Specifically about the governmental facility that you cannot have any type of coverings
restricted to their sight line? Yes. As well as the PICO power lines that hover over your facility?
Yes, thank you questions from the board.
So there's no way for you to do the usual kind of landscaping that we're talking about, like even like shrubs and things like that.
is that that that is correct because uh and i can go through the site plan again but it's a dedicated
133 parking spaces that's been there for over 40 years it's been cooked this way for 40 years where
there's dry vials and if we changed it up in any way it would be like for instance if we put the
shrubs in front of the like the parking spots right and that wouldn't hover over in the sight
line we're going to have to push those cars back which would affect the viability of that two lane
uh parking uh aisle got you so okay all right thank you
questions or comments from our attorney philary emerson not at this time mr chair questions or
comments from the audience or the virtual audience no hands at this time chair planning commission
amy boat with the planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends no change in
zoning to the current i2 medium industrial the proposal is part of a legalizing a parking lot
that precedes the landscape code the application is subject to the landscape entry code in a
situation where it is not feasible to comply with the code the planning commission staff
would consider a waiver from the required landscaping if a fee in lieu is provided
For this application, it is calculated at 31 trees for $31,000 fee-in-lieu, which would otherwise go to Parks and Recreation for the tree fund.
The appellant shows not to seek a waiver for the planting requirement, which is considered fee avoidance.
The Planning Commission has no objection to the Board granting the requested variances for perimeter screening interior landscape.
Thank you. MI 2025-006268-6204-208, Oxford Avenue. I vote yes.
michael johns my vote is yes cheryl gaston my vote is yes tenetta graham my vote is yes ryan
mcadams my vote is yes tyia wood my vote is yes thank you sir thank you i'm staying here yeah yeah
okay that's good okay one more right yes i do right mi2025-006-277-907 north 43rd street
alan knockamson is the attorney mr knockamson could you please state your name it's spelled
for the stenographer alan oh i'm sorry you you've done that yeah alan right and mr knockamson could
you identify your client and tell us the relationship to the property oh yeah my client
is still left of me phil felix okolo the owner of the property right and i i see that uh there's a
letter of support from west belmont civic association six in support five in opposition two near neighbors
okay thank you thank you please uh oh our vice chair has just a few questions yes
good evening again have you submitted your documents and exhibits five days in advance of
this hearing yes we have okay and do you waive the reading of the refusal and stipulate to its
accuracy i do not stipulate to this accuracy but we cleaned it up a little bit there's a
mislabeling of one the refusals talks about the front setback. We are providing the required setback of eight feet, but we did do revised plans to kind of, you know, highlight, I think it was just unclear from the revised plans. So we up, we gave
you know highlight i think it was just unclear from the revised plans so we up we gave revised
plans hopefully now it's clear that's an eight foot uh front setback when you say eight foot
do you mean a third floor or no no it's just we had to be in line with the building structure
okay yeah so it was mis misinterpreted so but we did it by revised plans okay that's fine
Thank you. Thank you. You can show your screen and proceed with your case.
All right. Thank you.
All right. So my client purchased this property as an RM1 property, hoping to put a triplex here.
The zoning changed on them, and that's why really we're here today.
And it's not out of character to have triplexes here.
YOU'LL SEE THAT THERE'S ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR, FIVE TRIPLEXES ON THIS BLOCK, YOU KNOW, AND WE'RE CLOSE TO A COMMERCIAL CORRIDURE ON LANDCATES OF AVENUE.
SO THERE'S ONLY ONE REFUSAL HERE. IT DEALS WITH THE USE OF THIS, YOU KNOW, SEEKING A THREE FAMILY DWELLING. AS I INDICATED, THE OTHER ONE WAS A MISINTERPRETATION OF OUR DRAWINGS.
SO WE DID GET A LETTER OF SUPPORT FROM THE COMMUNITY.
and then here's our revised plans and it says plan revised to clarify matching front setback
with adjacent property and then here are nearby triplexes and i'm just going to click through but
9 40 903 9 13 9 17 and 9 50 uh north 43rd street are all triplexes according to public record
Now, there was a bill introduced in 2023 to change the zoning on my client from RM1 to RSA5.
You know, he purchased this property depending on the fact that this was going to be a triplex, or he was going to be allowed to do this as of right.
So you can see here it was originally RM1.
They changed the zoning to RSA5.
Aerial view, there are nine vacant lots on his side of the street.
You know, we're hoping to encourage development through this triplex use.
Again, we're not that far off from Lancaster Avenue, and there is mixed zoning all around both CMX2 and RM1.
And then photographs of the property. Right now it's a vacant lot.
This is the property in 2009 before my client owned it.
you can see it's been it has a pretty rough history here this is our proof of our posting
for today's hearing north 43rd street to the right of the property to the left of the property
our plans and drawings we're three feet out of the ground just you know so you indicate
and then here you can see how we're matching the property to the left of us from the front setback
let's just go to the floor plans so you walk in there's a common vegetable area make a right
This is unit number one, where there's a living room, a kitchen, for light and air, there's an opening here to allow for that, a bathroom, and then the bedroom, and that person does have access to a lower level.
Instead of unit number one, you go up a flight of steps to unit number two.
There are two bedrooms, one here, one here.
There's a full bath.
There's the kitchen area, and here's the living room area.
And the same thing is on the third floor as well. And then there's a roof deck. The second and third floor units have a trash room right here, like a ventilated trash room. And then the first floor unit has the rear yard to store trash. My client would agree to provide some commercial trash pickup.
again we met with the community on january 14th 2026 at 6 p.m proof of mailing of that of that
notice went to the to the coordinating rco and other relevant parties a few weeks beforehand
significant amount of addresses were notified proof of mailing to those addresses our application
for appeal on behalf of 907 and 43rd llc i think originally i said my own the owner of the
property is philix occolo he is its member so he owns in the corporate capacity
feed to the property showing that 907 and 43rd llc is the owner of the property
and you can see he purchased the property in 2021 before the change in zoning
and then a certificate of tax clearance that those monies are not due yet again most importantly here
this would be a buy right project under the previous zoning classification through no fault
of my client um you know the zoning changed on him and now we're here today to ask for a variance
alan was that a new property next door uh i'll defer multiple units
Alan, was that a new property next door?
I'll defer
multiple units.
I'll defer to Mr. Okolo.
Sir, could you please state your name?
It's spelled for the sonographer.
My name is Felix Okolo.
F-E-L-I-X-O-K-O-L-O.
Right.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth,
the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Yes, I do.
Just sit a little closer to the mic.
Yes, I do.
Thank you.
Counsel?
Before I ask you the three questions,
the chairman had a question is there a new construction project next door to you yes there
is there is a three building which is pretty new right at the corner of that is it multiple units
yes how many units it is three units okay go ahead yeah so i don't know which one it is but
there's 940 903 913 917 and 950 is that one of them yes it's just two yeah you can see the new
signing that was next to your house yeah i'd say no which address all right okay uh you heard
everything i had to state today about your zoning matter yes yes i do uh and is it true and correct
that's correct yes and do you adopt this your own testimony yes i do thank you
questions from the board alan can you show the facade again and is there any is the drawing
doesn't show the adjacent property at 909 i guess i the one thing i saw was like you should
show the sign and i saw new siding next to it that's at 903 so okay and then there's a vacant
i think my i mean i understand that the setback i think my concern is that this immediate block
is mostly two-story single-family houses yes there's the three-story at the corner um and i
there's a few other newer builds in the block that have a step back at the third floor that's
actually not visible from the second floor and this is now going to be the only one in that line
that if aligns with those facades that has a third story um and i just wanted to understand
like how is your porch aligned with the one next to it i think it aligns you mean in terms of the
depth or i'm trying to understand i'm thinking height height and where it sits in the site plan
okay let me see the site plan let's see all right so how's it i think just want to make sure i think
our porch aligns with their porch um is it the intention is to align yes it's going to be on
the same line with the adjustment building yeah and just so he's a very experienced developer
and you're also a contractor too right that's correct yeah so i'm going to defer to him to
answer any questions can you just pull the drum i mean yeah i was just trying to make it yeah no
down up the other way yeah this way other way keep moving up so that i can see the front of the
building i'm for you you want to move it up okay just keep like this the other way
all right there's not much more room left this is what i needed okay thank you okay
but your intention is to line them up it's hard to it's hard to tell it's hard to tell
on the elevation that there's a setback above the second floor i mean this says roof and patio
but on the elevation it doesn't really it's hard to tell well the setback i think is not the roof
itself it's it's the it's the setback that you i i so my reading of the refusal was that the
buildings had to to line up um on the on the well the refusal was indicating that they weren't lined
up um at the the ground floor um not that there needed to be a eight foot setback above the second
floor because the one of the adjacent structures has three stories so it wouldn't need an eight
put set back okay either of the adjacent properties so this is the three-story there's a
there in the there's a picture it's two it's two doors there it's there's a vacant lot in between
i was tutor right so it's not so right it's right 905 is a vacant lot forward of everything on the
block but it's on the corner so like this is going to be the first three-story structure
that sits back with the two-story structures so i think like just personally like from a
block facade i would like to see the porches align and i would like to see a setback at the
third story it's not required but right yeah no it says the lot is vacant next door then that
doesn't trigger the requirement the the issue if you set back on the third story then it goes to
one bedroom yes it does which i understand and and i do think it would look better my personal
and and i do think it would look better my personal opinion is it would look better there's
opinion is it would look better there's two others already
two others already on that block and it's holding the facade line and the rest of the block looks
really neat even with the ones that are multi-family because of that setback this is going to be the
first one to break that well there's nine vacant lots on our side actually not on your side because
they most of them have been filled and there's one it's this one and the one next to it okay
am i not correct i let's go with two two more okay yeah it's two the other two got filled in
they all got filled in with the building i'm saying okay i'm just going based on the picture
that was provided i yeah no um no she's right they've all been filled in they've all been
filled in all right but felix in terms of the viability of this project would it be viable
to basically take a two-bedroom unit to a one-bedroom unit.
I don't know it will not.
Two-bedroom is definitely more viable.
And again, just looking at the hardship here,
like we were looking to do this as a three-unit at Byright building.
And unfortunately, the zoning changed on us.
It's not like we're trying.
It happens, but like it's unfortunate.
And, you know, he purchased this property as an RM1 property. So any type of deviation, and we're not trying to be greedy here. We're not seeking any dimensional variances here. So under those circumstances, we would, you know, request that the board to consider that as part of the calculation of deciding whether to grant the zoning variance.
and could you explain a little bit about the opposition from the at the community meeting
yeah they were just against anything they're i mean literally they were like we just don't want
any multi-family here and um we explained like i i hear you and this would be a different
conversation if this was an rsa5 property that we purchased but when it turns from rm1 to rsa5
that's a a real punch in the gut you know and and to have to wait like six months to go through this
process and the expense and and the uncertainty especially in these times where it's expensive
you know to build and and is your height 38 feet uh our height is 33 feet 33 feet okay yeah so we're
not trying with the roof deck well the roof deck is not quite it's from the roof line and then you
know i would assume that the pilot house which is probably another nine feet maybe 10 i don't think
it is but i think it's nine so no what's what's the what's the basement which would what is the
basement what's what are you using for the basement it's just you go back to the plant yeah
yeah it's we're three feet out of the ground oops and it's just open down there there's a
laundry down there for the for the tenant and utilities but there's nothing really else built
down there okay are there any of those so is it going to be finished or unfinished
uh it's going to be is it going to be finished or unfinished it's going to be unfinished okay
unfinished okay and are there any other roof decks i can't speak to that it sounds like
maybe you have updated drawings which i would estimate guesstimate that there are roof decks
um you know board member win is is nodding in an affirmative fashion so i believe there would be
but i'm gonna they built the other new ones but they're back no the other new ones the other ones
let's let's let's yeah but they don't they don't have roof decks but they don't have roof decks i'm
looking at zoom google rather why don't we take a look at this i mean so first two floors two
bedroom apartments on each floor uh no for uh unit number one is a one one because a one bedroom one
bath right and then unit two is a two bedroom one bath but the third floor if you set it back you'd
have a one bedroom unit yes and that's you can't make it with that i mean you're only taking one
bedroom off this well i'm just considering that look up look i see you smile a little bit i see
smile a little bit come on now okay so i was constantly like uh he said here when when the
project was bought actually borrowed because it was by right zoning right i got it but now we're
at this situation we are and i think you could have a project if you have a one bedroom or a
third floor i mean and there's there's no doubt in my mind you can make that a problem it's also
because of the cost of construction is going to cost a lot more money compared to what is going
to be it's going to cost a lot more money just with one bedroom yeah yes because the one bedroom
is a lot of difference when it comes to i think he's saying in relative like given the cost of
construction all right the numbers are not going to work you know um i don't think it's much cheaper
to just set it back um in terms of construction too i don't think it's gonna and but the issue here
um in terms of construction too i don't think it's gonna and but the issue here is the viability of
the income stream yeah i understand that yeah yeah i think that's that's the tough part well
i mean if you look at your if you look at your plan you know you've got a and compared to the
other second and third floor you've got a fairly large one bedroom on the first floor it could be
reconfigured as a two bedroom and you can set this third floor back and have the one bedroom
room on the third floor as opposed to the first floor and the units would be comparable in size