So we're now seeking two units, which still requires a variance.
So let's talk a little bit about the property as it exists right now.
So this is 5138 North Broad Street.
It's surrounded by three different streets.
In the front, we have Broad Street.
on this side the main side we have west duncanon street and then in the rear there's north carlisle
street this parcel is zoned rsa3 and it's rather large the entire parcel here is over 4 600 square
feet and i just want to go to and there is an existing structure on it that is six bedrooms
three stories and over 2,800 square feet not including the sort of ground level
here that's partially above ground so we have a large building a lot of
bedrooms I'm just gonna scroll through some props some of the photos just so
you can get oriented here this is the side of the building on Ducanon and this
is from the rear on Carlisle this is another street view from the rear that's
kind of backed out a little bit that you can see Carlisle on
And here are some more photos of the outside, and then this is what the building currently looks like on the inside.
This is going from the lower floor through the first floor, and these are the second and third floor as they currently exist.
So let's just talk a little bit about the background of this property.
The furthest background I could find was from a permit from 1937.
There's indication in the records that in 1937, this was used as a funeral parlor with an additional residential dwelling unit.
There's some other permits on the record later that seems to indicate that it had been used as a funeral parlor and residential unit from 1931 on.
It later in 1988 was purchased by the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.
there is a large catholic church across duncanon street from here it's our lady of hope and this
property was then used from 1988 on as a convent for the sisters of saint joseph so as far as we
can tell from 1931 on it has not been a single family home with some various uses from a convent
to a funeral parlor um the archdiocese didn't use it for many years um and my client uh has
it like has an affiliation with the church and approached them to purchase it and was able to
purchase the property in december of 2024. um so what he is proposing is this is the existing floor
is this is the existing floor plan so you can see kind of how things are already laid out
plan. So you can see
and the floor plan we showed to and what I like about how this is actually done this is the
existing floor plan and then you can see on the blue lines where things might be added
so the plan would be to renovate the whole property but and to convert it into two units
This floor plan shows, you know, the lower floor and the first floor being used for one unit.
That would be a three-bedroom, and the second and third floor being used for the second unit, and that would be a four-bedroom.
This plan actually only adds one bedroom to the total bedroom count because this is already a six-bedroom house.
um and uh you know we have fairly large units uh because we have a building that with all the
space is over 3 000 square feet um so we really have two quite large units um both have kitchens
dining areas living rooms um and good size bedrooms i know that's always a concern
the smallest of the bedrooms here when i was looking is like 11 by 12 feet um we have really
good size bedrooms. It's bigger than my bedroom at home. And as you can see, these three on the
third floor and this unit, these are already bedrooms that already exist. We're going to try
to use as much of the current floor plan as possible to preserve the building, which is
actually pretty nice inside in terms of like the existing architecture, although it is in need of
significant repairs and renovations from just not being from being vacant for a while and not
really being upkept before that um so uh and then i just wanted to go back to uh to show that the
there's plenty of room in the rear yard for storage of trash for both units and they will both have
access to that rear yard um we discussed with the community group they're concerned about where it
was taken out the trash needs to be taken out onto broad street um because that's the address
of the property and that will be in any tenant's lease to take the trash to the front of the
property so that it will be picked up on the correct day um and at the correct time um and
then so and i just also want to say there is a yard large yard here uh why and why uh this is
actually great is that Tim, who owns the property, also owns a landscaping company. And so his plan
is to, you know, fix up the outdoor space as well, you know, take care of the fencing and bushes and
trees. And he has been working on the outside of this property already to get it into shape and
maintain it. And I think he had told me he'd been helping the neighbor next door trim trees and
things like that. So he has a specific skill set in order to maintain the outside of this property.
The use, even as two units, would have two refusals.
The first is for the use as anything more than a single-family home.
And as I said, this hasn't been the case for this property as far back as the 1930s.
And the other would be for accessory off-street parking.
I'm going to, with only two units, we would need two spots.
We still are proposing none, and I'm going to go over why we kind of can't add parking and also the neighbor's opinions about that in a little bit.
But let's first address the use itself.
So this is, I've marked on this map, both the zoning and then the actual uses of the properties on the 5100th block of North Broad.
As you can see, the southern end here is RM1, and then it switches to RSA3 up here.
The houses and the properties are remarkably the same in architecture throughout this block, but half of it is zoned for multifamily and half of it is zoned for, you know, or two-thirds is zoned for single family.
I would also add that across the street is RTA1, where a duplex would also be a by-right use.
of note the property immediately adjacent at 5136 is permanent for a personal care home
with six units up to 10 with up to 10 people living in it when you do these calculations here
see i also wanted to say that so 50 of the property so the uses on this block are there's
mix of mixed-use commercial, multi-families ranging from 2 to 12 units, rooming houses,
and personal care homes. And the total on this block, about 57% of the properties are
non-single-family homes. If we go up to the next block, I don't have a map,
but on the 5200 block, which you can see the zoning of up here, that you can see this is also
Up here that you can see, this is also RSA 3 and RTA 1.
So RSA 3 and RTA 1.
The 5200 block also has significant uses that are not single family residential and have churches, doctor's offices, commercial units, a 22 unit apartment building, 3, 2, 4.
So when you combine these two blocks together, which I think is appropriate because we have it kind of our properties at the corner of the 5100 block into the 5200 block, a total of 63% of these properties are non-single family residential, including both of the properties that are adjacent to ours on Broad Street.
um and again this property has as far as we can tell never been used as a single family home
so with the parking variance um we did um i think the first thing to note here let me just get to
some photos to show you um let's just get to broad street one second so as you know this is located
on broad street um and there is ample public transit available uh within a block there are
several bus lines and a broad street line stop um one of the great things about living in this area
is the accessibility to public transit um but even with that we know people have cars right
we're not going to contest that so there is like i said three street frontages on this property
about a total of 235 feet of frontage which if we do a normal size car spot of about 21
feet you can fit about 10 cars along the front rear and side of this property
and you know any any off-street parking that we would create would necessitate taking away at
least one if not two spots off of the street parking um so you know we're not really gaining
a ton by taking away a spot or two for that uh for off-street parking um when we have so much
street parking around this property anyway um i did want to also show that we did want to make
sure that you know we went and took pictures um and this is what ducannon street looks like on a
saturday morning um you could see that there's lots of open spots available um and this is this
side here at the bushes is where our property is and that's also the side of the property where
so so jennifer i think i think we understand the parking what what i think you might want to do is
go back to the uh drawings and talk about the basement and what you're putting in the basement
in relationship to the first floor sure absolutely um so great i'll just add that in the community
meeting, the neighbors actually supported not having parking. They did not want parking along
Carlisle. Those are single family homes. They did not want the parking there. So I just wanted to
make sure that that was understood. So in the current plan right here, actually, let me go to
the photos first because it's easier to understand what's happening. Right now, there is proposed to
have a bathroom and two bedrooms in the basement. But I want to show you what's going on with this
basement uh because it's not necessarily your typical row house basement uh first firstly it's
not fully underground it's about half and half um and so you can see this both on the exterior here
where this is the window these are some of the windows um for the side of the building where
you can see this is these are for the for the lower level and you also have a direct access
right now it's a bill code door but there we are thinking you're going to try to convert that into
a direct access as well for one of the rear bedrooms um so you don't have the same sort
of fire safety concerns um and then here you can see these this is the existing condition of that
you know basement lower level um and this had been used as part of the funeral home
for a long time so we have finished ceilings we have lighting we have you know you can kind of
see that there's already some larger windows in place these were obviously brought up to code
you know if there was any window wells that needed to be added but we're not going to have
to dig fully underground to get those window well situations that you see a lot of the time
so it's a little bit different there and then also what I would say too is that we don't have
even if you add those sort of window well situations we're not right on the sidewalk
it would be into their own yard so you're not taking away any sidewalk space this isn't public
space this is private space of that property um the biggest concern raised with that with this
The biggest concern raised with that, with this space, I'll go to the floor plans now, was actually that they believed, the RCO believed that we were going to have to dig down to create these spaces.
space i'll go to the floor
Even with the finished ceiling that's there, the ceiling height is over, is eight feet or more in these spaces.
They are full height rooms because they were used for a commercial purpose prior.
That being said, we understand the concern, but, you know, and we can try to work around, you know, not having bedrooms in the basement, that sort of thing.
I talked to my client and he's willing to try to work around not having the bedrooms and try to reconfigure these units.
Because, again, it is a large building with some space that we can try to be creative with our floor plan layouts.
um so i think that was but really their concerns seem to be the digging down and that's not what
we're proposing uh we are going to use the existing space that's already there
and so community meeting we did um go to the community meeting um in addition to tim also
talking with the neighbors ahead of time some of the neighbors ahead of time while he was there
um there was let me just go to the letter um so uh the two neighbors two of the neighbors that
were in attendance were the two neighbors directly behind the property who are probably the most
impacted um because they are single family homeowners uh and they voted in support um
tim has reached out to them they have his contact information they have my contact information
And in general, they were in support. They did not want to see parking in the rear of the property.
And I just want to also add that it's physically impossible for us to do that as there's a fire hydrant and a haircut here that would prevent us from accessing a rear parking here.
So the I know.
Jennifer, why don't you bring your client on?
Sure. Tim, can you raise your hand?
Excuse me, what's your client's last name?
His name is Tim Miller.
Tim Miller has been promoted.
Tim, are you there?
It'll take him a minute to get in.
Tim, but I don't see him.
I was trying to give him like a few seconds to join.
Can you hear me?
Sir, could you please state your name and spell for the court stenographer?
My name is Timothy Miller, T-I-M-O-T-H-Y-M-I-L-L-E-R.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you turn your video on, please?
Counsel, please proceed.
He's coming on now.
He was having a problem with his camera before at the meeting.
I don't know if he's going to.
Please proceed then.
Timothy, did you, did you, first of all, let me ask you,
You are an authorized representative of 5138 Investments, LLC, right?
And did you hear my testimony here today and believe it to be truthful and accurate?
And would you adopt it as your own?
Yes, I do.
Great.
Questions from the board?
for the work that you plan to do with the basement um are there any thoughts about
replacing the windows so that they're operable absolutely um in order to meet fire code
requirements there would absolutely be a replacement of the windows so that they were
code compliant and allow for any sort of meeting of the fire code standards right
other questions from the board what's the height of the uh ceilings in this
in this basement uh it is at least eight feet um it varies slightly but um the part where people
are going to be that aren't just mechanicals because there's a fun part with mechanicals
Um, but this is eight feet or more.
And, uh, you said there was going to be, uh, there was a door maybe that could be, uh,
uh open to doors so right now bedroom we saw we have um one second let me just get to the picture
open to doors.
So right now.
so i could show you there's a bill co door right here um and that can be replaced with a regular
door like there's a staircase underneath that that accesses um directly to um that lower level
bedroom so you have another means of exit other than you know any window wells that would be
create it you'll have a direct exit um out to uh the rear yard as well okay thank you yeah yeah i
see the windows i just don't see window wells they're not there yet because we haven't done
the construction work at all so this is right now this is just in the state that it's there
um and so you know as as you can see here these are where the windows are and um you know when
the building these we're going to need to have building plans put um and when those building
plans are developed, obviously any window access will meet fire code compliance in order to obtain
the CO for this property. Did you mention that your client will be as amicable to having no
basement living? To not having bedrooms in the basement. Thank you. Thank you. Questions or
comments from our attorney? My only comment was covered by Ms. Vazidlo, which was that there was
no refusal listed for parking
and it will be required.