WE DO HAVE A LETTER.
YOU MAY PROCEED.
THANK YOU VERY MUCH.
I'M GOING TO SHARE MY SCREEN.
IS THE BOARD ABLE TO SEE THAT?
ALL RIGHT.
THANK YOU.
GOOD AFTERNOON AGAIN.
My name is Steve Bertil. I'm here on behalf of the owners of 3818 Midvale Avenue. We're requesting a
variant release to allow for the legalization of an existing partially constructed garage structure
with two accessory parking spaces and an accessory dwelling unit proposed use on the second level.
Just to give Mr. Chair and the board a bit of background, the owners of the property, Benicia and Darren, are a young couple who purchased a home back in 2019 with the intention to make this their forever home, their dream home, if you will.
So this, as many of you know, it falls in a desirable neighborhood, and as such, their intention is to grow a family here and spend the rest of their lives here.
Pursuant to that effect, the owners wanted to create an additional living space on their property for their aging parents when that time, well, for a place for their aging parents to stay when that time came.
And as such, pursuant to that, they began to construct an accessory dwelling unit structure above a proposed garage.
Admittedly, the owners got ahead of themselves for this project and started the construction without all the necessary approvals.
L&I rightfully issued a stop work order and the homeowners have since submitted all the
documentation needed for their approvals and it's here for a variance request on to our
refusals which I'll get to in a second.
Both the refusals are dimensional in nature.
Just to give a little context of the property at hand, you can see here the property that
we're referring to is on Midville Avenue, directly in the middle of the block between
Stokely Street to the north and Fox Street to the south.
to the south. The property is zoned as are, say, one. Now, the property itself with the structure
on the property zone as
RSA 1.
is actually two separate parcels, which is not uncommon, as you can see for this block.
Many of the homes or the addresses, I should say, are assigned to one larger parcel and
a rear parcel that opens up into a shared driveway, but it's the one continuous or
or contiguous sort of plot of land except it's two separate tax IDs.
So we're here regarding the rear of the property where the garage structure is located.
And so if you have a sense of location of structure, the dimensions, try to zoom in
here. Is the board able to see that? I know it's a little... Mr. Chair, are you able to
see that? Yeah, if you can make it a little larger, that would be helpful. A little larger.
So this is the structure in question. This is the location of it. As I stated, it is
It's a two-story garage structure with two accessory dwelling parking spots and a accessory dwelling unit on the second level.
It sits on this rear parcel.
The two refusals that we have are for the minimum setbacks from property lines per the code.
except three garage structures need to be generally three feet away from any property
line on the site. This structure is three feet from all property lines except for the
property line that is adjacent to the neighboring property, which I'll discuss in a little bit
more detail when we get into the neighborhood context. And in addition to that, the height.
As you can see, the height of this structure is 21 feet and the by-right height is 15 for these accessory parking structures.
In terms of the neighborhood context, before we get into the individual structure,
The block itself that this sits on, the aerial of the block, or I'll call it a block cluster,
sort of the rectangle facing on Midvale, Queens, Stokely, and Fox. That block cluster in itself
has 26 homes in the block cluster. 15 of those homes have rear garage structures or some sort
of accessory structure in the rear um in fact this aerial has some tree blockage so here's a better
sort of lot line aerial as you can see the the gray shaded sort of rectangles and boxes and
the rear of the properties are all the accessory structures that are existing on this property so
it's not uncommon for um an accessory structure parking structure to be constructed these this
purple rectangle that you see here is actually the shared driveway. The purple represents an
easement area for people to come in and out. What I want to bring the board's attention to
of the accessory structures that do share the driveway is that you can see that many of the
accessory structures are actually built along the property, the adjacent property line of the
structures where three of the sides are three feet away, over three feet away from a property
line, but one of them isn't. And that's essentially the same thing that's going on with our structures
I just showed you, which created that refusal, which as you can see, is not uncommon for
these structures to be built along the property lines or very close to them, closer than three
feet. In addition to that, as I stated, we received the height variance for having the
property being 21 or having the structure be 21 feet instead of 15 feet. Along the shared driveway,
there are at least two other properties that have two-story garages at 22 feet, one at 3010 Midville
and one on 3025 Queen. Both of those properties have rear structures that are two stories and
then also are 22 feet in height, which is one feet higher than our proposed height.
in height which is one feet higher than our proposed height um as i stated there are multiple
um structures our proposed structures you'll see in the second has an exterior stairwell which or
is will the proposed is to have an exterior stairwell that was an issue with some of the
neighbors um but as i'll show you here there are multiple
these are just some of the properties the structures that are existing that are over 20
over 15 feet some 22 those are 15 feet you see as you can see there's two floors windows
some are used for offices some are used for storage i'm unsure but what i wanted to bring
attention to the board is showing that there are exterior stairwells on these structures.
There's one there. As you can see to the right here, there's another exterior stairwell,
which will become an issue with the RCO, which I'll discuss in a moment. The homeowners did go
around to adjacent neighbors to obtain signatures of support for the project.
This is a copy of the petition of support that the homeowners went around and talked
to neighbors to get the sign.
In addition to that, this is just sort of an aerial mapping, a representation of the
signatures on this document and where they where they actually reside in relation to the property
in question which is uh the one that's highlighted in blue here um the green are the areas of
signatures in addition to the in addition to the petition support that was circulated
We did receive a letter of non-opposition by Councilman Curtis Jones.
We met with him and his staff and discussed the project.
And while he understands that the homeowners did jump the gun by starting the project without the permits,
say they've done everything thus far to make sure that all the proper approvals are in
existence. In addition to that, well, let me get into the community meeting. We did meet
with the RCO twice. We met with them and the RCO for this property is East Falls Community
Council. We met with them on December 15, 2020, then again on January 20, 2021.
Now at the initial meeting, there was a lot of concerns raised, some issues raised that
essentially fell into four separate categories that I want to address them currently.
So the first is just the expected issue, which is neighbors having a problem with the fact
that these homeowners started the project without receiving laws of proper approval.
That's obviously a valid and understandable concern.
Inherent in that is, well, how do we know it's built safe?
So, the homeowners obtained a structural report, a structural engineering report to confirm
that the construction thus far has been the code and I should zoom out a little bit so
you can see the whole thing here, so that the construction thus far is the code and
safe to continue construction. I'll flip through. Here's a side of the, as it currently stands,
there's a photo of the foundation, measurements, basically all the evidence that was
assessed by the structural engineer to make sure everything was built to code and everything was
safe. In addition to that, there were sort of questions regarding issues with the height,
just the design and the context and fitting within the context of the neighborhood,
and basically the style of the roof. Now, in regards to the design between the December 15th
Between the December 15th meeting and the January 20th meeting, the homeowners did go back and meet with their architect and their contractors to discuss what's feasible, what changes can be made that won't essentially require demolition of the project.
I'm hearing
Some of the comments made from the community members were essentially like changing the roof, taking it down six feet, things of that nature, all of which would essentially require tearing down the structure or moving it three feet away from the adjacent property to the left, which again, when you consider the foundation and everything that you have to do, would essentially require tearing down the structure.
And so what the homeowners in conjunction with their hired professionals came up with was some alternative materials, because admittedly the homeowner was looking for a more modern look for the structure, and that didn't go over well with the community.
And so we went back, decided to scrap the modern materials and come up with an alternative that utilizes period materials that are utilized in the other two-story structures that exist along the shared drywall.
And so we put together some renderings using the material that we believe are in use and would fit more within the context because we're, you know, we're taking the position of the community that there's a way to fit into a context of the community without having just identical duplication of what's there.
there. And we think material materials is a great way to do that. So the first option
that we came up with was utilizing a stone based siding in the wood composite. So here
is a composite with siding, stone base and wood composite doors. There is a second option
that we came up with, which is utilizing entirely stucco and then wood composite doors. Here
is a rendering of the stucco. Now this looks kind of just like drywall, but this is actually
to represent stucco. And the last one was just using completely brick with a stone base
and wood composite, which is a rendering of that. Now, all these materials are utilized
in other accessory garage structures, both along that driveway and along the neighborhood
as a whole, but that didn't seem to be enough neighbors or some comments were made that that
that was enough. They essentially want us to change the mapping in the design of the roof,
which would essentially require us tearing it down. And in addition to that, there was some
comments made regarding the accessory dwelling unit. It was mischaracterized this structure
as an apartment building. So we propose having a proviso that states that the accessibility
dwelling unit cannot be rented to the public at any time. In addition to that, we propose
having a proviso that also says that we are required to use the materials that we propose
in the alternate period materials that we proposed, but they didn't decide, the group didn't decide
on any of the three options because they didn't want any of them. But if they would have decided
and if they, we would have, as we proposed, we would have been more than happy to have the
provisos that we stick to those materials so there's no concern about someone sort of pulling
the wool over the community's eyes. Mr. Burchell, if I can interrupt you for just one minute to put
the record that we we have received letters in opposition from the east falls community council
and from neighbors kevin cassidy suzanne penn ellen purry nancy pontone william hefner francis
and francis bourne thank you mr bertill i have a question it's carol tenary where's the front of
the house? So this isn't actually the house. This is the rear driveway. This is the garage
structure with the accessory dwelling unit. And so do you mean the opposite side of this
and so do you mean the opposite side of this structure because that's what i was about to show
structure? Because that's what I was about to show you.
you this isn't the actual home uh you're muted mr chair this is a freestanding structure in the rear
uh are you look do you want to see the actual house in front of that carol yeah it yeah yes
you want to compare what it looks like from the front to back i assume yes
Do you have any photographs of the house?
Yes, I have to.
Let me just stop sharing and I'll bring it up.
I have it up on Google.
And I'll reach you there.
We can't figure out with the two garages how they can get out of the car and into their home when I can see no entrance.
Okay, that would be better reflected with the aerial, but I'll show you the front of the house now.
Are you able to see that?
The Tudor is the front of the house?
It's the one on the left.
It's obstructed by the trees.
But this is, again, these are two separate parcels.
The house is on one parcel.
The rear parcel is an entirely separate parcel.
And so the garage structure, when you leave the garage,
The intention is a walkway to the right, which I can show you here.
Okay, I understand now.
Let me bring it back up here.
Thank you very much.
as you can see here this is just the structure you're looking at and to access the home
um you would be just walking up this path now again the intention here is for the the second
floor to be an accessory dwelling unit. So generally speaking, the person here wouldn't
be making that walk. But if you're parked here, the intention was to have a path here
to connect with the existing path and to access the home. And that's why the left side of
the structure needed to be closer to this property line as opposed to three feet in
opposite direction. But again, that's part of the course with these garages. If you look at
the other garages along the driveway, most of them are closer to one of the property lines on one
side. And I imagine for the exact same reason, so there's clear walking paths on the opposite
side of the structure and so the the homeowners believe that yes the structure itself and i just
rely better than showing existing conditions here's the existing condition it's open it's covered in
these materials for protection obviously it's not going to be green there's a lot there was
a lot of comments about it being a large green structure that's just to protect the materials
And the homeowners believe that there's a way to match context that doesn't mean exact duplication.
We believe that if we utilize the materials that are utilizing the materials that are neighboring structures that are similar to this, that it will fit within that context nicely.
But they did want a different look to their accessory dwelling unit structure with the parking.
um but everything else from the from the height is not dissimilar to what's around there from the
location it's not dissimilar to what's around there and therefore we're asking various um
reaction for various approval for the distance from this property line and um to allow for the
height of the structure and so i have with me um one of the homeowners uh mr darren hardiman
who can
affirm and adopt my testimony
if necessary. I don't know if the board
wants to take outside
comments before that.
We'll swear him in and get him to
adopt your testimony, then we'll ask for
outside comments.
Can you say the name again?
Darren Hardiman.
He can unmute himself.
I've unmuted
Good afternoon sir
Good afternoon, sir. Please identify yourself with a record first and last name. Spell your
Please identify yourself with a record
First and last name, spell your last name
last name. Darren Hardiman, H-A-R-D-I-M-O-N, 3018 Midvale Avenue, Philadelphia, 19129.
Do you swear and affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?