COMMUNITY ASSOCIATION, WHICH IS THE COORDINATING RCO FOR THIS MATTER.
What we're trying to do here is simply add a fourth unit for this RM1 property.
We're just slightly below the limits.
This property is owned by Wise Holding Company, LLC, as indicated by the DEED.
Certificate of Tax Clearance, I'm just going to make it a little bit smaller.
It's just easier to navigate some of these documents.
But as you can see, there's no money owed by them.
They are tax compliant.
The notice of refusal, again, we are RM1 property.
We're seeking four dwelling units.
Under the code, we're required to have 1,440 square feet of lot size.
We have 1,376, so we're just slightly short.
Our application for appeal to the Zoning Board of Adjustment requesting approval of this
zoning variance along with the notice of refusal and our project information form.
Maps to the area.
Again, we're not seeking to take an RSA 5 property and make it into multifamily.
We're simply asking, because of the size of the lot, the way it's situated, and giving
the community support to allow us to have one additional unit there.
maps of the area with the google map photographs of the property my client purchased this property
this way it clearly needs some tlc and my client tends to do that photographs to the right of the
property on north 60th street as you can see we have a trolley line here for public transportation
to the left of the property on north 60th street there is a similar situation and i think it is
even referenced in the letter of support there is a nearby multi-family dwelling which is also
four units which is undersized which has a zoning permit at 1243 north 60th street so it's not out
which has a zoning permit at 1243 North 60th Street.
So it's not out of sorts to have such a use on this block,
similarly requesting for units.
Plants and drawings, I'm just going to reduce it just slightly
so we can just quickly walk through the plants and drawings.
But there's a front porch.
We're not changing dimensions of the property at all.
You walk from the porch, there's a vestibule area.
To the left is unit one, which is a bi-level.
You go up a flight of steps, you know, the flight of steps, there's two units on the second floor, units two and unit three, and then unit four is on the third floor.
One of the reasons why I believe we did receive support is that by increasing it to four units, it makes it more affordable for the community.
So our letter of support, just going to increase size here.
but as you can see not one member of the community was against this project they are in support with
the proviso that we provide these fire ladders there i don't know if this is a proviso that's
enforceable but there's these ladders that you can build into the wall which roll down on you know
outside and my client has no objection uh to doing that on the second and third floors excuse me
counselor yeah they're not uh legal oh we've gone in front of that we've gone in front of the board
of building standards similarly for situations like that when that when we talk about sprinkling
the the uh the building or not and one of the remedies that we've come across and that the
board of building standards have allowed us to do is to have these type of ladders so if it's not
code compliant i i do apologize but we have presented this in front of the board of building
standards you appeal for them yes okay i mean i'll look into it and obviously we don't want
to do something that's illegal but i have i have presented you know those similar type of like
situations those ladders that are embedded in the walls
thank you you're welcome so again you can see the letter of support the again they reference this
other properties under similar circumstances there are undersized lots and then just proof
of our notice of refusal the addresses of the 136 properties that we gave notice to the community
meeting and proof of mailing so with that being said i do have brian wise of wise uh holdings
holding company llc on the line who can adopt my testimony and of course we would be more than happy
to answer any questions from the board. So, Mr. Wise, can you virtually raise your hand?
Mr. Wise, you can unmute yourself. You're free to speak.
Good afternoon. Brian Wise from Wise. Hi, Mr. Wise. Can you put your name and address on the
record? Spell your last name and I'll swear you in. Brian Wise, B-R-I-A-N, last name W-I-S-E.
do you swear or affirm to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth yes thank you you may
proceed oh yes um mr wise you heard everything i stated today correct and is it true and correct
yes it is and do you adopt it as your own testimony yes i do i have no further questions
at this time planning commission uh ron bednar city planning this property is currently indicated
for multi-family residential on the city plan given the nearby public transit we
recommend that the request i'm sorry madam this is tanya sunkit yes might we um just check to
make sure the community doesn't wish to testify? I thought I did that. Is there anyone in the
virtual audience who would like to testify? Please raise your hand. I see no hands, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Calendar number 2166-1237 North 60th Street. My vote is yes.
Confessor Plaza, my vote is yes. James Snell, my vote is yes. Thomas Holliman, my vote is no.
Thank you.
Calendar number 2118-1437, Point Breeze Avenue, Parcel A. The attorney is Steve Bertil.
Mr. Burchill is coming back in as a panel okay great
Okay, great.
Good afternoon, Madam Chair.
Hi, Mr. Bertil.
Can you put your name and address on the records by your last name, and I'll swear you in and then ask all the questions.
Absolutely.
Steve Bertil, B-E-R-T-I-L, Claire Harrison, Harvey & Brandsburg, 1835 Market Street, 19103.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its accuracy?
Have you emailed the exhibit packet with proof of ownership, tax compliance, a copy of the refusal or referral, photos and or plans of the property five days in advance of this hearing?
And have you met with the RCO and do you have a letter?
Yes, I have a letter. I'm not sure if it reached Ms. Leto, but I can forward that along. I have a letter of support from the RCO. They circulated an email yesterday. I'm not sure if it reached the board.
Who is the RCO?
Point Breeze Community Development Coalition.
Mr. Berto, I don't believe I received it. If you could forward me a copy at some point.
Thank you. Okay, you may proceed. Thank you very much. I'll start sharing my screen.
Okay, as was stated, my name is Steve Bertil. We're here presenting an appeal for 1437-39
Point Breeze Avenue. I represent the owners and the applicants of this appeal. Lepore Properties
with me I have our architect Ivano D'Angelo and representatives from the owners Tommy Lepore,
which I will call on later after my presentation. As stated, as you can see from here, the property
in question sits along point breeze avenue uh between um along the point breeze avenue corridor
uh the property itself uh is zoned to cmx2 um as the entire corridor is um we're seeking the
erection of a mixed-use structure um for use of ground floor commercial with some commercial
storage in the basement and six dwelling units um along among uh three floors above the ground
for commercial. Just to give everyone context, here's an area of the block and the commercial
quarter we're talking about. The property is currently or received approval for a lot
consolidation. It is one structure. It originally was two, but sometime in the history of the
property, they were combined for one large storefront with residential units above it.
but it still sat on two individual parcels, although it was one structure. And so we
consolidated the structure, and the property itself is going to be demolished due to conditions,
which you'll see in a second, and this is what we're proposing to erect post-demolition.
Again, you'll see here, it's between Reed Street and Dickinson Street,
next door to a vacant parcel. And so just to get a sense of the the current condition of the
property, here's an exterior of the frontage on the property is currently vacant and blighted
with structural issues, hence why it needs to be demolished. And it's in the middle of a commercial
corridor. Here's some additional shots. This is along the sidewalk. As you can see, there's some
foundational cracks down the side. You'll get a better idea of conditions when we get to the
interior. Here's a better shot of it. This is just a shot of Point Breeze Avenue so you get a sense
of the area context with it. As I stated, you can see it's all commercial on the ground floor,
residential up top. And here is a shot. Let's start looking at the interior. As you can see,
at one point it was a commercial uh i believe a sneaker store um as you can see it's vacant
there's um some foundational um water damage structural damage it's not in great shape as you
can see i think part of the reason the community um supports this uh project is because as was
discussed in our multiple meetings, this property at some point is coming down, whether we do it
safely or not. It's either the elements are going to do it or we're going to do it safely. And so
as you can see here, there's sinking on the roof. You'll see structural issues there.
you'll see structural issues there.
Okay, so the refusal that we have is
for the proposed use of the residential,
or excuse me, the density.
At the time of the refusal, we were allowed,
we were permitted three units by right.
We were seeking six.
At the time that we received the refusal,
in fact, two days before,
the law changed and the new calculations for the section that dictates the buy right density
increased our buy right proposal from three units to four units. We are still seeking the six,
which I'll explain in a second, but this is the refusal that we have. Now we did meet with the
community meeting, meet with the community group twice. We met in July and in August.
The community group, as I stated earlier, is the Point Breeze Community Development Coalition.
We had a pretty substantial meeting that generated some actionable and really sort of detailed comments about our proposal, our original proposal and where we are now.
And so just to give you some context, this was the original design.
After our initial meeting, we leave a lot of comments stating that it's too modern,
it doesn't fit within the character of the neighborhood, too much glass, the commercial
space is not highlighted enough as this is a commercial corridor. The community wanted
to see additional three trees, benches, wanted more storage and overall change to the character
and also wanted us to agree to some provisals regarding trash. And so we went back to the
drawing board, took a lot of all, you know, many of the comments, seriously considered them and
made some substantial changes to what we're trying to do. And so, sorry, excuse me.
And so just to give you some additional context, all of these structures here on these photos
are structures along the commercial corridor on this block.
So this was our inspiration for the redesign in conjunction with all of the comments that
we received from community that were very helpful.
and so we ended up as i stated making some substantial changes um here is this zoomed
in enough can you see that it would be helpful if you can make it larger okay
Is that better?
It's great.
Okay, awesome.
So the first section is the basement.
As you can see, we have some commercial storage.
One of the changes that we made is we added interior laundry storage.
We added interior bike storage, which is a request, and then additional residential storage,
but maintaining some storage for the commercial space.
The next section is the ground floor commercial, which is entirely commercial. It's about
1,100 square feet of commercial space. This next section is identical on the second, third,
and fourth floor. As you can see, there's two units per floor. The front unit is about 651
square feet and the rear unit is 581 square feet. This floor plan, as you see here, is identical
on the second, third, and fourth floor.
There is a pilot house, but there is not
a residential roof deck.
The only thing that's up here is mechanical.
So the residents will not have access to the roof.
That was something that we thought
was not in the community's best interest
to have a roof deck for residential
along this commercial corridor.
Let me zoom out a little bit here.
And so, here's the elevations. As you can see here, you'll get a better sense of the rendering.
We redesigned it to match the bays that existed. Smaller windows, we added more brick to match the community's desires.
We changed the street frontage completely to highlight the commercial exclusively with space for canopy design like the rest of the buildings on the block.
The residential entrance is down the side yard.
We added, as I said, rear storage.
We added rear trash storage.
We agreed to private hauling, which will be every other day.
And then we added street trees and benches.
And then we added street trees and benches.
And so here is the redesign.
I'm pleased to say that the community was very receptive
to the redesign that we took their comments to heart.
And you can see that what's highlighted
everything I just discussed on the change to the bay
to match like all the bays that are up and down the block,
the prominence of the commercial space. This is basically on the entire frontage, the additional
street trees, the brick. In addition to that, as I stated, agreeing to the provisal of rear trash
storage, we have an entire area in the rear designated just for the rear dumpsters that
will be brought out through this breezeway for on collection days.
And so I'm pleased to report that in our second meeting after presenting the redesign that
we did we did obtain the support of the community.
We circulated they circulated yesterday this letter of support, which I will circulate
which I will provide to Ms. Saleto and the board
per her request.
And as such, due to what we believe is something
that's designed us in the best interest of the community
that's responsive to community requests and desires,
we believe that the proposed density,
which is our only refusal um is de minimis in nature that the it's not a situation which we
see sometimes when we're trying to cram units someplace that doesn't fit we have two units per