstances or conditions of this property the city planning
commission recommends that the zoning board deny the variance thank you MI 2023 007 206 5719
Ray Street, I vote yes. Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes. James Snell, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes. Thank you. Number three. Thank you, counsel. Number three,
MI 2023-007-049-704 South Front Street, number T-B-447962. Henry Clinton is the attorney.
There's a letter of support from the Queen Village Neighbors Association and a letter of non-opposition from Council Member Squilla.
Good afternoon, Mr. Clinton. Could you state your name and spell it, please, for the court stenographer?
Henry Clinton, H-E-N-R-Y, Clinton, C-L-I-N-T-O-N.
You swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client and relationship to this property?
Sure. My client is Elizabeth Whitticombe, W-I-D-D-I-C-O-M-B-E.
She is the owner of the property and she is on the call.
She is the owner of the property, and she is on the call.
Our vice chair has just a few...
Our vice chair has just a few questions, sir.
Good afternoon, counsel.
Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its advocacy?
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
We have, except within the day we handed in the tax information from the tax bureau.
Thank you, Mr. Clinton.
Please proceed and share your screen.
Thank you, Rasheed.
Is that feasible, Mr. Chairman?
Whoever's talking, mute, please.
Please proceed, Mr. Clinton.
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman.
Again, members of the board.
Henry Clinton for Elizabeth Whittacombe.
This is my presentation for today,
containing table of contents A1 through A10.
This is the refusal.
So a little bit of a background story, Mr. Chairman.
So this property, 704 South Front Street,
fronts on both Bainbridge Street and Front Street.
In June of last year, the properties were subdivided,
but the address on Bainbridge Street
is not reflected in the OPA public records yet.
So even though this says 704 South Front Street, we are going to talk about Lot B, which is fronts on Bainbridge Street.
And the refusal concerns the fact that the Bainbridge Street aspect of this lot has an existing garage, which is not permitted.
A front-loaded garage is not permitted in a single-family zoning district.
As the chair knows, typically you'd have to access your driveway or your parking space in your garage from a shared driveway, an alley, or a rear street.
The garage has been in existence for some time, and our proposal is to keep the garage and put a single-family home above it and behind it.
We do have an RCO letter of support from Queen Village Neighbors Association.
The only thing they asked us to do was add some more brick along the south side of the property, which we have done.
So here are the plans by the architect, and she has some really good aerial photographs and street photographs.
So basically, this is Bainbridge Street 108, and this is Front Street.
So the lot is shaped like an elongated L, or it was, until it was subdivided.
subdivide it. So today we're only talking again about 108 South Bainbridge Street. This is an
aerial view looking at 108 South Bainbridge Street. It's a one-story garage. There are
existing garages on the block. In fact, the two adjacent homes to this property have front-loaded
garages. Another view, again, here's the elongated L, which was prior to subdivision. Now as a result
subdivision we have a smaller L here fronting on Bainbridge Street and the single-family home
that's on Front Street will remain and I also have a photograph of that as we walk through this
presentation this is proof that the lot in fact was subdivided at one time if you follow my cursor
again here's Bainbridge Street Front Street it's a rather large lot and we're basically taking the
lot and cutting it uh right where my cursor is we have the approval of the survey district the
planning commission as well as uh l and i this is the photograph of the one-story garage with
adjacent garages some more views just to give the board some perspective it's looking down bambridge
street looking in the opposite direction uh and this is the proposal to to build a single family
home. Right here is the outer limits of the property. We have no issues with height, open
space, or rear yard. Again, we're simply keeping a garage, updating it, making it more familiar to
the neighborhood, and adding stories above. So this is the final product. And as I said,
Mr. Chairman, the only thing that the Queen Village Neighbors Association asked us to do
with regard to the first plan was to change the side alley here to all brick.
It doesn't really affect the footprint or the zoning submission,
so we're not asking for any plans to be stamped
if the board looks kindly upon this application.
I can walk through the floor plans for the board.
Basically, there's a basement.
The garage will be a slab on grade.
The remainder of the footprint will be a basement.
First floor plan, again, garage.
entrance area. You have a kitchen and a living area on the first floor.
Then on the second floor, there's three bedrooms.
Then on the second floor, there's three bedrooms.
That's just the side view.
Again, this is looking at the side of the building, two stories on top of the garage with a little kind of pen area to get onto the rooftop deck.
Side view.
Again, here's the garage on the first floor, kitchen, living, and then the three bedrooms with a little area to access the front deck.
overlooking Bainbridge Street.
Side view.
And this is the single-family existing home,
which will remain on Front Street.
You can see that we posted our notices
on both Front Street as well as on Bainbridge Street.
The rest of the documents are the pro forma documents
that the board usually sees in an application like this.
This is the tax information from the Philadelphia Tax Center.
The taxes are due by March 31st of this year.
My client will testify that her mortgage company actually paid the taxes March 3rd.
It hasn't been reflected yet, but since they're really not due, this really is considered
still a clear real estate tax document.
Zoning map again shows you the nature of this rather large lat, which has been subdivided.
And again, we're only talking about Bainbridge Street 108.
This is the deed indicating that I prepared this deed confirming the subdivision.
This is our notice letter to the community indicating we mailed out 200 pieces of mail.
So in conclusion, we have a situation where we have a large lot, Mr. Chairman, where we're asking that it be subdivided, which it has been, and approved to be subdivided.
We're going to keep the existing garage with the existing curb cut on Bainbridge Street and then put a single-family home basically on top of the garage without affecting, again, the open space, rear yard, or height requirements per the code.
We're basically in harmony with the rest of the block.
There's several garages on the block.
We're in harmony with the code.
We're not impacting any lighter air on either side of the property.
We are in harmony with the code and in harmony with the neighborhood's wishes, which we have acceded to.
And with that, I'm going to ask my client, Mr. Chairman, to unmute herself.
Ms. Whitacombe, can you unmute yourself?
Elizabeth, can you unmute yourself?
Ms. Whittacombe has been allowed to speak.
Could you please state your name and spell for the court's stenographer?
Elizabeth Whittacombe, E-L-I-Z-A-B-E-T-H, W-I-D-D-I-C-O-M-B-E.
Do you swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, Mr. Clinton.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Good afternoon, Mr. Whittacombe.
Were you on the call when I presented your project?
And if you had the opportunity to testify, would you adopt my testimony as your own and as true and correct?
Thank you very much.
Mr. Clinton, just to be clear, the only refusal is parking.
Am I correct?
Yes, Mr. Chairman.
Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
No, Chair.
No, Chair.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
Not at this time, Mr. Chair.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
I see no hand.
Planning Commission.
Thank you, Chair Bergman, Sarah Bond, Philadelphia City Planning Commission.
In 2017, the zoning map was amended to RSA 5 residential single family at this location in accord with recommendations from the comprehensive plan.
The proposed use of accessory parking is consistent with documented prior use of this property.
The City Planning Commission recommends that the Zoning Board grant the variance.
Thank you.
MI 2023-007049, 704 South Front Street, number T-B-447962, I vote yes.
Thomas Holliman, my vote is yes.
Mr. Snell?
You must not have heard me.
Jane Snell, my vote is yes.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Clinton.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Have a great day.
Number four, MI 2024, 000103, 836 North 4th Street.
Number four, MI 2024-0001.
Richard Pressman is the attorney.
Letter of support from Northern Liberties Neighbors Association.
Richard Pressman has been promoted as panelist.
Mr. Pressman, Mr. Pressman, yes, I'm here, I'm starting my video, it was a thing, thank
I'm being promoted.
Alright.
Hi, Mr. Pressman. Could you state your name, please, and spell for the stenographer?
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. Richard Pressman. Richard, R-I-C-H-A-R-D, Pressman, P-R-E-S-S-M-A-N.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client, the relationship to this property?
The owner of the property is 836-N4-LLC, and the principal who's on the call today is Shimshon Zakin.
Okay. Our vice chair has a few questions for you, sir.
Good afternoon.
Do you agree to read another refusal or stipulate towards accuracy?
Yes, we agree to the waiver.
Thank you.
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
yes we did with the caveat that we need to supplement the uh tax uh uh documents this
morning which were sent to council and the sunk it as well thank you council please proceed and
share your screen
Mr. Chairman, are you able to see the list?
We can, sir.
May I proceed?
Please.
This is the list of the exhibits that we presented to the board five days ago.
As I said, we supplemented the certificates of tax compliance for all four properties this morning.
I'm sorry.
That was it.
That was override.
Yes, but I'm sorry, Chair, if I may, can you please make the screen larger?
Is that helpful?
Yes, thank you so much.
You're welcome.
We are going to the notice of refusal, which is the second exhibit.
um this is a property that is located um on north 4th street 836 north 4th street it's four uh
subdivided into four lots it's currently two lots and also on the 800 block of north lithgow street
um there the lots um proposed to be divided into four single family attached residents
with roof decks with on-site parking on 4th street for one vehicle each and two cars each
on lithgow but the parking will be on site through an entrance on north 4th street through
a shared driveway so all the parking will be on site not on the uh parking uh on the street
um i don't know if there was an override there or not give me one second there we go the uh
The notice of refusal had two bases for it. One was over minimum lot size, which in this district, RSA 5, is 440 square feet. However, there is an exception where a lot containing at least 600 square feet is permitted to be divided into lots with a minimum lot size of 800 square feet.
In this case, the proposed lots are 1,200 square feet, which is 50% more than the minimum that would be permitted.
There is also a requirement of 75% of the lots around the property be 1,000 square feet and less, and we have that in our proposal, and I'll show it to you, those properties that meet that standard.
The other two conditions, each lot size has to be for single family, which is what these proposed use is.
and each of the lots uh created meet the lot with requirements of the zoning district which is also
And each of the lots created meet the lot with requirements of the zoning district, which is awesome.
met by the proposed plan the second issue is a dimensional standard for the height which is a
minimum a maximum height of 38 feet with a pilot house of four three and a half feet permitted
with a total of um uh 41.6 and this proposed uh dwelling comes in 43 and we'll get into that in
more detail. I want to go back to the documents that I wanted to show. You don't need to see
the deed or the tax compliance unless someone on the plan wants to, but I want to go bring
up the presentation, if I may, Mr. Chairman. And I have Mr. Zakin here to come in and help
if I need with presenting the yeah this is the presentation which is item number seven
are you able to see that Mr. Chairman okay we can okay this shows the location of the
the subject property up at the top here, 836 North 4th Street, where it's located in Northern
Liberties. And we also have, there we go. This is the site as it currently exists.
very slow and scrolling i apologize the current you can see the open lot there
and the uh the alleyway on lithgow and north 4th street there as it presently exists
in context of the site context and zoning on slide
three here again it's very slow and loading the full size that shows you the current location
of the project proposed project off of fourth street going back to let go and get some context
of the height of the buildings around the proposed project on either side that have been built up
this is the design coming in off of north fourth street
and showing where the entranceway will be built into going through North 4th street into a courtyard inside the property.
Also call your attention to the height of the proposed building. If you see the front height, it's less than the front height as facing 4th street to the existing property.
Behind them, you'll see the pilot houses, which are built as of right.
This shows the yellow hashed areas, show the existing properties which meet that standard
I was talking about of a lot with a minimum 800 square feet, and this shows the proposed
site in orange and the other properties which 33 lots are less than a thousand square feet
where the hatches are now going down i wanted to show you the prior design here this is the previous
i apologize
If you see, Mr. Chairman, on the right-hand side, I don't know why it's flicking around like this.
So the one partial has one parking place and the other one has two, am I correct?
That's correct.
the ones on lithgow because the entrance is on fourth street we needed to cut it down
to uh one car there but in the back they're each of the what i wanted to show you mr chairman and
i'll i'll expand it once i can uh get the uh prior sheet up it's jumping around i don't know why
You want to take over? Excuse me, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman, can we raise Mr. Zakin to come in?
Mr. Chairman, can we raise Mr. Zakin to come in to take over the screen?
He can show the presentation because I'm having problems with my computer and scrolling it down.
Mr. Zakin is the owner?
Yes, he's the architect of record and the principal of the applicant.
I apologize, but my computer is...
Mr. Zakin?
Mr. Zakin?
Mr. Zakin, can you please raise your hand?
Hi, Mr. Zakin, could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
Jim Sean Zakin, S-H-I-M-S-H-O-N, last name Zakin, Z-A-K-I-N.
right do you swear for him to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
yes i do mr pressman do you want to proceed what what you need from yeah
mr say can you please bring up the presentation please
everyone can see the screen we can't see we see it yep okay great so um
how smoothly yeah i'll hear about it later um can you please go to slide uh eight please
absolutely okay mr zakin um on the rights the original design as you bought the property is
that correct yes okay this was a project that was already approved by ellen i and had a building
permit is that correct yes and i would like to uh say a few words if i'm alone okay please do um
i'm i'm also an architect in my profession and i'm the developer uh future developer for this
lot um when we came to purchase this property there were uh plans approved for building permit
zoning and building permits for two houses on the lots i used to live in this neighborhood
for 13 years. I've done many, many
works in the neighborhood and
this is
this design is a bad
urbanism and a bad
design, but it takes advantage
of the code
which allow for
in RSA5
single family townhomes to be
if they are designed as a
detached building with minimum
five foot side yards
on each side, they allow for some
reason to have
front garages by right
this is obviously
a bed urbanism and bed
designed for the neighborhood
I approached the
chair of the
Northern Liberties Neighborhood Association
the RCO and
we saw eye to eye
that they would be
very happy to not have
these homes with front
garages on North 4th Street and
on North Litco
built the way
they approve. So we came up with our proposed design for four houses that sharing an inner
courtyard where they have an access through one 12-foot driveway of North 4th Street into a 30-foot
yard um that can house six cars two double car garages and two single car garages um so that
that is why we're presenting today a supportive letter for for this design um so i hope that's
clarifying these slides that we're showing here.
Can you go to slide 11, Shimmy?
And this shows the two-car garages on Lithgow
and the single-car garages on 4th Street,
as Mr. Chairman asked us, correct?
That is correct.
And what's important is that we have eyes on the street
on both streets, North Lithgow, and North 4th Street.
We don't have cars backing up from garages on both sides of the property.
It's safer and it's a better design for the neighborhood.
And there's living space on both first floors, correct?
I want to call your attention to slide six.
Okay, and this, as I was testifying, shows the neighboring area and the properties with less than 1,000 square feet.
the neighboring area and the properties with less than 1,000 square feet of users, homeowners, correct?
This particular area of northern neighborhoods, you'll find more houses that are built on lots that are smaller than 1,000 square foot.
And in this particular location, even more so, we find it more appropriate to have lots that are 1,200 square foot inside, which is roughly 15% less than what is the minimum required lot size in RSA 5,
but is about 50% larger than what the minimum would be allowed
if instead of 67% of the lot around me,
where that number was 75%, which is pretty close.
And you're only 220 square feet less under the code,
and you're going to build 1,200 square foot homes.
Is that correct?
Footprint?
That is correct.
Okay, if you want to go to slide nine, I want to talk about the building height in Masson.
Yes, and even here, we work together with the neighborhood.
The building next door to us, even though it sits on an RSA 5, it was previously approved in the zoning board of adjustment for a multifamily.
And this is what we're seeing on the left side of our proposed building.
And it's a higher building than 38 feet.
it's a 42 feet or 43 feet in height, actually 44 feet in height to the top of the parapet.
What we designed is a 42 foot building height with only one foot parapet at the front of the property.
We designed the houses, so the roof decks are... Go to slide 14, please.
Yes, I'm going to go there. So the roof decks, as you can see in these illustrations,
are all designed off the street.
None of our roof decks are facing the streets,
North 4th Street or Little Street.
So the activities are away from the street.
And that's allowing us to do a very short parapet,
only 12-inch parapet.
And the overall massing of the house
that is built 42 feet in height
will only be a foot and a half higher
than what would a by-right building height be
for a house that is built 38 foot in height
plus 42 inch parapets,
3 foot 6 inch of parapets,
which gives us 41, as it says here,
41 foot 6 massing.
And what we're proposing is 43.
And again, for that reason,
working with the Neighborhood Association and the neighbors,
we got the support for the height of the houses.
And Mr. Zakin, you met with the RCO three times, is that correct?
And the first time was before you filed anything with LNI for any approvals.
It was a concept meeting.
That was a concept meeting to show them what is now approved
and what I'm ready to break ground with.
and what I'm proposing, and there was a full support
and a unanimous support for our new proposed design
versus what was approved before.
And with that information, we proceed and got the refusals
from L&I, and we are today in front of the zoning board
of adjustment after meeting with the neighbors again
for slight adjustments that they were requesting,
and we complied with all of them.
with the project as presented to you.
And you went back at the end of the month
and showed them in August the revised plan at that meeting.
And then finally, in February, we had the official RCO meeting
after the zoning refusal was granted.
Is that correct?
That is correct.
And then if you go to exhibit 11, sir.
This is 11.
11. No, 11. Not the slide 11.
Oh, okay.
Right here.
Yeah. And this is a letter received this month from the RCO, Northern Liberties Neighbors Association?
And it's a letter of support. Is that correct?
That is correct.
I have no further questions in Mr. Zakin. Is there anything you wanted to add, Mr. Zakin?
no i'm happy to answer any question questions from the board no mr chairman
questions from the board no mr chairman no chair questions or comments from our
attorney hillary emerson not at this time mr chair questions or comments from the virtual audience
yes chair we have one hand bob pfeiffer and they have been allowed to speak
sure hi could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer
Bob Pfeiffer, B-O-B, last name Pfeiffer, P-F-E-I-F-F-E-R.
Right. Do you swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Are you a neighbor?
Please proceed.
I just want to confirm whether or not there are any encroachments or setbacks that are being affected, or is that all by right, Jimmy?
This is all by right as far as the position of the buildings on the land.
So there's no encroachments on the streets or sidewalks.
Everything's going to be in line.
That is correct.
Actually, there was one of the requirements or requests from the neighbors not to encroach into the sidewalk of Litgo Street in particular because it's a very narrow street.
and we made sure to not have any element
projecting out of the property line
into Viggo Street.
Thank you.
No further questions, Chair.
Thank you for taking time to call us.
Anyone else in a virtual audience?
No hands.
Planning Commission.
Shemin, you want to answer?
Thank you, Chair Bergman.
Sarah Bond, Philadelphia City Planning Commission.
And just a second. Computer jumped on me. Okay.
Okay. Thank you. Sarah Bond, Philadelphia City Planning Commission. In 2014, the zoning map was amended from ICMX, industrial mixed use, to RSA5, residential single family.
the proposed lot dimensions are consistent with nearby properties but in terms of the proposed
height variance the appellant has not shown that the property cannot possibly be used in strict
conformity with the zoning code and that a variance is therefore necessary to enable its
viable economic use the city planning commission recommends that the zoning board grant the
variance with the proviso that the height variance is denied.
Thank you.
MI 2024, 000103, 836 North 4th Street, I vote yes.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
Mr. Snell
Counsel, you have your three votes
That includes my business
May I be excused, Mr. Chairman
Yes, thank you very much
Number six
MI 2023
004-599
488 Byberry Road
Michael
McElhenney is the attorney. There's a letter of support from Somerton Civic Association
with a proviso.
Counsel, could you state your name, please, and spell for the court stenographer?
Michael McElhenney, M-C-I-L-H-I-N-N-E-Y.
You swear a firm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Could you identify your client in a relationship to this property?
The client is Agim, A-G-I-M, and his wife, Zali, Z-A-L-I-E, Bajrami, B-A-J-R-A-M-I.
They are the owners of the property.
All right.
Our vice chair has just a few questions for you, sir.
Good afternoon, counsel. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes, we do.
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, I have.
Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen, counsel.
Thank you.
a little slow on dragging it over today okay there we go
members of the board uh my exhibit packet that was presented um just the prerequisites
the tax clearance is at exhibit 14 the deed to my client from june 13 2022 is at exhibit 13
the deed to my client from June 13, 2022 is at Exhibit 13. Our 14303 notices are at Exhibit 12.
The property was posted and those photos are at Exhibit 11 and our zoning appeal with the PIF
form is at Exhibit 10. Mr. Chairman, you did reference that this did go to the community group
at Somerton and a letter of support, unanimous letter of support was provided, that's at Exhibit
one. My client's zoning refusal is at exhibit two. And the request here is to take the existing
parcel, which is an L-shaped oversized lot. We're asking to relocate the lot lines to create two
lots from one lot, and then to build a single family home on each of the two lots. One lot will
have an off-street parking for one space, and the second lot will have off-street parking for two
cars and it will be a buy right in terms of the height and three yards of the space of the proposed
structures. The refusals that we generated here are for one of the two lots, mainly a flag lot
that will be created. We have a refusal dimensionally for the front yard for the minimum lot
width because the width is taken off the dry vial we're creating and I'll show that on the plan
And then what is calculated as the front yard for the lot number one is eight feet on our plan, but 15 feet is required.
And on our plan, I'll show you, although it's the front yard, in practicality, it's the side.
I'll flip Exhibit 3.
There it goes.
Our zoning map is at Exhibit 3.
the property zoned RSA 2 single family. The properties around us to the north are similarly
zoned RSA 2 and immediately behind us is RM 2 which is currently used as a multifamily development.
Exhibit 3 also has some aerial photos just to orient the board
of the conditions on the ground. As you can see the properties along Byberry Road are single
family houses on both sides. And behind us is a dry vial for the multifamily development. And
I'll show that clearer on the site photographs. I can jump right to the exhibit four.
Is this are the site photographs for the subject property?
The property is currently a vacant lot with an existing dry vial curb cut in between two
single-family detached single-family houses on the south side of Byberry Road, the 400 block.
The second photograph is a view from the back of my client's property from the rear yard looking
out towards Byberry Road. I apologize for the delay the computer's giving me a little bit of a
flag. And there we go. The properties to the east of the subject property, again, are just
existing detached single family homes. Turning to page super slow. Page four are photos on the
side of Depew Avenue, which are the multifamily homes directly behind my client's property.
and then at the end of page five are properties on the north side of Byberry Road. Again,
there are a bunch of single-family homes along the 400 block of Byberry Road and when I get the
photograph page seven, these are photographs of the properties to the west of my client's property
on the same side of Byberry. There are just a series of single-family houses and at the end
of the block is Audubon Avenue where it intersects and that multifamily development perhaps around
this block of Byberry Road. Exhibit 5 is the actual subdivision plan that we're presenting.
The top left corner is the existing lot conditions, and I realize that's hard to see. The frontage
currently is 62.5 feet on Byberry Road, and at the rear property line, as I said, it's
107.5 square feet. The length is 160.750 square feet. This is a lot that consists of 13,230 square
feet. And we're proposing to create a one parcel that's in keeping with identical to the other
properties. And the property on the west has a 15 foot wide dry vial that we're proposing
to create the the lot on the westernmost lot which would be the flag lot. The lots will end up
at 7,020 square feet for this flag lot and the lot to the east is 6,210 square feet.
the lot to the east is 6210 square feet in the rsa2 district the minimum is 3150 square feet so
both of these proposed parcels are way larger than what's required under the code to create such lots
and i would say in looking at very road most of the neighboring properties are between
50, 600 square feet and 50, 800 square feet. So these are larger than most of the other properties
on this block of Byberry Road. And I should mention we do have a revised zoning plan after
meeting with the community. They did ask us to move the house back three feet and I'll show that
on the revised zoning plan. So we're going to zoom in. So looking at the screen, the property
at the top of the page is what we've designated as lot one on this plan, and that has a 15-foot
drive aisle leading to the single-family house with one car parking. The refusal is because
the zoning code looks at this 15 feet as the lot width, and it doesn't take into account
the 45 feet at where the property is actually situated. The second refusal is for the front yard.
The line that is behind 482 by Barry, this yard, although the house will be fronting,
looking east at the house to the bottom of the page the side this is not a side yard on the
right of the house that is actually the front yard under the code so we have an eight foot
setback whereas the code requires a 15 foot setback if we were to comply with an 18 foot
setback that would put the house over the rear property line there wouldn't be any room for a
side yard at the left side of the property. The subdivided lot would also have all the open area
at the bottom of the screen, which is behind what's known as lot two.
Lot two itself, again, we would have a two-car off-street parking on this property. It's
dimensionally compliant. The RCO, because there is an active sidewalk use here, in order to have a
buffer in case there's oversized trucks we did move the property back to 21 feet from the front
of the property whereas 18 is required by the code and that again changes the rear yard depth
of this property from 46 feet to 43 feet so there's tons of open space we're preserving a bunch of the
trees that are there and replacing the ones that are being removed to bring two properties that are
in keeping with the other properties on this block of Byberry Road. Exhibit 8 is our proviso plan
form which is pretty basic here it was as i just mentioned just to push the property back from
18 feet to 21 feet off the the front front curb line and to decrease the set the rear yard by the
same amount of three feet and both properties will consist of four bedrooms two baths each
the property and i will mention that this is on this i just noticed a scrivener's error
before we logged on this is stated as lot one on exhibit eight which is the floor plans
this is really lot two as we just discussed the front loaded garage for two cars
we have a full formal dining room full kitchen with eating kitchen a full living room an office
or den, and the upper floors consist of four bedrooms and two bathrooms.
And then the westernmost lot, which is identified on the floor plans as lot two, and on the
site plan as lot one, has that one car off-street parking, a full living room, full dining room,
full kitchen, laundry room, bath, and the upper floor is the same as the house next
store that we're proposing which is four bedrooms and two baths each and I'm going to zoom out a
little bit and the renderings as you can see looking at the front of the property the picture
on the screen right now which is the fifth page of the floor plans is a view of the lot two which
is the two-car off-street parking. And as you can see, it's in keeping with the other houses on
both sides of Byberry Road. And then the next photograph is the flag lot house that will have
one car off-street parking and again a two-story structure, four bedrooms, two baths each.
With that, members of the board, I would submit that this is an oversized,
irregularly shaped lot with the the L shape. The refusals are generated due to
um the refusals are generated due to the unique shape of the lot the use of this property as two
families is in keeping with the this block and in harmony with that the uses on the block
and there would be no negative impact to the subdividing of this lot and adding two single
family homes to this location we would request that the board support our request for the two
variances uh as part of our refusal and if number if i could have mr again bajrami raise his hand
mr bajrami can you please raise your hand
they have been allowed to speak sir could you please state your name and spell for the court
stenographer hi uh hello my name is agent a-g-i-m last name b-a-j-r-a-m-i
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Please proceed, counsel.
Mr. Bajrami, did you hear the presentation and statements I've made to the board?
Were they true and correct to the best of your knowledge, information, and belief?
Would you adopt my statements as your own?
No further questions, Mr. Chairman.
We have not available for questions, if any.
Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
no chair
no chair
thank you
questions or comments
from our attorney
Hillary Anderson
not at this time
Mr. Chair
questions or comments
from the virtual audience
I see no hands
Planning Commission
thank you Chair Bergman
Sarah Bond
Philadelphia City Planning Commission
the comprehensive plan
recommends no change to the existing RSA-2 residential single-family zoning. The dimensional
requirements of the zoning code do not create any economic detriment to, or sorry, for the
appellant. The City Planning Commission recommends that the zoning board deny the variance.
In line 2023, 004-599-488 Byberry Road, I vote yes for Viso. Revised plans, three pages,
stamped by ZBA, March 13th, 2024. Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes with provisos.
James Snell, my vote is yes with provisos.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
We're provisors.
Thank you, counsel.
Thank you.
I do have one other matter.
We'll be back to you.
Thank you.
Number seven, MI 2023, 007-093, 630 North 37th Street.
Meredith Furlicker and Brandon Saverin are the attorneys.
No RCO letter, but the meeting was held on 2-21-24 by the Mantua Civic Association.
Meredith is joining us as a panelist.
Good afternoon, counsel. Could you state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
Sure. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, members of the board.
Meredith Ferliger, F-E-R-L-E-G-E-R.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client and the relationship to the property?
Certainly. My client is 666 North 33rd Street, LP, represented here today by member Rami Shrine.
Our vice chair has a few questions.
Good afternoon, counsel. Do you agree to wave the reading?
of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy i do have you emailed in all the required documents
and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing
we did um we did also supplement those exhibits earlier this week and were provided to staff as
well as board council thank you fair enough please proceed and share the screen thank you and mr
chairman i don't know if it was already corrected but this is actually 6 20 north 37 street not 6 30.
Oh, I'm sorry. I said 620. I thought I said 620. Sorry.
Maybe you did, but my brain thought it was.
Okay, it's okay. It's okay.
Just making sure.
And just for point of information, I understand we're going to hold the vote on this.
Our council is going to talk to Elle and I.
That is correct, Mr. Chairman.
And I will address that in my presentation so that you are fully aware of why we're holding the vote.
Okay. You should see my screen now, I hope.
We do.
Okay, great. So as you're aware, the property before the board today is 620 North 37th Street, which is a large vacant property that measures 5,250 square feet.
which is a large vacant property that measures 5,250 square feet and is just off the corner
of Mount Vernon Street and North 37th Street. So North 37th Street is here and here is Mount
Vernon Street. The exhibit packet in front of the board today includes 14 exhibits. By way of just
a preliminary summary, this property was actually previously approved and permitted for the
construction of a multifamily dwelling to contain 15 dwelling units. As we'll explain, the request
today is relatively minor and seeks to add an additional extra four units, which will bring it
to a total of 19 units. Starting first with a basic property overview. As you can see on the
aerial that I have up on the screen at Exhibit 6, this property sits along a predominantly
unoccupied stretch of Mount Vernon Street that is directly across from the Mount Vernon Park
and Playground. Along North 37th Street are primarily three-story structures which are
predominantly multifamily in nature. Directly across 37th Street you'll notice a large swath
of vacant land and the board may recall having approved a large transformative development for
those sites, known as Village Square. And that development will encompass the entire block all
the way from North 37th Street to North 36th Street, between Wallace to the north and Haverford
all the way to the south. Just by context, that particular development will include a grocery store,
retail and office space, and nearly 150 units. And that is directly across the street from this
property. On the opposite end of Mount Vernon Street, you can see at the corner here a vacant
parcel of land that the board recently, in the last year or two, approved a 19-unit development
on that site at 3527 Mount Vernon Street. Looking at the zoning map at Exhibit 5,
the board will note that this property is currently zoned RSA 5, but is surrounded by
RM1 across the street, as well as CMX2 and special purpose park zoning.
If we look more closely at the photographs, just to give you some additional context,
you'll again note that this is a large corner lot that is the subject of this application.
And again, looking west here, you'll see that site of the future Village Square development,
which should be under construction any day now.
Notably, the portion of that development, which is directly across the street from the property,
which I'm pointing to with my cursor here, that is going to be the large parking lot
that will serve the grocery store, which will be right on the corner of 37th and Mount Vernon Street.
And again, scrolling, this is just a view showing the context along North 37th Street,
where you'll see the existing three-story structures that are immediately adjacent.
As the board may gather, this block was one of the many blocks that was previously zoned RM1
prior to the 2017 Mantua rezoning. This board hears about the Mantua rezoning effort quite a lot,
but it is especially important here given the history of this lot. Back in 2017, prior to the
lot being zoned RSA 5, this property was granted a zoning permit for the erection of a new structure
for use as 15 dwelling units. You'll notice at the top it was zoned RM1 at the time.
It was not until several years later that a building permit was also issued authorizing
the construction of this project. That building permit still remains active. Under the current
permit, the proposal includes a mix of predominantly three and even four bedroom units.
As the board is aware, four bedroom units have been rendered essentially inhabitable due to the
three unrelated rule in the zoning code. This is especially true in this case where the four
bedroom units that were approved for the site were nearly 2,000 square feet, which is
uncharacteristically large for the area and would be extraordinarily challenging to fill
without seeking a special exception to permit that fourth occupant for each of those four-bedroom
units. In addition, the currently approved design has zero one-bedroom units, which are generally
more in line and consistent with the marketable development trends in this area. As a result,
but before putting a shovel in the ground, the applicant sought to redesign the interiors
based on some community input he had received to align more closely with the unit mix.
based on some community input he had received to align more closely with the unit mix of the
immediate area. The most efficient redesign ultimately resulted in the addition of those
four extra units. The current design includes one, two, and three bedroom units that range from 575
square feet all the way to 1250 square feet. This unit mix is far more consistent with the
Mantua community's desire to see a broader mix of unit types and price points.
Just generally speaking, trash will be stored in the rear and will be collected via a commercial
hauler. And as the board noted early on, we are asking that the board hold the vote today
as a result of the applicant's request to also remove the green roof, which was included in the
previous approval. The green roof is going to be removed to try and accommodate some additional
space for the current tenants. But we do understand that the board has to hold its vote
since we have not been able to seek clarity on whether the board can do that via proviso
or whether that needs to be done through some form of revised plan proviso. So that is ultimately
the reason that the vote will need to be held. However, since the record is going to be closed,
I will note that the removal of the green roof will not impact or change the ultimate refusal
that was issued. The refusal, as the board can see, was drafted as if the full 19 units are not
permitted, despite the fact that 15 of them were already previously approved and will remain
approved. Regarding the refusal that's up on the screen, the proposal did only receive one refusal
for the proposed multifamily use. As the board can see, the refusal is not specifically for the
additional four units, but is instead issued as if the entire proposal is prohibited. As the board
has seen today, this proposal is fully permitted for 15 units, and the scope of the review should
be limited just to those four additional units. No dimensional variances are requested and the
proposed structure is not changing from the previously approved design. This change would
only impact the interior layouts to create and generate a more efficient and desirable design.
The applicant submits to hardship given the history of this property, the size of the property,
as well as the context of the neighborhood and the block. As I noted earlier, the property is
over 5,200 square feet, which is significantly larger than the predominantly 800 to 1,100 square
foot lots on this block. While the multifamily use is not necessarily in question today,
given the applicant's permitted right, single-family homes on this lot would be significantly out of
character with the direct area here in Mantua. Even putting the lot size aside, proposing a new
single-family home on this block would also represent a deviation from the predominantly
high-density multifamily development in this area. As referenced, the other end of this block
was recently approved for a similar 19-unit proposal, and Village Square directly across
the street is slated to see the construction of over 150 residential units with significant
commercial uses that will thrive on the additional density in this in this immediate neighborhood
this additional density will directly contribute to the vitality of this neighborhood
and support the viability of the coming coming soon grocer and other retail uses
this property is also uniquely situated in that it has a nearly 15-year history of attempted
development with a variety of zoning and building permits dating all the way back to 2009 that were
never achieved all for a variety of multifamily proposals the applicant is confident today's
request will finally achieve the missing balance that will enable the project to come to light
The applicant submits the number of proposed units is the least minimum, as this is a de
minimis increase in the unit count that is directly driven by design and unit feasibility
considerations. Furthermore, as I did mention previously, the project was designed to include
a significant mix of unit types, sizes, and layouts to encourage a variety of price points
and tenancies, and of course no dimensional variances are needed to support the proposed
use and i do have up the previously approved zoning site plan and elevations which are not
slated to change with this request we do submit the proposal will not increase congestion
harm neighbors properties or impair light and air the proposal is slated to be
harm neighbors' properties, or impair light and air. The proposal is slated to be consistent
in height with the surrounding structures, particularly with the surrounding new structures
that did receive height variances to be quite a bit larger than this proposal, which is by right.
A full analysis is provided in the Memorandum of Law submitted to the Board at Tab 12,
and I'd be happy to touch on any particular point in more detail.
With respect to the community, we did meet with Mantua back on February 21st, and just in case, because I did see it just come through this morning, we did receive a letter of support from Mantua that I do have up on the screen now, and I do note that was sent to board council this morning as well, in case you don't have it.
So at this time, I would call up Rami to adopt my testimony if the administrator could look for Rami Shrine.
Rami, could you please state your name and spell for the sonographer?
Sure, it's Rami Schraim, R-A-M-Y-S-H-R-A-I-M.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, counsel.
Thank you. Rami, have you heard all of the testimony and evidence that was offered for the board today?
Would you agree that testimony was true and accurate, and would you adopt it as if it were your own?
And is there anything further you'd like to add?
No, thanks.
Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
No, Chair.
No, Chair.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Anderson?
just briefly
Ms. Furlier I just checked
for some reason we didn't get the email
if you wouldn't mind
from the RCO if you wouldn't mind forwarding
that to us that would be great
there's been some emails that have not been going through lately
including today
so this may have been one that for some reason
just didn't come through
absolutely no problem I'll do that right now
questions or comments from the virtual audience
I see no hands
Hilary, you're speaking with L&I will not affect planning, right? Let planning take a position today?
Yes, planning can take a position. I mean, unless they want to defer, but I don't think it's up to them.
Planning?
Thank you, Chair Bergman. Sorry, I didn't realize you were ready for me.
Okay, actually, I am going to be on the path of the planning commission, Sarah Bond.
I am going to be deferring testimony today. It was my understanding that there might have been an issue with mixed income bonuses here, but Hillary didn't mention it. So maybe that is not the case. Either way, just given the information today, I don't want to make an uneducated testimony. So I am going to withhold.
All right. Thank you.
Just to follow up on that, it was my understanding, it wasn't the bonuses, but there was a question about whether the overlay should have applied. That was the question I just received today.
Oh, that's correct, Hilary. Yeah, that is correct.
So that was not brought to my attention. I would very much like the opportunity to address that because this was previously approved prior to the overlay and four additional units would not trigger a re-review of the units that had already been approved. So we can certainly discuss that offline, but I'm not sure.
Yeah, no, absolutely. Absolutely. That was just brought to my attention this afternoon.
so okay all right all right so so we're going to hold the vote on this um the records closed
except for hillary and murderous responses and then planning commission does that sound okay
yes that is fine all right thank you thank you very much oh mr chairman i'm sorry but you didn't
take any any uh questions from the audience i don't think i did i thought i said questions
or from the virtual audience, no?
I did.
You stated that there were no fans at the time.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
All right.
Number eight.
MI 2023-007-283-2644 Buckeya Street.
Sean Ward is the attorney.
There's a letter of support from Bridesburg Community Action Alliance, and Councilmember Driscoll has taken a position of non-opposition per email to Sean.
And Councilmember Driscoll has taken a position of non-opposition per an email to Sean Ward.
Can we hear from Sean?
There we go.
I'm here, Mr. Chairman.
There you go, Mr. Ward.
Took a little while to log in to join his panelists, but I'm here.
That's okay.
Just state your name for the stenographer, please, and spell it.
Yeah, my name is Sean, S-H-A-W-N, last name Ward, W-A-R-D, attorney for the applicant.
David, D-A-V-I-D, Schepansky.
Let me spell that. S-Z-C-Z-E-P-A-N-S-K-I for 2644 Buckeyes Street.
He is in the virtual audience and will raise his hand to be recognized at the appropriate time.
You swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth.
I most certainly do.
And our vice chair has a few questions for you, Mr. Ward.
Good afternoon, counsel.
do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate towards
accuracy? Yes, I do. Have you emailed in all the
required documents and exhibits that is needed
to proceed with this case five days in advance to this hearing?
Yes, I have. Thank you, counsel. Please proceed and share your screen.
All right, Mr. Chair, can everybody see my screen?
Yes. Excellent. I've submitted my typical exhibit packet for
David Schapansky at 2644 Buckeyes Street, that calendar number ending 7283.
This is an application.
A1 is the notice of refusal.
It's an application for a permit for a relocation of lot lines to transfer an existing accessory garage from 2638-40 Buckeyes,
which is on the corner, to his parcel at 2644 Buckeyes Street, which is known as Parcel B.
There was one refusal issued for no more than one principal building allowed per lot in RSA 5.
And I submit that that is probably due to the size of the freestanding accessory garage.
Accordingly, we seek a dimensional variance for that today.
A2 is the application of appeal.
A3, the project information form.
A4 is proof of ownership.
There was a settlement agreement between the parties due to some litigation, which I was not involved in.
However, it does include the sale of the property. A5 is Mr. Schepansky's tax clearance proof.
A6 is an archive plot plan. A7, an atlas plot plan.
A8 is the lot line relocation survey plan approved by the survey district.
A-9 are my photographs.
At the time I submitted the exhibit packet, the RCO letter from Bridesburg was not attached, however it is attached at this point.
A-11, a district council letter from Councilman Driscoll.
I do have an email from Tom Forkin, his chief of staff today, indicating that as an officer of the court, I am free to express to the board their non-opposition to the application in light of Bridesburg's support letter.
uh briefly the only relevant zoning here i could find was uh nothing for 2644 it's an existing
single family dwelling and uh there was a permit for 2638-40 with the vacant garage it was a
former grocery store on the corner with a single family dwelling a13 is the zoning map a14 is the
aerial photo. There is no commercial use proposed for the accessory garage. It's for residential
uses only. The applicant did express to the community that he proposes a new roof on the
garage, new garage doors, and he was going to replace the sidewalk and curb cut apron
at the front of the structure. So basically, we have the notice of refusal,
the application of appeal the project information form attached my transmittal letter to the board
a copy of the settlement agreement including uh the purchase from the defendant for
my client for the garage listed as exhibit a on the agreement uh here is a the survey plan as
approved by the survey district i have a better cut of that i will run you through that real quick
however that was signed electronically by the parties
However, that was signed electronically by the parties.
we have proof of tax
We have proof of tax compliance through this year, even though they're not due till March.
And then we have a archive copy of a site plan.
You can see the existing garage at 2438-40.
It was a store in the front with a single family dwelling included.
So with regard to the site, the Atlas maps, you can see the 2830-202638-40 at the rear.
There was a single freestanding garage.
My client's property is located two properties in from the corner of Thompson Street.
However, it does abut the garage in the back rear of the property.
Again, the site plan, proof of posting.
Here are some Google street photos of the subject premises.
The property with the colored brick, brown, is the subject property, Mr. Schapansky's.
Then we have, this is the corner property, 2438-40.
To the right is the garage in question, which would be relocated at lot lines for to consolidate that with Mr. Schapansky's property.
Again, another view of Mr. Schapansky's property looking at Buckeye Street.
Here is a Google angle photo.
You can see the garage is located right here where my cursor is pointing and Mr. Schapansky's property.
is over here, and they attach at the rear.
We have a copy of the letter from Bridesburg Community Action Alliance, dated March 6th.
There was a vote taken at the meeting, and all 14 community members, including the board members,
voted to approve the project.
And then we have the zoning archive documents, as previously mentioned.
um then we have let me see if i can do this
is the board still saying uh the prizeberg letter now okay very good uh excellent then we have uh
the email from uh thomas forkin uh councilman driscoll's chief of staff uh stance uh savinski
was unavailable uh and so he indicated as an officer of the court i can make the representation
that there's no objection from the councilman's office.
We have a copy of the notice to the neighbors.
We have a copy of the address list, which included the subject property 2644 Buckeyes,
as well as the certificate of mailing.
So based upon the foregoing, we submit that there be no adverse impact upon the community.
This is an existing freestanding one-story garage.
However, it does, once consolidated with the new parcel, I guess constitute two principal structures, even though it's an accessory structure for the existing single-family home.
At this point in time, I would ask that Dave Schepansky, if you haven't raised your hand already, that he be recognized to verify and adopt.
dave shepansky has been allowed to speak sir could you please state your name and spell for
the stenographer david sapansky d-a-v-i-d-s-z-c-z-e-p-a-n-s-k-i do you swear or affirm
to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth i do please proceed counsel
Dave have you heard my representations to the board today I have and are they true and correct
to the best your knowledge information and belief they are and do you adopt them as your own
testimony I do that is all I have at this point Mr. Chair unless there's any questions from the
board questions from the board no Mr. Chairman questions or comments from our attorney Hillary
or Emerson? Not at this time. Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
I see no hands. Planning Commission.
Thank you Chair Bergman, Sarah Bond, Philadelphia City Planning Commission.
The comprehensive plan recommends no change to the existing RSA 5 residential single-family zoning.
The proposed use and dimensions of accessory parking is consistent with documented prior
use of this property. Therefore, the City Planning Commission recommends that the Zoning Board grant
the variance. Thank you. MI 2023-007-283-26...
MI 2023-007-283-2644 Buckeye Street, I vote yes.
Thomas Holliman, my vote is yes.
James Nell, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
Thank you.
Thank you, counsel.
See you at 3.30.
Okay, thank you.
Number nine, MI 2023-001-265-2203 North Natrona Street.
This is a resumptive hearing.
Alan Nockamson is the attorney.
Alan Nockamson is coming in as a panelist.
Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, members of the board, Alan Nockamson, A-L-A-N, last name
Nockamson, N-O-C-H-U-M-S-O-N.
You swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
Mr. Nackamson, this is a resumptive hearing.
We're going to start with updates from you, updates from the RCO.
We'll take public testimony, and then we'll vote.
All right.
My office submitted an updated presentation packet.
I don't know if you received it, but I'm glad to say we have a letter of support from the coordinating RCO, Strawberry Mansion CDC.
So this is an RM1 property where we're seeking the allowable amount of units. Dimensionally, it's all good with the exception of this. There's an overlay which, you know, for certain size streets only allow for 25 feet in height for building height.
And that's where we run afoul of the Philadelphia zoning code, where we're asking to put a three story structure there.
The entire block is three stories on our side. So we met with with the coordinating RCO, not once, not twice, but three times.
And I think the third time was a charm. And that's how we got their letter of support.
So if this board feels so inclined, and I can share my screen if you want to see what it looks like, the refusals, and even a letter of support, if you need be.
But if this board feels so inclined to grant our zoning appeal, I would ask for two provisos.
Not sure if one of them is necessary.
I would defer to Ms. Emerson, but we have an updated refusal dated October 13th of 2023.
We received authorization from the ZBA to amend our project to include a porch at the request of the community, but we have an amended refusal dated that date.
So that would be proviso one, but I would defer to Ms. Emerson whether that's necessary.
And then the second proviso would be we updated our plans even after that time at the request of the community.
So we would ask for a proviso for revised plans where you have a proviso form with the revised site plan.
Thank you. Are there representatives from the RCO here?
I'll go in the car.
Kerbey Mansion has been allowed to speak.
Okay. Hi, could you please state your name and spell for the stenography?
Hi, my name is Bonita Cummings. I am one of the affected RCOs.
I'm not the coordinating RACO.
Ms. Cummings, could you spell your name for the court stenographer as a matter?
It's B as in boy, O-N-I-T-A, Cummings, C-U-M-M-I-N-G-I.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, told truth, nothing but the truth?
Please proceed.
The only concern that Strawberry Mansion community concern has with the revisions is that the
um overlay speaks about porches being equal in height to from new development and it appears to
me and and just from what they showed us as a revised plan that the porch really still is not
the height of the neighboring porches so the coordinating rvco did uh decide to uh give a
letter of support but i did have a concern that i raised regarding whether or not um they that
development is actually uh going to be to the to the requirements um spoken to in the zone in the
zoning code so that was a concern okay all right thank you for taking the time to call us let me
All right. Thank you for taking the time to call us. Let me see if the coordinating RCO is present. Coordinating RCO.
shifted as a coordinating
And just to clarify, the coordinating RCO was Strawberry Mansion CDC. I don't know if anybody is here from there.
Chair, I see no hands.
Okay. Mr. Chair, can I just respond to Ms. Cummings for a second about the porch?
So we did not update the rendering to show that the porches were of equal height, our new porch versus the neighboring porch.
But our revised plans did show a lowering of our porch to match the porch.
And that's one of the provisos or one of the elements within our revised plans to match that.
Thank you.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
no hands. Thank you. Planning has already taken a position on this. So MI 2023-001-265-2203
North Natrona Street. I vote yes with proviso. Her amended refusal dated 10-13-23.
Revised plans, one page, stamped by ZBA on March 13th, 2024.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes with provisos.
James Snell, my vote is yes with provisos.
Ishmael Shaheen, my vote is yes with provisos.
Thank you, Mr. Nagamson.
We're going to move to number 11, MI 2023-007-204, 4136-40 Mitchell Street.
Meredith Ferlicker and Brandon Shagman are the listed attorneys.
There is a letter of support from Central Roxburgh Civic Association.
Afternoon, Mr. Chairman.
Hi, just for the record, state your name, please.
Meredith Ferliger, F-E-R-L-E-G-E-R.
Would you identify your client in relationship to the property?
Sure. My client is Mitchell Commons, LLC, the owner of the property at 4136 Mitchell Street, represented here today by member Mark Duzak.
Our vice chair has just a few questions.
Good afternoon, counsel. Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
I agree to waive the reading. I stipulate that it is accurate as written, although we do have an argument that it in theory could have been issued by Wright.
Understood. Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
We did, and we did also supplement the exhibits earlier this week.
Thank you very much, counsel. Please proceed and share your screen.
All right.
All right, Mr. Chairman, members of the board, the board may have some deja vu as it relates to this particular property.
having reviewed a different proposal back on May 10, 2023, at calendar number MI-2023-006-999.
By way of preliminary housekeeping, I would note that our presentation today does expressly
incorporate all the testimony that was given at the May 10, 2023 hearing, and a copy of that
transcript is provided for reference at Exhibit 16. To refresh your memory generally, the applicant
in May sought relief to permit a variety of commercial uses of an existing commercial space
located in a relatively newly constructed building at 4136 Mitchell Street. At the hearing in May of
2023, and in response to the community's input, the applicant presented the board with a condensed
list of a maximum of 13 commercial uses that the space might reasonably accommodate.
following that hearing the board held its vote for a week and later denied that request the
denial had the natural effect of rendering the space unusable since the May 2023 hearing the
applicant has continued to assess options for the vacant space as the manager of roughly 800 units
around the city the applicant routinely receives inquiries from tenants with certain physical
disabilities that cannot often be accommodated in existing units, even in newer construction
buildings. Accordingly, the request before the board today is to permit the use of the vacant
first floor commercial space for one additional residential unit, which is intended to be built
to suit the needs of an ADA-specific tenant based on their needs. It is our understanding that CRCA
sent a letter of support for this very specifically tailored request.
In light of the testimony and evidence offered in May 2023, the resulting denial, and the case
In light of the testimony and evidence offered in May 2023, the resulting
we'll present before the board today, the board will see the continuing significant hardship that
this particular property faces. As we noted in May of 2023, any proposed use of this previously
approved commercial space will generate a variance. Aside from the hardship, the applicant
also submits the request may have been approved by L&I by right as a permissible increase in a
non-conforming condition. The exhibit packet includes 15 total exhibits, 16 total exhibits.
Allow me first to reorient and refresh your memory to this property.
The property is located at 4136 Mitchell Street, which is just south of Pensdale Street. The
aerials at Exhibit 10 provide the board with context to this area. You will note the newly
constructed building, which is surrounded by a large religious congregation to the south,
residences, dense apartment buildings, and other commercial properties as you travel north on
Mitchell Street. And again, just another view. Directly across the street, where I'm indicating
with my cursor, is the Roxborough Dog Park, which was revitalized in part due to a partnership
with this property owner when the project was constructed.
In fact, the dog park users regularly visit this property to access fresh water for their dogs.
Additional photographs are shown at Exhibit 15, and the board may start to get deja vu here.
In this front view, which is extremely important to the case today,
you'll notice that there are currently two separate entrances to the building.
The entrance on the right is the main residential lobby.
the entrance on the left with the ADA accessible access point
and the ramp was originally intended for a commercial space,
specifically a fresh food market,
which is no longer a contemplated use under the zoning code.
Again, I'll scroll through
just so you can get a general context of the area.
And again, across the street is the dog park.
Looking the other way,
you'll notice the apartment building up the street.
Again, another view of the dog park.
And here's a front and side view of the property,
and then this shows the existing parking,
the accessory parking lot that serves this property.
Right along the side here,
I'm not sure if it's visible in this image,
I believe it's farther in the back here.
There is currently a reserved and unused ADA accessible space,
and the intent would be that that space would be
reserved for this particular unit as well.
The vacant space is shown up on the screen now and you can see this is currently just an empty space.
You'll note this is a nicely sized space of approximately 740 square feet and has ample street facing windows.
As of now, the space exists as an empty shell that can be designed and fit out to suit the needs of a specifically identified tenant with ADA needs.
In comparison to some of the other smaller units in the building, this is actually quite a well-sized space to accommodate a residential tenant, particularly one that has individualized needs.
By way of the history shown at Exhibit 6, this project was first issued its first zoning permit in June of 2016 and was granted several subsequent permits between 2016 and 2019, including the grant of a variance in 2019 for the addition of the accessory parking.
The project was approved under the then-existing CMX-2 zoning classification that included 72 dwelling units, 10 parking spaces, and a fresh food market on the first floor.
My client purchased the already approved project from the former owner in December of 2017 through an LLC asset purchase and proceeded to secure the building permits for the new construction.
The building was completed and occupied as of 2020.
The as-built first floor plan is shown at Exhibit 7, and you'll see the space here.
This building is already currently heavily amenitized with a gym, vegetated roof deck, open space in the rear with a common gazebo, and several open gathering and study rooms in the buildings.
As I mentioned earlier, there's also a dog park across the street.
Unless the board desires it, I will refer the board specifically to the transcript of the May 2023 hearing for my client's detailed testimony concerning the difficulty he faced in locating a permissible tenant for this space.
His testimony begins on page 8 of the transcript shown at Exhibit 16.
His testimony begins on page 8 of the transcript shown at Exhibit 16.
To summarize that testimony, the board heard that this property has been occupied for nearly four years,
during which time significant efforts to find a tenant that fits the extremely limited definition of a fresh food market occurred.
Those efforts were unfortunately not fruitful.
Accordingly, the owner first started investigating whether there are other commercial users that would be interested in the space.
The owner testified that he received significant interest from several possible tenants.
However, none of those tenants were willing to sign a lease with the risk that their use would not be approved and the significant delays that exist in securing zoning relief for one specific use.
That was ultimately what precipitated the request for the broader swath of possible commercial uses.
However, the board's 2023 denial had the effect of foreclosing any commercial use of this space.
Adding to the challenge in activating the space, as the board can see on Exhibit 9, this property is currently zoned RSA 5, single-family residential.
At the time the project was approved, the property was zoned CMX-2, which permitted the multifamily and commercial use.
The property was rezoned in 2017 by Bill number 170465, which is shown in the packet at Exhibit 8.
The board will note that the properties prior CMX-2 and partial RM-1 classification were all rezoned solely to RSA-5.
As a result of this rezoning, the only use that's permitted for the property in this particular space is the previously approved fresh food market.
Because of the RSA-5 zoning, any changing use to the space will trigger a variance, whether that changes to another commercial use or, as requested today, to an additional residential unit.
As I alluded to, any changing use for this space will trigger a variance.
because of the current zoning classification.
This has made it nearly impossible
for the owner to find a tenant
willing to commit to the space
with the uncertainty and delay
that comes with seeking relief.
This use change was first initiated in November of 2022.
It is now March of 2024
and the applicant is still seeking relief
to authorize some reasonable use of that first floor space.
As shown today and in May of 2023,
this property owner faces a significant hardship in that any by right use of the space and property
more broadly is no longer permissible under the new RSA 5 zoning classification. The board has
ample grounds to grant today's relief on both traditional hardship grounds, as well as
considering that the request constitutes a permissible expansion of a legal non-conforming
condition. Once the property was rezoned to RSA 5, the existing multifamily use became legally
non-conforming. In accordance with section 14305.5 of the code, a non-conforming use may be expanded
within an existing building so long as the expansion since the use became non-conforming
does not increase the floor area occupied by that use by more than 10%. The total gross square
footage of the building is 74,880 square feet. The 740 square foot space is less than one percent
of the total square footage and should constitute a permissible expansion of a non-conforming
condition. The evidence also establishes this property, particularly this ground floor space,
suffers from a unique and unnecessary hardship. As the owner testified during the May 2023 hearing,
locating a fresh food grocer for the space has been met with unfortunately limited success.
As the board has heard repeatedly, any changing use of this space will trigger a variance.
That statement is the very essence of a hardship in that there is no possibility this space can be
used in strict conformity with the code or the previously issued permits in light of the owner's
diligent but failed attempts at finding a user to occupy the space. This hardship was only
accentuated once any commercial use of the space was denied. We submit this is not a self-imposed
hardship as this owner and this applicant purchased the LLC following full zoning approval of the
project and has, based on that original approval, attempted for many years to find a viable
commercial market. We further submit the request as the least minimum variance as the property already
We further submit the request as the least minimum variance, as the property already contains 72 dwelling units.
This is a de minimis increase in one extra unit that will serve a severely underserved need for both ADA accessibility and affordability.
This newly constructed multifamily building is in an area surrounded by mixed residential, religious, and commercial uses, including an active dog park just across the street.
One additional residential unit will have no perceptible increased impact.
We submit the proposal will not increase congestion, harm neighboring properties, or impair light and air.
Full analysis is provided in the memo of law submitted to the Board at Exhibit 11, as is supplemented by the transcript from the May 2023 hearing.
With respect to the community, as the board is aware, CRCA sent a letter of condition support, which we specifically acknowledge is consistent with the owner's goals for this space, and the applicant has no objection to the requested provisos.
I will call up my client to adopt my testimony, but before I do, we would summarize and submit that the evidence presented in May 2023, in conjunction with the evidence the board has heard today, establishes a clear and unambiguous hardship pursuant to Section 3038E.2 of the Code, and we respectfully request the board grant the requested relief.
At this point, if the administrator could locate Mark Duzak, please.
mark dusak has been allowed to speak sir could you please state your name and spell for the
court stenographer uh good afternoon my name is mark m-a-r-k dusak d-u-s-z-a-k you swear
affirm to tell the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth yes sir please proceed counsel
thank you uh mark have you heard all the testimony that was offered before the board today
I have.
And would you agree that testimony was true and accurate, and would you adopt it as if it were your own?
Yes, I do.
And would you also specifically re-adopt the testimony that you had given at the May 2023 hearing?
Yes, I do.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Questions from the board?
Mr. Chairman.
No, Chair.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
Not at this time, Mr. Chair.
questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands planning commission
thank you chair bergman um in 2017 the zoning map was amended from split zoning
of residential multi-family and commercial mixed use due to residential
excuse me, let me start over this. Okay. In 2017, the zoning map was amended from the split zoning
of residential multifamily and commercial mixed use to residential multifamily and residential
single family with the support of the community. The appellant has shown that a variance is
necessary to enable the viable economic use of the property. Therefore, the city planning
commission recommends that the zoning board grant the variance. Thank you. MI 2023-007-204-4307
4136 to 40 Mitchell Street, I vote yes.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes.
James Snell, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Councilman.
Number 12, MI2023-007156, 3532 North Carlisle Street.
Michael McElhenney is the attorney.
letter of support from Nicetown-Tahoga
improvement team with unenforceable
provisos.
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman.
Counsel, you've already been sworn. Could you just state your name for the
record? Michael McElhenney.
And could you identify your client, their relationship to this
property? The client is
NG Properties LLC. That LLC
is the owner.
And our vice chair has a few questions.
Good afternoon, counsel.
Do you agree to weigh the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes, I do.
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Thank you, counsel.
Please proceed and share your screen.
Good afternoon again, members of the board. On the screen is my exhibit pack that was submitted to the board.
good afternoon again members of the board on the screen is my exhibit pack that was submitted
Preliminary matters, the ZBA appeal is at Exhibit 9. Our photographs of the zoning posters are at Exhibit 10.
The 14303 notices are at Exhibit 11. My client's deed is at Exhibit 12.
And the tax zero tax balance form is at Exhibit 13.
Mr. Chairman, as you mentioned, I was connecting when you mentioned that there was a letter from the RCO.
Yes. One, we do have a letter of support for the project, given the size of the property and location and the need for housing at this location.
The RCO did include a bunch of documents that they call provisos.
They're non-zoning issues, but my client is going to be looking to hire local contractors and prioritize local tenants, especially with the accessible units we're preparing.
And the rents that we're trying to keep are going to try to be on the lower end for affordability purposes.
Our refusal is at Exhibit 2, and this is an application to erect a new construction attached structure that will be for multifamily household living for seven dwelling units.
The property itself is zoned RSA 5, residential single family, and that creates a refusal for us.
And here we have two refusals. One, multifamily is not allowed by right in the RSA 5 district, which is why we're seeking the variance today.
And the second issue is the proposed structure, since it's an intermediate lot, can only be 75 feet of occupied area, and we are at 87% occupied area.
Exhibit 3 is the zoning map and aerial maps for the subject property and surrounding area.
Our property is on the west side of North Carlisle Street.
and it's zoned RSA-5.
The properties to the east of us are CMX-3 properties
that front on Broad Street.
The second photograph of Exhibit 3 is a map of the property
just showing Tioga Street to the south,
15th Street to the west,
Benango Street to the north,
and Broad Street to the east.
And the next major intersection I'll mention for the board
above Benango Street would be Erie Avenue
and the Erie Transit stop.
Looking at page three is a 3D aerial photo of the 3500 block in North Carlisle Street.
For context, the properties to the east of us is the 12-story Temple Medical School building
and then Broad Street and Shriners Hospital.
And the additional photos just show additional angles from the view looking north.
And then page five is the view looking east, which is the front of the property would be
looking into the Temple Medical School building, and then a view looking west from the Broad Street
where the towering building blocks this block of Carlisle Street. Exhibit four are the site
photographs. The subject property is the vacant lot in the middle of the screen. We have a two-story
structure to the east of us, and a three-story abandoned structure at 3534 North Carlisle to the
north looking from south from benango street the corner property there is a use used for an
after-school program for 25 children going south along carlisle street the next property
is a property at 3540 north carlisle that is last permitted for storage of contractor equipment
continuing south there's two three-story residential dwellings and then that abandoned
house at 35 34 and then my client's vacant lot and then going down the block farther to the south
we have a series of five single family two-story houses and the rest of the block we then have
five two-story houses that are the carlisle port student housing apartments
and the next photograph on page four there's two more residences at the end of the block and then
a vacant lot at Tioga Street, which is the next intersection. I took a photo looking north of
this block of Carlisle Street just to see the context with the Temple Medical School building
to the east. And then we have a view looking east towards Broad Street and south at Tioga looking
south on Carlisle Street, just for context. And then the top of the block back at Venango Street
looking west, we have a series of three-story structures looking west and then turning looking
east, we have the Broad Street intersection at Benango which has Shriners Hospital, a church on
the northeast corner, and another religious use on the northwest corner. Exhibit 5 is the zoning
plan for this lot. I'm going to zoom in because it's very hard to see. So this is a large oversized
So this is a large oversized lot on this block. It is a 20 foot wide parcel and it has an existing depth of 78 inches.
lot on this block.
We do have a zoning plan attached that exhibits at five, but we do have revised plans after meeting with the community.
The big feedback that we heard is we need more residential units, but we also need accessible units.
So we did revise the plan to meet the request from the Nice Time Tioga Group to revise the front of our entryway.
And I'll start with the elevation. The proposed structure is 35 feet, one inches high, not to exceed 38 feet.
Looking at the front elevation, we're proposing a brick structure to match the other brick buildings on the block.
We would be approximately 35 feet high. And the front entryway, as you can see, this arched entryway,
that's actually a passageway leading to the doors to the building, which would be in the
center of the building through that passageway. That's a private passageway for safety purposes,
ingress, egress, and from the rear yard. The zoning overview of the front of the property,
so we have an access ramp at the front of the property to allow for accessibility of this
building we have a front landing stoop and steps and that leads into a four foot six inch wide
access way that leads back to the center where there would be an an entry door and the stair
tower that would provide access to the units inside the proposed building our rear yard is
code compliant we have to have nine foot minimum rear yard space we have nine feet eight and a
quarter inches of proposed rear yard and we have a large oversized egress well at the back of the
property that's approximately four feet six inches. The looking at the layout that based
off the revisions from the community the first floor would enter in either off the ramp into
the access passage or the steps and going down the hallway and this would be an exterior hallway
that would lead to the front entry door in the middle of the building that has a central stair
tower. So we would have units in the front of the building and also in the back. The first floor
front would be a accessible class. It's a class B accessible unit, 400 square foot studio apartment
that would have living space, kitchen, full bathroom. The rear unit would be an accessible
unit as well, 340 square foot unit, living space, kitchen, bathroom. And we have the central
stair tower that goes down to a lower unit that is a 370 square foot studio apartment with a large
oversized egress well again living space kitchen bathroom and we then would have a second and a
third floor that has each have two units each they're one bedroom apartments 530 square feet
a piece so going up the stairs to the second floor we have a full kitchen a full living room
bedroom and bathroom and they are mirror images at the second and third floor levels so the same
unit is in the front and the back and at the second and third floor levels we did include
trash storage closets outside of the units for each of the units to have the a place to store
their trash in between trash day and all of these units would have access to that egress passageway
and full access to the backyard for trash storage and outside space.
The revised proviso plan form is attached at Exhibit 7, and it's pretty minor.
The main changes were the interior layout to make the units accessible on the first floor.
We've reduced the height of the building to approximately 35 feet 1 inch,
And we lengthened that front sidewalk ramp to allow for accessibility and accessible units on the first floor level.
At Exhibit 8, I've included from atlas.philo.gov the dimensions of the neighboring properties on this block.
Our property is 20 feet, over 78 feet deep.
Most of the neighboring properties on this block, as you look to the north, they're 13.5 feet wide.
going to the south you have a series of these the smaller single family homes are 14 foot wide
properties and then farther to the south towards uh tioga most of those properties are 13.3 feet
by 78 feet wide substantially smaller than what my client's property is at 20 feet by 78 feet
and we would submit that it's it's not economically viable to build a large single family house on
on this massive oversized lot at this location. This is a property where we would submit that
this massive oversized lot at this location.
This is...
the least minimum variance is the multi-family, seven multi-family units that we're suggesting
the variance for here, especially with the accessible units that we'll be able to provide
to the community. This is a transit-oriented development right next to Broad Street,
and the Erie Transit's not being a block away, and we're immediately behind that 12-story Temple
medical school building, there's going to be no impact on the light and air of any neighboring
properties. There's going to be no impact on the traffic at this location. And there's no impact
on negative impact on the neighbors. And it's in keeping with the other rental properties that
dominate this block. So we would submit that the board approve the variance request for the
multifamily space so we can bring affordable, accessible property rentals to this neighborhood
as requested by the community you bring your client on please and adopt your testimony
mr ferko can you please raise your hand
and his name is nori n-o-r-i f-e-r-k-o ferko mr ferko has been allowed to speak mr ferko could
you please state your name and spell for the stenographer hi my name is nori n-o-r-i last
name is Ferko, F-E-R-K-O. Do you swear or affirm, tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the
truth? Yes, I do. Please proceed, counsel. Mr. Ferko, did you hear the statements that I presented
to the board today? Yes, I did. Were they true and correct to the best of your knowledge,
information, and belief? Yes, they were. And do you, after having met with the community,
do you feel that we've revised the plans to meet their concerns with accessible units?
yes i did and would you adopt my statements as your own yes questions from the questions from
the board questions or comments from our attorney hillary emerson not at this time
mr chair questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands planning commission
Thank you, Chair. Sarah Bond, Philadelphia City Planning Commission. The comprehensive plan recommends no change to the existing residential single-family zoning. The appellant has not supported their hardship claim for seven rental units with evidence of the unique physical circumstances or conditions of the property.
The Philadelphia City Planning Commission recommends that the zoning board grant the variance with the following conditions. Maximum three units.
Thank you.
MI 2023-007-156-3552 North Carlisle Street.
I vote yes with proviso.
Revised plan, one page, stamped by ZBA on March 13, 2024, and no more than five units.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes with proviso.
James Snell, my vote is yes with Proviso.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes with Proviso.
Thank you. Thank you, counsel.
Thank you.
Number 14, MI 2023-007-095, 5341 Westford Road.
Alan Nockmson is the attorney.
Letter of support from the 42nd Ward Democratic RCO.
LETTERS IN SUPPORT. ALAN NOCHEMSON HAS BEEN PROMOTED TO PANELISTS.
MR. NOCHEMSON, COULD YOU JUST STATE YOUR NAME? YOU'VE ALREADY BEEN SWORN.
good afternoon again mr chair members of the board alan knockamson could you identify your
client the relationship to this property yeah my client is alvaro alvarez uh the owner of the
property all right now our vice chair has a few questions for you sir good afternoon council do
Do you agree to read another refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
The only thing I don't stipulate to, there's a refusal for the use of the beauty salon.
And I saw in the public record that there is a zoning permit for it.
But with the exception of that, I stipulate.
Understood.
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits as needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, we have.
Thank you, Councilor. Please proceed and share your screen.
Thank you, Counselor. Please proceed and share your screen. Thank you.
Thank you.
Oh, you don't want to see my ESPN here.
Nothing special going on. No eagles being signed today, I think.
I'm going to share this screen.
5341 Westford Road, a pretty straightforward project.
So during this presentation, we'll share the notice of refusal to allow our support from the 42nd Democratic Board, which I believe was unanimous support.
We have an extensive petition. Mr. Alvarez actually lives above this commercial unit here, and he's lived in this community since 2007.
So he's a well-known entity. So he was able to get significant support from not just the people who voted at the community meeting, but his nearby neighbors.
The refusal essentially has to deal with a structure that was constructed in the rear of the property.
That structure started before Ms. Alvarez even owned the property.
He just made improvements to it by adding a roof, but that structure has been there a while.
But it's not uncommon to have secondary structures of this nature. And we have we looked at the city records and we have a whole map of nearby properties with secondary structures, which are similar in nature.
I have the use permit 472568, which references the beauty salon, and that's why I objected to the refusal that's included with our notice of refusal, you know, dealing with the beauty salon.
We have an aerial view of the property, maps of the area, photographs of the property in the surrounding area, our simple plans and drawings, our RCO meeting notice, and again, unanimous support in support of this matter, our application for appeal that we filed on Mr. Alvarez's behalf, the deed to the property showing that he's owned this property for almost a generation, and the certificate of tax clearance.
Again, at the conclusion of my presentation, I would ask Mr. Alvarez to virtually raise his hand, be sworn in, and I'll have a few questions for him.
So in terms of refusal, it seems scarier than it is.
It really is not.
It's an RSA 5 property.
It's a corner property, the quintessential corner property, where you have a commercial use on the ground floor, which is legal, although it's not referenced in that refusal and such.
It's a beauty salon, and it's been there for almost a decade.
And above there, Mr. Alvarez lives there. And so all we're trying to do, like essentially is legalize that structure that's in the back. He's basically the neighborhood handyman. He puts his materials in that structure in the back. And no one really has any objection to it.
But we have all these technical refusals. So we have multiple principal uses in the residential district. We have the fact that this is an accessory structure for certain size, and we exceed the size that is allowable.
We have the fact that the proposed used storage building is not allowed to be used in the RSA 5 zoning.
And then an issue with the rear yard depth, because the structure is in the rear yard, we have those refusals.
Again, they all kind of go to the heart of the matter, that this is just a structure for his storage of materials.
And then, by the way, here it says approved for a beauty salon on the first floor with one family above.
So that's another reason showing that we shouldn't have that refusal for the use for the beauty salon.
So letter of support, we have eight people who showed up to that meeting.
I would have to say it was one of the more straightforward, easier presentations our office has done in some time.
Everyone was supportive of it. They completely understood it.
And, you know, they generously support this project.
and again in the letter of support they indicate that he's that my clients lived in the community
for 20 years and you know the beauty salon has been there since 2013 and you know you know they
want to ultimately they want the zba to support this variance request and then again what my
client did was he you know diligently canvassed the neighborhood got letters or signatures and
support and you know included next door neighbor who would be most directly impacted by you know
this building structure in there and everyone's in support of it and here's our petition our letters
to support support which you know is a background for that map i just showed you and then nearby
secondary structures again my office diligently went on atlas and looked at you know from a map
and looked at, you know, from a map perspective, like all these structures, which would run afoul of the Philadelphia zoning code because it's a secondary structure or the rear yard setback or many of the refusals that we have.
perspective, like all these structures.
So what we're offering is not out of character to what you would expect in this part of Philadelphia.
And then here's the use permit for the beauty salon.
Again, it was referenced in the notice of refusal.
So I think that was just a mistake on the examiner's part to issue that part of the refusal.
And then the aerial view of the property.
Again, you can see all these building structures in the rear that we were mentioning, but we want to give it from a photographic point of view as well.
And then maps of the area.
Even though this is an RSA 5 property, you know, there's nothing about it that looks like RSA 5.
This looks like a CMX 1 property.
It may have been CMX1 back in the day. And it's just mapped to the area. We're at the corner of Westford and Tabor. And then you can see this, you know, the property from Westford. And then you can see it from the side. And you can see here's the beauty salon right here. Again, the quintessential, I would say, CMX1 property.
And then this is, you can see kind of here, the pictures aren't great, but like this is our building structure in the rear.
And you can see that we put the orange posters on both sides of the property.
And then this is westward, you know, from different angles.
And this is east of Boer from different angles.
And then you can see the building structure right here.
He's not using the building structure. He wants to legalize it.
So, and then this is just our simple site plan, but here's a building structure here. It already exists. We're just trying to legalize it.
And then this is our community meeting notice. We had a meeting on March 7th at 6.45 p.m. 101 addresses were notified in the meeting, list of the addresses, proof of mailing to those addresses, our application for appeal on Mr. Alvarez's behalf, along with the notice of refusal in the project information form, our deed to the property showing that Mr. Alvarez is the owner of the property since 2007, and our Certificate of Tax Clearance.
Technically, there's a balance due, but that's only for 2024, and those monies are not technically due until the end of the month.
With that being said, I would ask that Mr. Alvarez virtually raise his hand and be sworn in.
Now, it's a real quick question.
How long do you think that structure has been there?
um since since they did i looked at it on google earth it looked like the foundation itself was
there as late as 2007 or as early as 2000 as late as 2007 and then over time he's expanded
that structure by eventually including the the the roof on there okay thank you yeah
mr alvarez mr alvarez as you're in the audience please raise your hand
i see no hands so so counsel you're an officer of the court gladly take your testimony
questions from the board no mr chairman no chair questions or comments from our attorney hillary
not at this time mr chair questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands planning commission
thank you chair bergman um i just do i want to clarify um if mr nalkamson could just um could
just uh once again let us know if the if the structure was there before the current owner or
where essentially it was built by the current owner?
The foundation was there.
I looked at Google Earth myself.
And you can look at Google Earth.
The foundation was there.
And over time, he built the structure,
like, you know, the walls and the ceiling.
But it was set up that way for him.
All right.
So the comprehensive plan recommends no change
to the existing residential single-family zoning.
The proposed uses for multiple principal uses in residential districts and personal services for a beauty salon are consistent with the documented prior use of this property.
However, the appellant's claim, hardship claim, seems to be self-created in terms of the accessory structure.
So I think what we are testifying on behalf of the City Planning Commission is that we grant the uses for multiple principal uses and for the beauty salon.
multiple principle use and multiple principle uses and for the beauty salon
and deny the for denying the legalization of the of the structure accessory structure
Mr. Chair can I just respond briefly sure yeah so you know the the existing law in Pennsylvania
is this. You look at the surrounding properties and seeing if there's similar characteristics
to the variants that we're seeking. And here, again, my office did a thorough review of the
surrounding area, and I didn't count it, but there are like 20 or 30 properties which have similar
structures which we're seeking legalization here. So for those reasons, we would ask that the board
grant the variance. Number 14, MI 2023, 007, 095, 5341 Westford Road. I vote yes. Thomas
Holloman, my vote is yes. James Snell, my vote is yes. Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes. Thank
Thank you, Council.
Thank you.
Number 15, MI 2023, 007159, 217 South 24th Street.
Robert Keralis is the attorney.
Letter of non-opposition from the Center City Residents Association.
Applicant also provided 12 form letters of support from the neighbors.
Mr. Keralis.
Good afternoon, counsel. Could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. Robert Careless, C-A-R-E-L-E-S-S.
Right. Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client and a relationship to this property?
I represent South Bonsall, LLC, the record owner of the property.
And our vice chair has just a few questions, sir.
Certainly.
Good afternoon, counsel. Do you agree to leave the reading of the refusal or stipulate to his
accuracy? I do. Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed
to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing? Yes, I have.
Thank you. Please proceed. Okay. Thank you again, Bob Terrellis of Cozen O'Connor.
We're here on a very straightforward application by South Bondsville LLC, the record owner of the properties.
Ken and Kerry Cox, who are the principals of the ownership entity, our longtime residents of this subject street that you'll see today.
I have for the record here all the required exhibits.
A1 is our deed. A2 is our tax clearance certificate. A3 is our zoning permit application.
A4 is our refusal. A5 is our application to the board.
A-6 is our drawing submitted to Dell and I. I will go through the remainder of the exhibits through the course of my testimony here.
The application is to permit an off-street parking space for an existing single-family structure, which is being renovated right now.
Our refusal, the subject's underlying zoning is RSA-5.
The residential parking control area of the Center City District overlay district does not permit off-street parking,
except when that parking is accessed by a shared driveway or a rear alley.
As I'll go through and describe to the board,
you'll see the rear of this property is accessed by Bonsall Street,
which effectively acts as a rear alley and fulfills the intention of the code here.
Just to orient the board here as to where we are,
this is a view looking north on 24th Street, property right here.
The view looking the other way south on 24th Street.
Here you see you have Chancellor Street here, and now we're looking east in that direction, continuing to look east.
And you can see we're starting to get into how cars are accessing the rear of the property here.
This is a perspective that looks south on Bonsville Street.
This is the current exterior of the property on Bonsville Street.
We're now looking west on Locust Street, where my cursor is indicating, and looking east on Locust Street.
So, essentially, cars come in and access Bonsall Street here for access to rear parking.
Photographs of the postings of the property.
Exhibit A8, you'll see this is essentially another of the views of Bonsall Street, but we're highlighting the existing off-street parking that is currently on Bonsall Street.
Now, you can see there's a number of properties that have garages and off-street parking on Bonsall Street.
Just more properties here, properties, existing properties on the street that have garages.
It's an elevation of the rear exterior of the property.
It's an elevation of the rear exterior of the property where I was showing you in the earlier picture, where we're now proposing a garage to access.
And here we have a turning diagram.
This was submitted with our plans to L&I that show we have the proper turning radius for the garage off of Bonsal Street.
This is perspective rendering of the proposed renovations.
This is clearly an upgrade over the existing conditions.
and clearly harmonious with the existing properties on Bonsall Street,
including those that have off-street parking currently today.
We have 12 letters or petitions of support here from our near neighbors,
which are included in the packet that was submitted to the board.
I'll scroll through these.
We met with Center City Residents Association on February 27th. We have a letter of non-opposition from them as the coordinating RCO here.
And I do have one witness, Mr. Chairman, to bring up. Just before I do, I just would like to state for the record that, as evidenced by the images here, there are a number of numerous off-street parking spaces on Bonsall Street, as the Board has seen.
the existing conditions of Bonsall Street, I think, clearly demonstrate the hardship here,
where this is, I think, theoretically or technically a glitch in the code. The code
very well does not want to have curb cuts along 24th Street or Market Street or similar streets.
They want the parking in the rear properties, access through shared driveways or rear alleys
here. Bonsall Street, as you saw, effectively acts that way. And once upon a time, the code
allowed off-street parking there, as you saw by the number of properties that are built there with
garages. Now, and that obviously evidences a clearly harmonious design with the surrounding
properties. And as I mentioned earlier, the fact that Bonson Street effectively acts as a rear
alley and fulfills the intent of the code section that we cited here for where the code would like
to see off-street parking placed. Allowing the parking here would not cause any traffic
congestion. In fact, quite the opposite. It would relieve pressure by taking away an on-street
parking spot otherwise. It will not increase the danger of any fire, endanger the health,
public health, safety, or welfare. Granting the variance would not adversely affect any public
facilities, nor would it create any significant environmental damage, have any impact on light
and air. And we obviously would argue that this is the minimum variance to grant relief here to
provide a harmonious design consistent with the rest of the surrounding area. So, Mr. Chairman,
if I could ask Warren Fisher from Peter Zimmern Architects to be promoted as a panelist just to
not my testimony you see the owner of the property he's not he's our architect on the project
warren fisher is coming in as a panelist hi mr fisher could you please state your
name and spell for the court stenographer
Warren Fisher please unmute yourself sorry about that uh w-a-r-r-e-n-f-i-s-h-e-r
I do swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth
I do please proceed counsel Mr. Fisher are you with the architect for this project
And did you hear the testimony, my testimony to the board here today?
And given the opportunity, would you adopt that testimony as if it were your own?
I would.
I don't have any further questions for Mr. Fisher.
Thank you.
Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
No, Chair.
No, Chair.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
Not at this time, Mr. Chair.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
i see no hands planning commission thank you chair bergman sarah bond philadelphia city
planning commission the comprehend excuse me the comprehensive plan recommends
the comprehensive plan recommends no change to the existing rsa5 for instance residential
single-family zoning the proposed use of off-street parking is consistent with nearby
properties on this block of bonsall street where the proposed parking and accompanying curb cut
would be located. The City Planning Commission recommends that the Zoning Board grant the
variance. Thank you. MI 2023-007-159-217 South 24th Street, I vote yes. Thomas Holloman,
my vote is yes. James Snell, my vote is yes. Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes.
So we have one more case left on the two o'clock list, but what I want to do is take a break now
But what I want to do is take a break now for five minutes.
for five minutes we'll come back and do that case then go right through
We'll come back and do that case, then go right through the 330 list where we don't have a lot of cases.
So let's take a five minute break, everyone.
MI, thank you.
MI 2023-007-097-2226 Hope Street.
David Orfanides is the attorney.
letter of support from NARS Square Action Network, and a letter of non-opposition from Council Member Lozada.
I am here.
Thank you. Could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer?
Certainly. My name is David Orphanides, O-R-P-H-A-N-I-D-E-S.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client in a relationship to this property?
Certainly. My client is ODA LLC, and they are the owner of the property.
Okay. Isher, you back? Mr. Holloman, could you take care of the follow-up questions?
Good afternoon, counsel.
Good afternoon, Mr. Holloman.
Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or referral and stipulate to his accuracy?
I do. Both.
Did you email all the exhibits and documents as required five days in advance to this hearing?
We did forward everything, but it was not five days in advance.
It was earlier this week.
It was either yesterday or Monday.
We were waiting for some documents.
Thank you.
Please proceed and share your screen.
Certainly.
All right.
So again, good.
We're getting into almost good late afternoon, good early evening.
David Orphanides from Orphanides & Toner on behalf of ODA LLC, the owner of the property.
As mentioned by the chairman at tab 1A of our exhibit book, we have a letter of non-opposition
from Councilwoman Lozada that was based upon the coordinating RCO.
So, as mentioned, the North Square Community Action Network issuing a letter of support
for the proposal that we were going to be presenting to the Zoning Board today.
As indicated, they had well over 40 people at the meeting.
It was an in-person and Zoom meeting, so we had both options for people to attend.
And there was large support for the project.
I think the vote was 26 to 9. So by way of a little background, the property is again located on the 2200 block of Hope Street. It's located between West Susquehanna Avenue at the south. If I can move this or not. There we go. West Susquehanna at the south and West Dauphin at the north.
We have North Front Street just to the east of us at the end of the block, across the street, and the next block over.
You can see back in the early 1900s, the block was developed with dwellings.
And again, we are on the west side of the 2200 block.
I can't tell from this whether in 19, sometime between 1917 and 1947, the property went vacant
because it no longer, you see a line at the back where it would look like it's the back of the
building, but it doesn't indicate D for dwelling. But sometime between 1951 and 1982, you can see
that line is no longer there, just like the other properties surrounding us. So sometime between
at least either after the 40s or even sometime after 1917, our property and a lot of other
properties on our side of the 2200 block of Hope, or also known as North Hope Street,
went vacant, became vacant lots. You can see in the Sanborn maps that there's an alley that runs
behind our property to the west. It runs north and south parallel with Hope Street. As you'll
see in the zoning plans, our property is 42 feet deep, so it's relatively shallow. But the last
two feet of that goes into the middle of the alley. That's a four-foot wide alley. So we only
have 40 feet of usable space. It's a 16-foot wide lot. So it's a pretty small lot and only 672
square feet which is um as you know is well below the minimum lot size for rsa5 properties
but again as you go through the years you can see the vacancies um we did pull street view images
back in 2007 this is our property right here with the chain link fence
Back in 2007, this is our property right here with the chain link fence, 2226 Hope Street.
You can see the property to the south of us is vacant.
You have this masonry wall with some type of swinging garage door or door in it.
A gate property to the south, a gate to the north, a gate for the property to the north of that.
Here's from 2009.
You can see a lot of trash, blighted, a lot of blight, graffiti on the wall next to us to the north.
Here you can see in 2011, chain link fences with barbed wire, a lot of debris.
This is, again, 2014.
You can see all the trash that's strewn in the lot.
2016 little cleaned up a little bit better fence chain link fence next door still have that kind
of that masonry wall with two doors in it properties to the to the north here's been
dressed up a little bit in 2017 um you can see banners and streamers but um you know tarps and
other kind of rigged up structures around the property. You can see there's cars that are
parked in front of it up on the sidewalk. And then sometime after around 2021, there's a building
built to the south of us. You can see our property here to the north with the tarp and a bunch of
trash and dilapidated gates. We do have photographs of the property. These are photographs that I
took. This is the current condition of our property. You can see the chain link fence,
the property to the north of us, which is under common ownership with the property behind
on Howard Street. And you'll see in these photographs, a lot of the properties on our
side of the block are actually looked to be utilized by the properties behind them,
The houses behind them that are zoned RM1 on the 2200 block of North Howard Street.
But this property adjacent to it was 2228 is owned by the same people that own 2225 North Howard directly behind.
So and I'm sorry, I made a mistake. That's 2227 North Howard is directly behind it.
And they are under common ownership. 2225 North Howard is directly behind us.
And this is the property, the Hope Street property that's adjacent to us to North 2228, what's going on behind the masonry wall there.
At the bottom, you see a view, head looking up the block.
Again, there's a lot of lots that are vacant, open, they're not built upon, that are curb cuts being used as parking, whether with or without permits, largely without permits.
As far as we can tell from Atlas, here you go.
Here's some more vacant lots here.
I think the picture's of the same lot there at the bottom of page six of tab 5C.
Here you have a single-family dwelling that was approved with front-loaded parking, a garage, single-family garage, just like what we're proposing, and what we have a variance for.
that I can show you that went before the zoning board and was granted a variance.
It went in front of the community group, received unanimous support.
It was a different community group at the time.
It was North Square.
And they had a letter of non-opposition from Councilwoman Sanchez.
To the north of that, more vacant lots.
And then you have some garages.
And then you have a multifamily with a commercial establishment at the ground floor.
We have a library at the north end, and then single families across the street.
We have a multifamily down at the bottom of the block, down at West Susquehanna on the opposite side.
And then we have an auto repair.
It might have been a Pep Boys at one time.
I saw that in a file just to the south of us, at the southwest corner.
And you can see it here at the bottom of page 19.
with curb cuts and obviously a lot of vehicles.
They get lots further to the north,
just to the north of that, you can see right here,
probably serving as the rear yards
of the people on Howard Street.
This is the rear yard of the single family
to the south of us.
And I bring that to your attention
because I referenced the alley
that's supposed to exist behind our property.
You can see it goes through a little bit
to the south from our property,
but it's clear that it doesn't go all the way
through to West Susquehanna like it's supposed to. You can see the property not behind us,
2225 Howard, but 2223 Howard has built out completely to the rear property line.
This is 2225, Howard, the property behind us.
This is 2225 Howard, the property behind us. You can see right here.
You can see right here.
And then the property to the north of that, which I mentioned, was 2227, which uses 2228 Hope Street.
This is what you see here at the top photo is the alley extending to the north behind us,
completely blocked off with walls, masonry or wood doors.
So there's no way.
And the reason I bring that up is, and you'll see one of the refusals, is that we are two feet short of our required rear yard depth, but the reality is that two feet is our portion of the alley that doesn't go anywhere, which is completely blocked to the north and south of us.
And we'll get to that when we get to the notice of refusal.
The property is on RSA 5, as you can see.
We're back up to RM1.
You have CMX 2 at the top and bottom.
And then you have the front street properties on the other side at CMX 2.
aerial images. Here, again, here is our property. You can see the vacant lots or the lots that are
not being used at all or don't have a structure in them or being used for parking from this view.
We are obviously, as you know, over Front Street, you have the L just to the north at Dauphin and
Front, you have the York Dauphin Station, the elevated SEPTA station. And then some other aerial
images that you can see of the block and the property surrounding those are at tab 5B.
So we did do a check on the uses of the property surrounding us. 2225, which is a property right
behind us, again, it's zoned RM1, has rental licenses for two units. 2223 has a rental,
which I showed you, which was the property that had been built out all the way to the alley,
has a rental unit for one, a license for one rental unit. And then 2227, Howard, that goes,
is owned also by 2228. It looks to be owner-occupied from what we can see from the records.
In terms of the other uses on the block, as I mentioned, as you can see from the photographs,
you've got three other single families. One of them is new, was granted a variance. I think,
like I said, in 21 was granted a variance by the zoning board. They have off-street parking.
There are 21 properties. Out of those, 11 of those have curb cuts in front of them. So over
half the properties on the block have curb cuts. Mind you, there is no parking on either side of
the street. So the curb cuts are not taking any parking away from anybody else, any on-street
parking away from anybody else, which goes to the one of the criteria for the granting of the
variance for the off-street parking that we're proposing, in that driving around
slowly looking for on-street parking causes more traffic congestion than a car just pulling into
its garage. The zoning plans that we have that we submitted to L&I are at tab 3A. You can see
them right here, site plan section. The proposal is, in terms of the building itself, is dimensionally
compliant in terms of the height. Again, you'll see in the notice of refusal, we're a little short
and our rear yard depth. And that is mainly because we have that alley to the rear of us,
which we were not able to count in terms of rear yard depth. When the lot is less than 45 feet
under the zoning code, rather than the required nine feet that you see typically in RSA 5,
it's only seven feet. And again, this is way below 45 feet percentage wise. We're only at 40 feet
to the alley. So we got a refusal for having five feet to the alley, and then you have two feet to
our actual rear property line, but we don't get to count that two feet of the alley as our rear
yard depth. We get to count it as open area, so we don't have an open area refusal, but we do have a
rear yard depth refusal, as you'll see. This is a rendering of what we're proposing. We do have a
deck off the back of the second floor, which creates one of our refusals. Here's an elevation.
at tab 3C, sections at tab 3D, four-story, as you can see, single-family dwelling,
so we don't have a use variance for the number of units, which is nice.
The number, and here's the floor plans, three bedrooms, two baths, again, no cellar, it's slab-on-grade.
Primary living is at the ground floor, then you have a deck off the back, a roof deck above, and then roof deck is compliant.
We did do a shadow. We met with the coordinating RCO within a preliminary Zoom meeting, and they asked some questions regarding the shadowing from the deck. FUSA Design did these shadow studies, and I went ahead and circled, and you can see.
So what we compared it to is the top row is what we're proposing, and then the bottom is no deck, but with a dimensionally compliant building where the roof deck.
but with a dimensionally compliant building where the roof deck could actually be higher than what we're proposing and as could the pilot house.
So, and as you see, oops, sorry about that.
As you see, if you were to take a look at these closely, and these renderings are at 3F of our exhibit book, the shadows are identical.
There's no discernible difference between them.
So in terms of the criteria for the granting of variance, the impact on air and light of adjacent conforming properties, again, the property to the southeast of us, 2223, is not compliant because they built all the way out to the rear property line.
I don't believe that 2225 or 2227 North Howard are compliant, but even to the extent that they might be, we're not shadowing them any more than a by-right design would be.
And we're obviously to the north of the house beside us, and we're barely any deeper in terms of the structure than we would be as a matter of right.
So you can see all those here at 3F.
Uh, scrolling on down, uh, we do have the zoning archives for some of the other properties on the block again, uh, 2200 to 04 north front, which is down at the south down here at this corner is a, I think, a six unit, uh, multifamily with commercial.
we have the zoning archives for the what i mentioned was the southwest corner which is
the auto repair uh so you can see what um that there are those other uses non-single family uses
that are on the block and then we also included the zoning archives for 2250 north hope which i
mentioned is the single family that was granted a variance for the front-loaded parking and
And real quickly, you can see here they had the refusal for the parking, the notice of decision by the zoning board, the coordinating RCO, which again at that time was noticed North Square Community Alliance, a unanimous support, and the letter of non-opposition from Councilwoman Sanchez.
in terms of the applicable provisions of the zoning code and the notice of refusal
to go back up to the notice of refusal at tab two i did talk about the off-street parking we feel
that the use has obviously been granted a variance by the zoning board already obviously there is no
precedent in zoning but when you take a look at the blighted condition of this property and the
rest of the block for such a long period of time again decades half a century maybe longer
the number of other curb cuts where over half the properties have curb cuts the fact that they serve
essentially as the rear yards for the properties that are on north howard street um we feel that
the uh that the criteria for the grand variance for the off-street parking has been satisfied
In terms of the minimum rear yard depth, as I mentioned, and to go to the zoning plans,
and if I zoom in a little bit, the required, there you go.
So the required is seven.
So the required is seven.
And you see, we have seven feet to the rear property line, but again, and that's, again, that alley that's blocked right next to us to the north, completely blocked and blocked a few properties down to the south.
we don't intend to fence in that alley. We show a fence along the edge of the alley,
which is what you're supposed to do. But essentially, we do have that seven feet
clear to the rear property line, which is what would be required if that alley was not there.
In terms of the other refusal, excuse me, which is the rear deck at the second floor,
The decks aren't supposed to encroach into the rear yard.
And again, our rear yard, what's interesting here is that you have a rear yard depth that's
seven feet.
I don't know why it keeps doing that.
It doesn't like scrolling over.
But it is a small rear yard with the building to us to the south, with the other buildings
to the west of us on North Howard Street built so close to the rear property line.
It does create a little bit of a chasm or a pit there, bringing out – seeing that the main living space is off the second floor, having that deck come off the living space is a nice feature.
And again, at the request – and it was a good request or suggestion of the community group – we did the shadow study and showed that having that deck wasn't going to have any impact on the air and light of surrounding properties.
It isn't going to have any impact on the air and light of surrounding properties, and it's low enough that it's not going to be intruding necessarily on the privacy of the property surrounding us.
As a little bit of a housekeeping matter, we do have the ownership, the deed for the property at tab 8.
You can see their deed from September 6, 2017.
Tax compliance, you can see here, through March 16th.
and um our 14 303 notice the email from the planning commission designating north square
community action network and scan as the coordinating rco for the project and that is
who we met with the list of addresses from the um the planning commission's link
a copy of the 14 303 notice for our meeting in february again it was a it was
i thought that was me you can you hear him bill right no i can't hear him i think he went dead
Okay, yeah.
Hillary, do we have David's phone number?
Yes, I can call him.
Give me one second.
Thanks.
Thank you.
Thank you.
um mr chair i i can't get him on the phone um
maybe just just wait a couple more minutes since he is the last case on the two o'clock list
can you hear me yeah can you hear me
okay yes i can hear you now yep i think this is the last case right yeah i know it is it is the
last case on the list so you just give him a couple more minutes if not we may have to do a resumption
i think he was just about done too
Thank you.
I'm surprised he hasn't called you, Hillary.
yeah when i tried to call him it went straight to voicemail
Yeah, when I tried to call him, it went straight to voicemail.
he likes to talk bill he might still be talking
i'm knowing him he's he's he's running around trying to find a way to get back on i can see
right now i'm just kidding you know
Does someone with their hand raised?
um i don't know if they're in a new relationship this why don't we try to answer this see who they
are okay so edward betterman has been allowed to speak hi hi chairman my name's edward betterman
i'm the applicant uh look can you hear me yes yes yes so we're waiting to see if we get him
back on okay yeah i was good yeah i was gonna i don't know what phone number you have i have
the cell phone number is going to try to text
them. Why don't you do the same thing?
Hi, Chair. This is Tanya.
Michael McIhenney
remarked that his
phone died, he believes, and so
he's using a hotspot because they
have an internet outage.
So Michael is trying to get him
now, so he's assisting us.
OK, thank you. OK, cheer. No, that's fine. It's totally your call.
Well, let's just wait a couple more minutes and then. OK, I hate to close out the two o'clock list without finishing.
Hillary, let me ask you this. Once we close the two o'clock list out.
If he will come back when we're doing the three thirty, can we take him back on?
um not not technically no he just messaged me give me a second okay he said he didn't realize
my his internet went off so he's been talking the whole time so yeah and i i know there was
there was an outage um in center city today or still may still be my husband was impacted at
his office oh that i see i did not know that i had i must have went out about five times today
i did not know that
is there any way we can get him on the phone he's logging back in now
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Yeah, all we need to do is
if he will call us.
He said he was
logging back on.
Right, okay.
And he did text me on his phone, so I think
if his phone died, he may have been able to get it
plug back in and get the get the hotspot going again.
Get the hotspot going again.
Thank you.
he's having problems logging back on is he is he still a panelist or no
his name is not among the panelists but he did disconnect while being a panelist
okay there's nothing else that you have to do to take him out of panelist status right
oh if he's using the same link that he used initially he should come back in as a panelist
either way we could see him either under panelists or attendees okay right okay
Thank you.
Chair, we have somebody with their hand up. Alex Duller, would that perhaps be Mr. Orphanidis?
Let's see.
Orphanidis or society associated?
Let's see.
They have been allowed to speak.
Hi, could you please state your name?
Hello, my name is Alex Duller. I'm with FUSA Designs. I was a designer.
um i'm basically david's texting me he's asking what the phone number is to call in because he
can't seem to get logged back in i was i've been giving him uh updates as we've been going
is there is there a phone number i can text him to call
yes it's the phone number that comes on the uh the email uh fatina or
yeah we could put it in the chat but okay yeah thank you kindly
thank you mr dollar by the way
Thank you.
Thank you.
let's wait five more minutes we're gonna have to move on i mean he has the phone number now
so if we don't hear it in five minutes i think we need to move on and we'll just do every something
And we'll just do a resumption here.
He's here on the phone now.
he's here on the phone now.
He just got on.
He just got on.
He's, I think it's that top phone number, the 870.
They've been allowed to speak.
Storfenitis?
Can we tell him what number to push so he can speak on the phone, please?
r6 to unmute right
all right here we go is that all right yeah can you hear me please yes we hear you mr orphanetes
i have i have no idea what happened okay so why don't we do this why don't we
why don't we just finish up and then your your client was on a little bit ago so why don't you
finish up?
I have no idea where I let off. I was
talking and talking and talking.
What was the last thing?
I had no idea
until all of a sudden I was like, wait a minute.
I'm not hearing anything.
All right.
Do you want a resumptive
hearing?
I'd rather not. Do you just remember
the last thing I said?
I mean, I thought you had
just went through the refusals
and you hit each one.
I was going to say, can we could ask the court reporter what was the last thing she transcribed?
Yeah, the last thing that I have is you were getting ready to give a link to the meeting that was in February.
Oh, so probably what I did is what I what I was going through is the 14303 notice.
That's not about right. About the hearing.
That sounds about right. Yeah. Yeah.
Yes. I mean, listen, I went through the refusals. The things that are in the package, I might have then moved on to show the deed, showing my client as the owner of the property, the tax clearance certificate, which is valid through the 16th, the 14303 notice, the email designating, the NSCAN as a coordinating RCO, the list of addresses pulled from the Planning Commission's link, the copy of the 14303 notice that went out.
And then the certificate of first class mailing of that, a copy of our notice is at tab, let's see, tab, wait a minute, at tab, the notice for the hearing is at tab 11A, posting photographs are 11B.
The 14303 notice is all at tab 10.
So, and again, I apologize.
Comcast has been down in town and I was using my phone and I think it kicked in for a moment onto the Comcast, you know, our internal network.
I then went out and knocked me off and I had no idea.
So I had to call you guys back in.
David, why don't we do this?
Why don't we have your client come on and he can adopt your testimony.
Edward Biederman is how he's identified on Zoom.
Yep, yep.
and uh has he been sworn he has done okay eddie uh did you hear the statements that i made to the
board today yes hold on mr beter mr biederman do me a favor state your name and spell it for
the court stenographer it's edward betterman that's b-e-d-e-r-m-a-n right do you swear or
affirm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth i do please proceed counsel
yes mr betterman um did you hear the statements i made to the board today yes now are they true
and correct to the best of your knowledge yes they are and would you adopt them as your own
yes i would okay and then i have the dollar who's the architect they did the drawings if you'd like
to have them adopt my statements as well you want to do that please bring them on alex dollar
they have been allowed to speak start could you please state your name and spell for the
court's phonographer alex duller d as in david u l l e r right do you swear for him to tell the
truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth i do please proceed counsel alex did you hear the
statement that i made to the board this afternoon regarding the proposal i did correct to the best
they are would you adopt this and would you adopt the statements as your own yes thank you
questions from the board no chair no chair no chair no mr chairman questions or comments from
our attorney hillary emerson not at this time mr chair questions or comments from the virtual
audience i see no hands planning commission thank you chair bergman
Thank you, Chair Bergman, Sarah Bond, Philadelphia City Planning Commission. In 2021, the zoning map was amended to RSA 5, Residential Single Family, at this location with the support of the community.
sarah bond philadelphia city planning commission
The appellant has not shown that the property cannot possibly be used in strict conformity with the zoning code and that variances for a rear yard deck and accessory parking are therefore necessary to enable viable economic use of the property.
regarding the rear yard depth variance the appellant has supported their hardship playing
with evidence of unique physical circumstances of the property the city planning commission
recommends that the zoning board grant the variance with the following conditions denial
of uses of rear deck and off-street parking thank you so no i'm sorry go ahead no no do you have
something to say david no i just i mean there's off-street parking up and down our side of the
block and the variance was granted for a single family with off-street parking i think those
exist so okay thank you so mi 2023 007 097 2226 hope street i vote yes
thomas holloman my vote is yes james snell my vote is yes
thank you counsel thank you apologies i'm going to send the cop a screenshot
happens and when i can't get but when he can't get so no no apologies thank you thanks uh is
there anyone in the audience who the who had a 2 p.m case that has not been called
i see no hands we're moving on to our 330 list good afternoon my name is bill bergman i will be
chairing the 330 hearing with me as our vice chair ismail shaheed present mr chairman our board
member thomas holliman present mr chairman our board member james snell present mr chairman also
president is hillary emerson our attorney and our executive director tanya sunkett here's our
virtual format. Be advised, the proceedings are being recorded. The video will be available by
contacting TanyaSunkett at phila.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. I'll leave your email and the address of 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 Sunken. Let's look at our schedule
for this afternoon. Number seven, MI 2021-005-123-931 South 18th Street, this case has been
continue. Are there any other requests for continuance in the audience?
I see no hands. Thank you. Now we're going to go to our no exhibits. So number three,
MI 2023-004-266-1458 North 30th Street. We have no exhibits for this case. This is a pro se.
the applicant is erin herman and kevin bryan is listed as the owner
any hands erin herman if you're in the audience please raise your virtual hand
no hands chair thank you so mi 2023 004 266 1458 north 30 street this case is continued mark must
be heard number four mi 2023 001 810 1327 mcfernan street
renece morris is the owner applicant no exhibits this case's mark must be heard
renece morris if you're in the audience please raise your virtual hand
no hands chair thank you so mi2023 001 810 1327 mcfernan street this case was mark must be heard
i vote to dismiss i'm a solomon my vote is to dismiss james snell my vote is to dismiss
Mr. Chair, this is Hillary. I just want to note for the record on that case, when it was previously listed on October 18th, no exhibits were submitted then and no one appeared.
james snell my vote is to dismiss mr chair
Thank you very much. We appreciate it. So, number nine, MI-2023-0784-1953-LOCUS, number 1F. Sager Kritty is the applicant listed owner. This case has been marked, must be heard.
Mr. Chair, like the prior case, this one was also previously listed on October 18th.
No exhibits were submitted and no one appeared.
Thank you very much.
No hands, Chair.
Thank you.
So MI2023-001784, case was marked, must be heard.
In the past listing, no one appeared.
I vote to dismiss.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is to dismiss.
James Snell, my vote is to dismiss.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is to dismiss.
Thank you.
And number two, MI 2023, 000274, 2630 to 44 Wharton Street, this case has been withdrawn.
We're going to go to number six first.
MI 2023-001-885, 2248 North 2nd Street.
Vern Anastasio is the attorney.
Letter of non-opposition received from Council Member Lozada.
Good evening, Mr. Chair.
Good evening, sir.
Could you mention your—I don't—you didn't have a case.
I didn't get sworn in. I had a case, but I didn't get sworn in.
All right. All right. Could you, just for the record,
mention your name and spell for the court stenographer? Yes, sir. Vern Anastasio,
A-N-A-S-T-A-S-I-O, on behalf of Howard Street
Holdings, LLC, and Mr. Bill Latham.
Right. You swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
I do. Our vice chair
has just a few questions.
Good afternoon, do you agree to read another refusal or stipulate to his accuracy?
I have emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with
this case five days in advance of this hearing.
I have.
Thank you.
Please proceed.
You've already shared your screen.
Thank you, sir.
Mr. Chair, members of the board, the application is for personal services on the first floor.
and seller in the same property with the two-family household living.
And it is 2248 North 2nd Street.
It is currently zoned RSA 5, but my client purchased, renovated, and secured a tenant
for this property when it was not zoned RSA 5, and the zoning changed somewhere during
that process.
And as such, he now is forced to seek a variance for the use.
The tenant, unfortunately, had to move on and get out of the lease.
But my client is committed to occupying the space with an appropriate commercial tenant.
And right here is the interior layout drawn to scale.
And we've got the commercial space right here with the entrance.
as you can see there's an ada bathroom and some bilko doors and a rear yard
on the right hand side you have stairs that go up to the living quarters that have been
already previously approved by the board and here are additional plans for that
here are some photos of the property as you can see clearly commercial space is built out here
on the left and on the right is the um residential units entrance
and we also have interior photos as well and the architect was kind enough to put in an aerial view
we did meet with the north square folks there's proof of uh mailing and we have proof of posting
And I believe as Mr. Chair said,
the Norrisquare folks did give,
send us a letter of support and as such,
And as such, we were able to get a letter of non-opposition from the council member late last week.
we were able to get a letter of non-opposition from.
And here's proof that the commercial use was already permitted.
Of course, the rezoning notwithstanding, I do want to make sure that these two documents,
page 20 and 21, are both entered into evidence, along with the council member's letter of
non-opposition, showing clearly that it's for a vacant commercial space on the ground floor
with the two-family household living above. And then, of course, the rezoning happened
in conjunction with the council office. So the fact that the council office is now supporting
the variance, speaks to the fact that my client would suffer a significant hardship if he were
not able to complete what he started, which was purchase, renovate, and secure a lease for a
commercial mixed-use property. For all of those reasons, I respectfully request the variance.
With that, I'd like Mr. Bill Latham to raise his virtual hand.
bill lathen has been allowed to speak mr lathen could you state your name please and spell for
the court stenographer yeah it's uh bill lappen l-a-p-h-e-n right do you swear or affirm to tell
the truth the whole truth nothing but the truth i do please proceed counsel thank you mr chair
mr lappen did you hear my presentation to the board this evening yes is it true and accurate
to the best of your knowledge yes and you adopt it as your own testimony yes thank you sir i have
nothing further mr chair any questions from the board no mr chairman no mr chairman no mr chairman
questions or comments from our attorney hillary emerson not at this time mr chair questions or
comments from the virtual audience i see no hands planning commission uh ron bednar city planning
first name ron r-o-n last name bednar b-e-d-n-a-r you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole
truth nothing but the truth i do please proceed while this property is currently indicated for
residential use on a city plan prior to 2021 rezoning uh we recommended a change to multifamily
residential at this location given the physical conditions of the site the requested personal
business service uh um application would be the least impactful permit allowed therefore we
recommend the request for aspirin i 20 23 001 885 22 48 north second street i vote yes
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes
James Snell, my vote is yes
Thank you, counsel
Thank you
We're going to move to number 8
MI 2021
004-460
Nidro Avenue
Mary Rose Roach is the
Attorney
Two RCO letters plus the position from Council Member Bass.
Hi, could you unmute, please?
Hi, could you state your name, please, and spell for the court stenographer?
Yes, my name is Mary Rose Roach.
First name, M-A-R-I-R-O-S-E.
Last name, Roach.
R-O-A-C-H.
Do you swear a firm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client in relationship to the property?
Yes, my client's name is Yolaine Leone, and she is the owner and applicant.
Our vice chair has just a few questions.
Good afternoon, counsel.
Do you agree to waive the ruling of the refusal or stipulate to exact proceeding?
Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, I have. And there was one supplemental document, which was the non-opposition letter.
Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen.
Okay. I'm sharing it now. Are you able to see it?
It's up. We're good.
Okay. So, as stated, my client is Yolaine Leone.
What I've submitted to the zoning board was the refusal, photos of the property, the project information sheet, a copy of the deed, tax compliance, the mailing list for the RCO meeting, and photos of the posting on the property.
And photos of the posting on the property.
One of the administrative things I like to get out of the way, as you'll see on the refusal, the parcel owner was listed as Gaston Pierre.
The deed that I have attached to my application will show that my client purchased the property in July of 2023.
And she's been granted the ability to proceed with this zoning application.
As we proceed down through, I did provide, well, first and foremost, the issue with this property is there was a refusal. It is a RS5 single-family district.
She's requesting that the property be used as a two-unit dwelling.
When she purchased the property, it was used as a two-unit dwelling and later found out that there was a zoning appeal pending and that she would need to continue with the zoning appeal to be able to use the property as purchased.
So here is the first floor living room area.
She is working on doing non-structural renovations, paint, new appliances, things like that to the property.
If she gets the herbarian's request granted, she plans on doing the cosmetic renovations before renting it out.
So the interior pictures.
and here are the exterior pictures as stated it is a um situated on a single family um
overlay district a lot of properties on her block are multi-family units
there's parking in the back as well as parking in the front on the street
um trash is picked up in the back and the tenants would be able to use the um trash cans um
here or new trash cans they would have to bring them or make sure that the trash is in the back
for pickup
counsel then utilities are the utilities already separated so yes as far as i know the property
was used as a two-unit property before she purchased it.
Okay, thank you.
Yep, that's, yeah.
This is just, let's see it in here.
So this is the current deed that shows
that Ms. Leone is the property owner
and it was purchased in July of 2023.
The tax clearance.
This is the certification of mailing for the zoning, or sorry, the RCO meeting.
And finally, there is postings on the property that were done both on the property as well as the fence.
The property is set back far from the street, so we also posted on the fence.
And we also did posting on the back of the property as well.
And this is the non-opposition letter from the RCO meeting that was held with her local district, the Oak Lane Worcester RCO.
I would like to promote my client, Yolaine Leone, to adopt my testimony.
they have been allowed to speak.
Hi, could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
Yolaine, please unmute yourself.
Hello?
Can you hear me?
I can.
Could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
My name is Yolaine Leone, Y-O-L-A-I-N-E, Leone, L-E-O-N.
Right.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, counsel.
Ms. Leone, were you able to hear and see what was presented today at the ZBA hearing?
Yes, I was.
In relation to your property, 1508 West Avenue, 1508.
yes thank you um and do you adopt all that was presented as true and accurate yes okay
questions from the board no mr chairman
Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
No, Chair.
No, Chair.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Emerson?
Just briefly, Mr. Chair,
excuse me, I just want to note that we also received a letter from
an affected RCO, a Concerned Community Association.
They asked for a proviso that trash be stored in the rear of the property.
um i also want to note that councilman bath is leaving this decision to the board um because
there was um there was a slight disagreement in the rc between the rcos in their position
and there were also no near neighbors at the rco meeting thank you
questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands planning commission so ron bednar city planning
property is indicated for residential use on a city plan or adopted district plan.
Peton recommends no change to the existing zoning at this location.
The applicant's hardship was self-created, not supported with evidence of unique physical
circumstances or condition of property that would prevent it from being used informally
with the requirements of the code, for we recommend the request of various documents.
MI 2021-004-460-1508-WestNedro, I vote yes with Proviso, Trash Door to New York.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes with Proviso.
James Snell, my vote is yes with Proviso.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes with Proviso.
Thank you.
Number one, MI 2023-000839-2349, East Allegheny Avenue.
Sean Ward is the attorney.
We're waiting for an RCO letter, but there is a letter from Council Member Driscoll in support of the project.
Sean Ward is coming in as a panelist.
Mr. Ward, I'm back.
Could you just state your name for the record?
You've already been sworn.
Thank you.
My first name is Sean, S-H-A-W-N, last name Ward, W-A-R-D,
Council for Haki, H-A-K-I, Colacu, C-O-L-L-A-K-U, property owner.
The vice chair has just a few questions for you, sir.
Good afternoon, Councilor.
Do you agree to wait to read another refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
Yes, I do.
Have you emailed in all the required documents that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, I have.
Thank you, Councilor.
please proceed. Mr. Chairman, attached is my typical exhibit packet, which was submitted to
the board. Again, I represent Aki Kalaku, owner of the property at 2349 East Algany Avenue,
calendar number ending in 839. This is a permit for a residential dwelling at the first floor
of a two-story structure. Currently, there is an apartment on the second floor, two-bedroom,
and a vacant commercial office space on the first floor. So we're looking for a variance for a total
of two apartments, not permitted in RSA 5. Therefore, we require a variance. That was A1,
the notice of refusal. A2 is the ZBA application of appeal. A3 is the project information form,
A4 proof of ownership, A5 proof of tax clearance. A6 is a site location map, A7 are photographs.
A8 is the letter of unanimous support from PROPAC.
A9 is a letter from Councilman Mike Driscoll in support of the application.
In addition, I submitted today also a letter from Councilman Squilla, who is the adjoining district located directly across the street on Allegheny Avenue.
With regard to the relevant zoning history, in 2018, we appeared before the board and we were granted a variance for a real estate office at the first floor, together with that existing apartment above.
Unfortunately, the commercial use has not panned out for the property owner.
And at this time, he seeks a variance to convert the first floor commercial space into a dwelling unit.
A11 is the zoning map and A12 is the photograph.
I would support that. This is a mixed use block on Aramingo Avenue. There are several commercial spaces at the first floor with apartments above, and there are several two families.
Commercial spaces at the first floor were departments above, and there are several two family dwellings along the block.
So very quickly, we have our notice of refusal, the petition of appeal, our project information form,
my transmittal letter to the board filing the appeal, copy of his deed, obtained a property June of 2017.
we also have proof of tax compliance the taxes for this year are not due till the end of the
month as the board is well aware so we're currently tax compliant again this property
is located at the northeast corner of Allegheny and Aramingo it is a each each floor has its own
entrance one for the first floor and one for the second floor again it's a mixed-use block along
Allegheny Avenue. There are several commercial units at the first floor of at least three or
four of the structures. The rest appear to be two family dwellings. This is a street view facing
westbound on Allegheny Avenue. The subject property is located to the right. Here is a
view facing eastbound on Allegheny. Property is situate to the left. This is the letter from
ProPAC. As you can see, it was unanimous support, 17 to nothing in support. Here's a copy of
Councilman Driscoll's letter of support. A copy of the zoning permit from 2018. As you can see,
the board granted the variance, a calendar 32115 on January 17th, 2018 for a real estate
management office and a single family dwelling at the second floor. Again, this is the archived
documents associated with that permit, copy of the Notice of Decision. I presented that case to
the board back in 2018, granted. Additionally, we have the Councilman at Driscoll's letter,
councilman uh school is letter of support
the rco notice went out on january 30th of 2024 that was sent to
the addresses on the list provided by the planning commission and we asked the
i'm sorry hang on a second uh certificate of mailing with 141 addresses uh pursuant to that
list. Based upon the following, I would ask that the board grant the variance. Mr. Kalkou is
currently in Albania. He thought he was coming back today, but he didn't make it. I guess his
flight got delayed. So as an officer of the court, I would submit that he has reviewed the exhibit
packet and that if called to testify, he would verify and adopt my representations as true and
correct and that they are his own testimony. Thank you. Hillary, do we have that PRO PAC letter?
yes no yes we do have it now yes all right good thank you very much um questions from the board
no mr chairman no chair
no chair questions or comments from our attorney hillary emerson
not at this time mr chair questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands planning commission it's a run bed in our city planning
this property is currently indicated for residential use city plan given a documented
site history and the physical conditions we we have no objection to the granting of the variants
because the variance maximum two units only mi2023 000 839 2349 east allegheny avenue
I vote yes with proviso, maximum two units.
Thomas Holloman, my vote is yes with proviso.
James Snell, my vote is yes with proviso.
Ishmael Shaheed, my vote is yes with proviso.
Thank you, counsel.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Okay, thank you.
Number five, Thomas Holloman is recused from this case.
So number five is MI 2023-001-904-1201-203 Princeton Avenue. Darlene III is the attorney. The RCO is in support of this project.
Good morning, Commissioners. Darlene III on behalf of the applicant.
Could you please spell your name for the court stenographer?
Darlene, D-A-R-L-E-N-E, Threat, T as in Thomas, H-R-E-A-T-T.
H-R-E-A-T-T.
All right.
All right.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Do you swear or affirm to tell the...
Could you identify your client and relationship to the property?
My client is on the line.
Her name is Marisol Suarez.
Our vice chair has a few questions.
Good afternoon, counsel.
Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal or stipulate to its accuracy?
No, I don't think the refusal in this particular case is accurate today.
All right. Have you emailed in all the required documents and exhibits that is needed to proceed with this case five days in advance of this hearing?
Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen.
are you able to see my screen
yes thank you commissioners I represent the owner of 1201 to 1203 Princeton Avenue
I've submitted a package of information that contains 14 exhibits I won't go through every
exhibit, but I would like to start with taking a look at the refusal. This refusal indicates that
we were refused for a four-family dwelling, as well as business and professional use. I would
like to inform the board that this property has been a legal four-family dwelling since 1981.
one uh let me just here's the exhibit in particular we were legal at this time for a
four-family dwelling uh with a superintendent apartment and the office on the ground floor
today i am just trying to change the ground floor use to total office on no apartment and just to
show you that this has been legal and a legal use. We do currently
have a valid rental license, which expires
in April for a full family dwelling for this
location, 1201 Princeton Avenue.
Commissioners, my client currently operates a realty office on Rising Sun Avenue.
She's been operating this office for many, many years, and at this
time, she's ready to downsize towards retirement.
In that vein, she would like to zone her other property here, which I just showed you the zoning archive information, to just have a plain office use on the first floor, as opposed to what the prior zoning was, was an office use plus a superintendent apartment.
We like to get rid of the superintendent apartment that's located on the first floor currently and just use the first floor for office use for a real estate office.
As you can see in this picture here, here is the posting that we did in preparation for the hearing.
I'll show you a couple more just pictures of the property.
That's a side posting of the property.
Here's the poster right there.
I don't know if you can see it that well.
But this is Somerdale Avenue here, and the main street over here is Princeton.
As you can see, the backyard is fenced in, and this is where the tenants store the trash until trash date, and then we sit it out there.
I just want to show you the interior pictures of the apartment.
I mean, as you can see, we have four electrical units here plus a unit for the common areas.
That's just another picture of a similar property on the street.
And I just wanted to show you another similar property on these streets.
Many of the rear floors on Somerdale Avenue, especially the corner properties, currently have businesses in them.
I show you the picture to let you know that what we're attempting to do here is what's common in this area and what's done to have businesses on the first floor or ground floor, as we would say.
Commissioner, here's a copy of the plan.
I'm just going to enlarge it a little bit for you.
So this is the current, excuse me, this is the current makeup of the property.
You would really come into the property off of Somerdale Avenue.
Previously, we had a bedroom here.
There was a garage here.
There was a room here, and there was a room here.
And that was for the apartment, and we had two bathrooms and a powder room.
and that was for the apartment, and we had two bathrooms and a powder room.
What we attempt to do, what we would like to do here now, is just have a regular office.
We'll have an office space over this side.
We'll have office space here, office space here,
and we'll keep the kitchen and the bathrooms in the property as they are now.
It's just another look at the front of the property.
This is where the tenants enter the building.
They can walk up the stairs to their various apartments.
As you can see for the rental office, there's a side door here that will be used.
This is also a side door, but it won't be used for the office.
This will be the entrance to the real estate office that we're proposing here.
Just other various pictures of the property to show you what it looks like.
That's the front entrance where the tenants walk up the stairs.
Similar property in the neighborhood with a ground floor business.
And then I just took some interior photos for you so you can see it's not moving.
That's currently what the interior of the building looked like.
We have some empty space, some empty space that we plan to renovate.
That was part of the
super's apartment that
prior use.
It's another
interior bathroom. Commissioners,
we did notice the community and we
actually had two meetings. We met at the property initially with community on the rise. Then we
sent out this letter for an actual in-person community meeting. We had a community meeting
on March 1st at 6601 Rutland Street. Here's the notice of proof of mailing the certificate. We
We mailed the certificate out to 72 individuals provided by City Planning.
We did get a letter of support from Community on the Rise.
We also got a summary sheet of the voting.
I believe everybody who was actually in attendance at the meeting supported the application.
There were 23 individuals, I don't know that they were all at the meeting.
there were some call-ins. And then we had the tenant actually circulate a petition on the
actual block. And as you can see, many, many of the neighbors on this block had no objection to
the converting of a full real estate office as opposed to just a office there. And with that,
commissioners, I'm here to answer any questions that you may have about this application.
Is your client here?
I'm sure she is.
Marisol, can you raise your hand, please?
Marisol has been allowed to speak.
Marisol, could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
My name is Marisol Sierra now.
I got divorced, so I owned the building for many years, 20 years.
Could you please spell your name for the stenographer?
M-A-R-I-S-O-L, last name S-S-N-S-M-I-E-R-R-A.
You swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, counsel.
So are you the owner of 1201 Princeton Avenue?
Yes, I am.
Is it your intention to operate your real estate office there?
Yes, I am.
Yes, I do.
And have you heard the testimony
That I've given to the board today
And if you were required to testify
Would you be able to adopt my testimony
That's all I have Commissioner
Questions from the board
No Chair
Thomas
He's recused from this one
But no Chair
Are you for this ish?
Well, we're not voting, Mr. Chair.
Well, we're not voting, Mr.
Chair.
You asked a question.
You asked the question.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
Questions or comments from Hilary Emerson?
Just a quick question for Ms. 3.
Is there any parking at the property?
Did she freeze?
I think she froze.
There's parking in the back in the gated area with the fences.
How many spaces are there?
yes i can hear you now how many i believe there are two parking spaces behind the property
okay so i i think the refusal because um in rta one you're supposed to have one for one parking
and then with a commercial use um one space per 1 000 square feet if there is a thousand square
feet of commercial there um so i i think there was a missed refusal for um at least two if not
three parking spaces okay so that's why they
okay and i just i just wanted to put that on the record so if the board if the board grants today
then that will be incorporated but i just wanted to make a note of that
questions or comments from the virtual audience
i see no hands planning commission so ron bend our city planning while this property is currently
indicated for residential use on the city plan given sites physical conditions we have no
objection to the going on first hillary so when we vote on this hillary include uh this covers also
lack of parking you don't need to do that because that would need to be reviewed by l and i to
determine exactly the
nature of the variance. I'm just putting it on the
record that was reviewed
and discussed. Thank you.
So, MI2023
1201 203
Princeton Avenue, I vote yes.
James Snell, my vote is yes.
Ishmael Shahi,
my vote is yes. Thank you,
Counsel. Thank you very much, Commissioners.
okay is there anyone who had a case on the 330 list that the case has not been called
i see no hands um thanks everyone we we uh we got a lot of work done today if you look we
we cleared up we did 12 add-ons besides the regular list we had so i appreciate what everybody
did and i think we moved along really well today thank you great job chair yes great job everyone
thank you all
thank you court reporter have a great night
thank you all you as well thank you thank you good night
good night