And do you believe that the statements I made to the board are true and correct, to the best of your knowledge?
And would you adopt my testimony as if it was your own today to this board?
Yes, I do.
Thank you.
I have no further questions for him.
Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chairman.
No, Chair.
Questions or comments from our attorney, Hillary Ambers?
Just quickly, and Mr. President, I apologize if you addressed this earlier.
there. The wholesale distribution and storage uses, because it's actually kind of two separate
uses under the code, is there already a permit for that? Are you seeking a separate permit for
that? Because it wasn't included on this application. And I recognize both uses are
by right. So I was just a little bit confused about that. Yes. I know that it's by right.
That specific use was not put on here because it was at the time that I had filed it, I did not
see that as one of the tenants and wasn't able to distinguish it from the business use. But then
seeing that it was a buy right use, I do recognize that that business itself may have to register
some way, but that business itself wouldn't require a variance. Okay. Thank you so much
for the clarification. Thank you. I'll send you a comment from the virtual audience.
good afternoon chairman members of the board alice udovich on behalf of councilman brian o'neill's
office alice just for a record could you spell your name for the stenographer sure it's a-l-i-c-e
last name is u-d-o-v-i-c-h you swear or firm to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but
the truth? I do. Please proceed. The councilman has no objection to the granting of the variance
at this location. Thank you very much for calling us. We appreciate it. Thank you. Is there anyone
else in the audience? Yes, Jack O'Hara. Okay. He's been allowed to speak. Sarah, could you
state your name, please, and spell for the stenographer? Mr. O'Hara?
he's disappeared chair let me see if we see him i'm trying to see if he's going to come
mr o'hara can you raise your hand please
yes he's back chair i will allow him to speak
mr harrah could you please state your name please and spell for the court stenographer
Yes, Jack O'Hara, J-A-C-K-O-A-P-I-F-E-H-A-R-A.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, sir.
We, the community, the RCO, the Greater Boston Civic League, does support the change in use.
our meeting. And this hearing is based on the accuracy of the refusal that was sent to us.
And we did a lot of homework. We did a lot of investigation. There seemed to be a lot of
issues that were unaddressed on the refusal, which is why I added that paragraph. Parking,
you know, operating so long without any permits. I don't know, it's up to 12 businesses operating
out of there, all of them illegally for some time. We just thought an audit, an L&I audit,
was appropriate to have that refusal complete and accurate.
Thank you, Mr. Hire, for calling in. We do appreciate your input.
Thank you, Mr. Hire for calling in.
We do appreciate your input for anyone else in the audience.
There are no more hands to any commission.
Good afternoon, chair members of the board.
This is Greg Walden, planning commission staff.
Comprehensive plan recommends no change to existing medium industrial zoning.
The appellant's property is irregularly shaped, and the proposed use is consistent with documented prior use of the property.
The requested variance seeks to legalize some existing commercial uses.
The City Planning Commission recommends that the Zoning Board grant the variance.
Thank you.
MI 2023-006-511-248 Geiger Road.
I vote yes.
Thomas Holloman
my vote is yes
James Snell my vote is yes
thank you you have your vote sir
thank you thank you members of the board
have a good night
Mr. Chair we're going to switch our order
around because we have a scheduling
issue can we please call
number 13 next
Latona Street thank you
and then we'll go back to number
Number 13, MI 2023-004-875-1633 Latona Street.
Alan Nockmson is the attorney.
There's a letter of opposition from East Point Breeze Neighbors.
Applicant provided petition of support signed by approximately 18 neighbors.
Alan Nockmson is coming back in as a panelist.
Mr. Chair, I also wanted to note for the record that we received a letter of opposition this afternoon
from council president johnson okay thank you proceed sir yes thank you very much thank you
for the accommodation uh alan knockamson and mr knockamson uh could you identify your client
and the relationship with this property yes my client is nate itescue okay um
Mr. Holliman has just a few questions.
Good afternoon, Counselor.
Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal and stimulate to his accuracy?
Yes, I do.
Did you email all the exhibits and documents as required five days in advance to this hearing?
Yes, we have.
Thank you. Please proceed and share your screen.
Thank you.
All right, so I'm here to present 1633 Latona Street. We're seeking a variance to allow this property to be used as visitor accommodations. We're not increasing the density in this property. This is a single family property.
I would like to start off first with the fact that, as the board knows, the City of Philadelphia changed its requirements with regards to visitor accommodations a few years ago.
Mr. Teskew purchased the property prior to that change.
There was a Commonwealth decision, a Commonwealth court decision that recently came down, Johnson v. Pocono Township zoning hearing board under 2024 PA Commonwealth Lexus 46.
It came down this month. And in that decision, the Commonwealth court stated that an existing short-term rental may be considered a legal nonconforming use.
And we believe that that's the case here, where the rules of engagement changed by the city has put in jeopardy a lot of properties in the city of Philadelphia.
So the question is, is like what the board's going to be doing about this. And I understand what they have is to hold these properties under a short leash.
And we have no objection to a temporary variance. And even in the letter of opposition, they stated that they would be accommodating to a letter, excuse me, a temporary variance of three years.
So we'll go over the notice of refusal, the correspondence from the East Point Breeze neighbors, the petition we have.
And by the way, it kind of goes to, you know, what didn't make sense with the community meeting was that the neighbors said that this was a tight knit block and they wanted to keep it as such.
But many of the people who are supportive of this project live in that block, including the property to the left and right of us, both support this project.
So the people that would be most directly impacted are in support of it.
And the one person who was to the right of us where we didn't have him sign a letter prior to the community meeting when he obviously expresses.
him sign a letter prior to the community meeting when he's you know obviously expressed his full
support about it we reached out to him to make sure he signed the letter prior to this hearing
and it's not enough character to have airbnbs in this neighborhood we're not that far off a broad
street there's reason there's rationale behind having airbnbs in neighborhoods because again
not everyone wants a hotel room in center city philadelphia which is expensive and inconvenient
Because many times you have these Airbnbs because you have family over and your place is too small and you want, but you want them nearby.
So, but again, there's not out of character to have Airbnbs in this neighborhood.
We'll then review maps of the area.
Again, we're not changing the density of this property in any way.
We're using it as a single family home.
And, you know, Mr. Teskew not only owns this property, but other several other properties where he paid a significant amount of money expecting to have Airbnbs.
And he's a well-known Airbnb operator, and we'll discuss that. Photographs of the property inside and out. Our plans and drawings. Again, we're not changing the dimensions of this property. We're not changing the use technically. We're just asking to allow us accommodations that if we want to have rentals of less than 30 days, we're able to do so.
So our RCO meeting notice, not very well attended meeting, but we'll go over that as well.
Our application for appeal, our deeds of property, and certificate of tax clearance.
Again, even though Mr. Ritescu owns this as an Airbnb, he's not hiding behind an LLC.
He's putting his personal name.
So like, again, that's also an issue with a lot of community groups are like, well, we don't know who we're dealing with.
Mr. Ritescu is a known quantity.
That's why he got support by nearby neighbors.
So our notice of refusal is this is an RSA-5 property, and we're trying to use this for visitor accommodations.
Again, based on the recent court case of Johnson v. Pocono Township's zoning hearing board stating that, you know, that Airbnbs may be considered a legal nonconforming use, and under the doctrine of vested rights and variance by estoppel, we would make the argument that, you know, we have well made our burden under the circumstances here.
And the correspondence from the East Point Breeze group, if you look at it, there were five votes, excuse me, not five, there were nine votes by the neighborhood group, I mean, the neighbors, excuse me, and not included, and there were three additional votes by board members.
But of the nine community members that were there, five people voted for the project, four people voted against the project.
So a majority of the people who actually showed up to the meeting specific for our project, actually more people voted for the project than against the project.
The three board members voted against the project.
Again, our understanding is that the East Point Breeze group is conceptually against Airbnbs, and they won't even consider anything different than that.
That's their policy. Now, we have appeared in front of them before, and we even got support under similar circumstances.
So these are these are their issues. You know, and these are their comments.
The first is our block and the whole neighborhood is extremely residential and close knit.
Well, this doesn't mean, you know, Airbnb doesn't mean it's not residential.
It's just the allowable time period that we can rent the property remains a residential property.
property. It remains a single-family home. And by the way, Mr. Intescue has rented to people
in the neighborhood. So in addition to family members who stay close by, it's also a benefit
for people who are doing work to their house or having issues with their house and they need a
place to stay, and they don't want to go into a long-term rental of more than a month.
You know, there was actually a community member who attended the meeting who actually lived at
that property recently at 1633 Latona, who stayed there for two months. And she said she was
appreciative of the fact of Mr. Ittescu's flexibility in renting the property out. She
didn't want to enter into a long, long-term lease. She needed flexibility. And that's what some of
these visitor accommodation properties allow for. Whether you have it for one day, two months,
three months, you know, that's what we're looking for here. The second thing is, it looks like a
comment that's in support of this project or of this use. I believe the tensions fall with the
complexity of humans. With Nate's calm nature, I trust that that and the neighborhood will defend
when things go awry. So it sounds like they trust Nate because they know Nate. And then finally,
the third comment, a positive variance, if it must be granted, it must be for only three years or
three years only. And we have no objection to that. And then the petition. So this is our property
at 1633, 1635, and 1631.
at 1633 1635 and 1631 are in support of this project and all these addresses here in close
proximity specifically many many addresses on latona street are in support of this of this use
and here's the petition and then we try to get phone numbers so they can be verified like you
know we you know again what we're not trying to do here is is to is to go against the uh you know
what the community meeting is all about. But unfortunately, many times people don't show up
to community meetings. And even here, like many times people would love to attend the zoning
hearings, but they're in the middle of the day and they have other family and work obligations.
So what we try to do is to reach out to the community, see what the temperature is within
the community, specifically people who will be most directly impacted. The person to the left
and the person to the right of us who will be most directly impacted by any nuisances are in
support of this use. And again, uh, the member, the person to the right of us actually spit
without any, you know, like direct communication with them. They specifically showed up to the
community meeting. And usually when someone's showing up who's right next door, you always
are like, Oh my God, what's going to happen? The person was in support of it. And, uh, and that's
what, you know, and we, we said, okay, you're probably not gonna be able to show up to the
ZBA hearing, can you at least sign a letter of support, which he did. And then nearby Airbnbs,
again, we're not that far off of Broad Street, and it's not uncommon to have Airbnbs in this
neighborhood. It's a good complement, you know, to what you would expect in Center City,
Philadelphia. But there's not much hotel accommodations nearby here. And most people
don't want to have like a full hotel room. They want a kitchen, they want like different
accommodations that you can't get into uh like what you would expect from any hotel in center
city or close by and then maps of the area again this is rsa 5 but we're not trying to change
you know the actual use of the property in that we're not increasing the density we're just asking
can we just rent this property sometimes for less than 30 days at a time and then photographs of the
property. Again, Mr. Itescu has owned the property for the last five years. Here's a photograph of
the noticed poster for the hearing. And then this is Latona from different angles. It's a residential
neighborhood and we're doing a residential use. And here are pictures. Mr. Itescu is very particular
about what his properties look like and who rents them. In terms of what they look like,
I do think we have interior photos. So if you look at this, this is someone who really cares about what's inside his property. And by the way, who's inside his property too? And I wanted to say, this is some of the ground rules that Mr. Teske lives by.
So just like landlords on Airbnb services like this get raided, so do the occupants.
And Mr. Teskew doesn't just choose anyone.
So he confirms the number of guests who are entering the property, who they are, what their ratings are.
He takes the ID of everyone that's in there.
He doesn't take one night stays because, again, a lot of these Airbnbs get a bad rap because they become party houses.
He doesn't want a party house.
If anyone like lives, if he sees an ID where someone is living in Philadelphia, he asks, why are you renting this property?
He doesn't want a party school, I mean, a party in his property.
And look at what he's done in terms of the decor.
You know, the last thing he wants to do is have people disrupt, forget about the neighborhood, but his property as a whole.
He has quiet hours from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m.
He hasn't, he's, you know, if he's lucky enough to get this approved, he's also intending to put remote sound monitors.
So, you know, again, just to make sure that if there's any issues, you know, people will be alerted of that as well.
And he has security cameras surrounding the exterior of the property, and he provides his information to surrounding homeowners.
That's why a lot of the people who were in that petition supported that this proposed use live on this block.
And then there are plans and drawings, just very basic floor plan.
But again, this is all existing.
You know, if this is a long-term accommodation, we wouldn't have an issue here.
Given the change in the rules and regulations and the enforcement of those regulations,
This is a legal non-conforming use that we hope the board recognizes by way of a temporary variance for three years.
And then the RCO meeting notice we met December 20th.
Maybe that's why not as many people showed up as they usually show up for East Point Breeze, but it wasn't well attended.
You know, and then this is proof of mailing of that notice, our application for appeal that we filed on Mr. Teske's behalf, the deed to the property showing that he owns the property, and then finally the certificate of tax clearance.