i have up on the screen exhibit eight to give you a better sense of the location of this particular
property as you can see here on the north view looking in a north direction it shows that this
block is predominantly made up of semi-detached twin homes and again if i scroll down
why did this zoom in on me
if i scroll down further looking in the opposite direction again you can see the
the makeup of this block is really characteristic cedar park twin detached homes semi-detached
at exhibit seven i have the zoning map which shows that the property in the surrounding area
are predominantly zoned rsa3 in this area
at exhibit 15 i have photographs of the property
and i'll walk through showing the well-maintained property that again is a really characteristic
brick twin structure that is very common to this area of West Philadelphia. There are three current
units that are in this building, all three of which are bi-level. I'll bring up the floor plans
in a moment, but as you'll see, the unit in question occupies a portion of the first floor
and the lower level that is more than half above grade. All of these three units are and have been
consistently occupied for the duration of my client's ownership so just to walk you through
the photographs again you can see here on the right hand side you can see one of two access
points to the unit that is in question before the board today and as you'll see in a moment
these stairs lead lead directly into the kitchen in the next photograph
you can see here the inconspicuous shared trash storage location on the side of the building
as well as a photograph from the back of the structure where you can see a well-loved garden
that is maintained by one of the tenants guessing it looks a little bit more lively in the spring
and summer whereas this photograph was taken in the middle of the winter
just to give you a little bit better context again for this area you can see
this the characteristic semi-detached twin structures that line this block up and down
the street and then again this is looking uh towards the property from beaumont street which
intersects the street right in the middle and other than this newer structure right in the
middle you can see most of it is fairly uniform in character and then turning back to the property
itself i've provided two other photographs showing there are three electrical meters
each serving one of the units and then just another view of the front of the property as well
i will turn back in a moment to interior pictures but before i do that i want to walk you through
the floor plans so that you have a sense of what you're actually looking at when we get to the
floor plans. So we will start first. And again, I do have the architect just in case there's any
questions. So I want to start in reverse here and work our way down instead of up. So starting with
unit two you can see unit two labeled here this unit is an existing 1 000 square foot unit
the existing living and kitchen areas are in the front of the property on the second floor
with the bedrooms occupying the entire third floor of unit two
moving to unit three unit three is an existing 957 square foot unit with the bedrooms occupying
the back half of the second floor and then if I move down again you can see that the kitchen
living area and there's even an additional work room that are in the first floor in the rear
and again as a reminder these two units are not the ones that are before the board today
there are these two units have been documented for quite some time
the unit that has been lost through permitting is the unit that was occupied by the former owner
which is unit one so this unit is uh just over 800 square feet
and you can see that it is like the rest a bi-level uh unit that has living space on the
and you can see that it is like the rest a bi-level uh unit
first floor and then the rest of this unit is on the lower level which again has an existing
kitchen and dining area as well as uh two bedrooms
there is also an unfinished attic in this building and there is a plan of that as well
we did also include sections just to give you a sense of the the grade of this building and again
you can see here that the that lower level really functions uh as the the first floor it is
predominantly above grade here with that set of stairs that you saw in the photographs and again
there's a couple of different sections uh that we that we can walk through if that would be helpful
so now that you have the context from the floor plans i'll walk back through the interior photographs
so that you can see the unit a little bit more clearly let me just make sure okay yeah so this
is the first one so uh to the left here is uh bathroom and laundry to the right is that first
floor living space so this is looking out to uh south 49th street if you walk out this door you
then are right at the door to the front door and then if we flip in the opposite direction
on the next photograph this is the hallway that then leads down to the steps
the next photograph is walking down the steps and then uh this is showing one of the bedrooms at a
POINT WHEN IT WAS UNOCCUPIED BUT I DO ALSO HAVE CURRENT PHOTOGRAPHS SHOWING ITS OCCUPIED CONDITION.
BASED ON GUIDANCE FROM THE ARCHITECT THIS PARTICULAR EGRASS WINDOW DOES NEED TO BE
UPDATED TO MODERN CODE STANDARDS WHEN ANTON APPLIES FOR A CERTIFICATE OF OCCUPANCY.
NEXT YOU CAN SEE THE KITCHEN AND THEN MOVING INTO THE RIGHT IS NOW THE CURRENT CONDITIONS
of this unit showing that it is currently occupied and again this is that first floor living space
and then this is as you're standing in the kitchen looking at that door and then again
to the right would be leading directly out to uh this path that leads directly out to the street
so the kitchen is basically directly behind you in this photograph
Now, regarding the refusal, because the property itself is zoned RSA 3, the application was
refused entirely for the multifamily use, not just for the legalization of the one unit.
RSA 3 would also require one parking space per unit, where the existing conditions, of
course, have none.
At Exhibit 9, I have included the zoning permit history.
again just to try and give you some sense of what i believe might have happened here
and this shows the progression of the unit count uh and should establish at least some sense of
of where we have uh moved into current day so here you can see that in 1937 a variance was
granted for use of this property as four dwelling units if we then fast forward again this is 1937
174 dwelling units and then if we move fast forward to 1979 you can see existing conditions
at the top with the four and then a permit was submitted to reduce it to two units with
one of the units at that point being identified as the owner's apartment now history on this
property was maintained essentially until the 80s and now even as of the 80s you can
SEE THAT IN TERMS OF THE PHYSICAL CONDITIONS, I DO HAVE ANOTHER PERMIT HERE, EVEN AS OF THE 80s,
YOU CAN SEE THAT THAT STAIRWELL WAS ALREADY IN EXISTENCE AS OF THAT POINT.
AND THEN IF WE MOVE TO THE NEXT AVAILABLE PERMIT HISTORY, A CLEAR DISCREPANCY EMERGES,
WHERE YOU CAN SEE THAT IN 2003, A RENTAL LICENSE WAS OBTAINED FOR TWO UNITS.
However, at that point, the former owner was still living in one of these units, and no rental license would have been required for the owner-occupied unit.
This rental license was maintained until 2015 when my client purchased the property, and then he took over the licensing as well.
Now, aside from the permit history and the physical conditions, the property itself also suffers a clear hardship in that it has never, based on all of the history, maintained a single family use.
in that it has never based on all of the history maintained a single-family use and we would argue
that the photographs and physical conditions make it clear that this layout has existed for many
decades each of the three units are large and have been consistently occupied at least during Anton's
ownership but even before that I did also include here an appraisal that was done shortly after the
anton purchased the property again just to show that even at that point in time
i'll bring up below even as of that time it was a triplex
noted right here and highlighted and it looks like it was built in 1906.
and then i did also again i won't walk through them but i did include relevant sections of
leases, just to show again that these were occupied very shortly after he purchased,
and that the physical modifications of this property were not done by Anton himself.
It would not only be a considerable hardship to return the structure to a single-family
use given its long-standing multifamily use, but it would be a further hardship to attempt
to convert it to two units which the history shows likely never existed but instead was only
considered two units because of that owner occupied condition even beyond the properties
history itself exhibit 10 shows that the proposal is consistent with the context of the density of
this block which are mostly three and four units with a couple of duplexes and even some five or
six unit properties as well there are only a handful of single-family homes on this block
despite the rsa3 zoning you might also note in terms of one of up one of the other refusals
that not a single one of these properties have off-street parking and the physical conditions
of both this property and all of the others on this block would render it impossible to provide
any parking for the existing units. If the board is interested, I do have several case law
references confirming that it would be unreasonable and not the least minimum variance to request that
a property owner convert a structure back to single-family use after a long history of
multifamily use, nor would it be justifiable to require physical modifications to reduce it by
one unit to render it in compliance with inconsistent permit history this is not a
self-imposed hardship as i did mention and as anton can confirm uh he purchased the property
in its physical condition and is undertaking this process voluntarily to ensure that the property
has all up-to-date permits in place he did initially start this process and hired the
architect shortly after his purchase but life unfortunately got in the way of it being completed
no violations were issued for this use i did also include a memo of law at exhibit 11
confirming that the prop the proposal will not increase congestion harm neighbors
properties or impair light and air and as board chair mentioned did receive a vote of unanimous
non-opposition.
Anton?
Sir, could you please state your name and spell for the Sanofre?
Make sure you're close to the mic.
Anton Gallant, A-N-T-O-N-G-O-L-A-N-T.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Counsel?
Thank you.
Anton, have you heard all of the testimony and evidence that I offered in front of the
board today?
Yes, I did.
Was that testimony true and accurate, and would you adopt it as if you had given it yourself?
And just real quickly, could you just give the board an understanding of how you maintain this property in terms of trash and other maintenance?
So my company does our own maintenance on the properties that we have.
We have several employees that go out and they take care of trash and repairs and so on and so forth.
thank you we're happy to answer any questions questions from the board
questions or comments from our attorney not at this time mr chair questions or comments from the um
the audience
i do not see any hands mr chair planning commission
morning michael gall with the philip city planning commission uh the comprehensive plan recommends
no change to the existing RSA3 residential single-family attached zoning at this location.
There is a documented history of multifamily use in this property dating back to 1937. The proposed
use would not cause undue detriment beyond what might otherwise be expected. Therefore,
the City Planning Commission recommends the Board grant the requested variance for multifamily use.
MI-2025-006591-812-SOUTH-49th-Street. I vote yes.
William Moore- My vote is yes.
William Moore- Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes.
William Moore- Tenetta Graham, my vote is yes.
William Moore- Ryan McAdams, my vote is yes.
William Moore- Ryan, my vote is yes.
William Moore- Thank you.
William Moore- Counsel, I will mention to Ian that you made it within a minute, one minute.
amazing thank you board listen i i aim to please okay was i last again
um i'm starting to see what's going on here this this is years now of me you weren't you weren't
last yesterday is there anyone in the audience whose case has not been called
from the 930 list all right see everybody okay see everyone at 2 p.m. thank
you yeah you can step out that way you can get a little break
she may not come back michael all right right yeah that's right don't do that don't do that
okay everyone good afternoon everyone my name is bill bergman and i will be chairing this meeting
of the philadelphia zoning board of adjustment with me is our board vice chair danetta graham
president mr chairman board secretary cheryl l gaston president mr chair board member
michael johns president mr chairman board member kaya win and our board member ryan mcadams mcadams
is right outside also present is our board attorney hillary emerson our zoning board
director ian haggarty and our board administrator lakesha dandy a recording of this hearing will be
posted on the zba website by participating you consent to be recorded this is an in-person
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across arch street please remain there so that we can account for you let's look at our schedule
Number 6, MI-2025-007-692-1311 South 4th Street.
That case is continued until 8-5-2026 at 2 p.m.
Is there any other requests for continuance?
We're going to go to our add-on list.
No answer.
Raise at the same checks.
number one 2025-007-550-1400 mcnulty road
I vote yes with proviso. Per refusal dated 227-26.
i vote yes with proviso per refusal dated
Michael Johns, my vote is yes with proviso.
Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes with proviso.
Tanetta Graham, my vote is yes with proviso.
Ryan McAdams, my vote is yes with proviso.