2026-11-02 - Zoning Hearing Board

So what should we do without anything here? It's not in that case. Just you can just wait for here the other two cases first. And then-- First, then this will be last. Yeah, it'll be last. Yeah. OK.

Thank you very much. Appreciate it. If she's not here by that time I spoke to her about this, and her case is called, just come forth from the podium. And then you can ask for-- you can ask for a

continuance till later date because of-- Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. OK, ladies and gentlemen, we call to order the meeting of the Zoning Hearing Board for the City of

Allentown for November 1, 2026. The board this evening consists of Samantha McClean to my right, Scott Unger to my left. My name's Robert Knauer. We have three matters on our agenda this evening, and

our secretary will call that list in just a moment. We ask that the appellant or applicant indicate his or her presence and whether represented by counsel. She'll ask for a raise of hands from anyone

who objects in each case, and she asks for a raise of hands if anyone is interested party, but not necessarily an objector. Tabitha? Case number one, special use application of City Star Management at

170 Allen Street is the appellant present. The appellant was present a month ago, but stepped down the lobby. They're represented by counsel, and the counsel is running late this evening, and I made

the board aware. OK. The appellant is present. Are there any objectors to case number one? Keep your hands up, please. One, two, three, four, five, six. Six. Are there any interested parties, not

necessarily objectors to case number one? No. Case number two, a pill of S6 Realty Group LLC at 212 South Dauphin Street is the appellant present. The appellant is present. Are there any objectors to

case number two? No. Are there any interested parties, not necessarily objectors to case number two? Yes. How many? Raise your hands. Three. Three. Case number three, a pill of East Penn Properties LP

City Center Group at 702 Hamilton Street is the appellant present. Present. The appellant is present. Are there any objectors to case number three? No. Are there any interested parties, not

necessarily objectors to case number three? No. OK. Thank you. Dennis, you're up. Thank you. Ready whenever you are? Go right ahead. All right, great. Well, again, my name is Dennis McCarthy. I'm here

representing the applicant, East Penn Properties and City Center Investment Corp. The property is 702 Hamilton Street. You all know where it is at the corner of 7th and Hamilton. It is in the new MXD

zoning district and in the historic building demolition control overlay zone. This is my third time here. You might recall that in 2020, the board granted special exception approval to demolish a

portion of the building to allow for a 16-story office building. In June of 2025, we were back. City Center revised its plan, essentially reducing it from 16 stories to four stories with other design

changes. And again, requested special exception approval to demolish a portion of the building while maintaining the first and second floors and the facades pursuant to the recommendation of HARP. As

part of that request, City Center submitted that the first floor of the building would be used for retail and restaurant uses, which we'll get back to. Then last June or June of 2025, the board

granted special exception approval and found that the existing building could not be feasibly reused. Denial would result in an unreasonable economic hardship. The project would have a substantial

public benefit and the design of the new structure would be a net addition to the streetscape. In its decision, the board noted that the approval was subject to conditions that included development of

the property as testified and shown on the exhibits, which included retaining the facade and on the Hamilton Street side. Okay, now we fast forward to today. In July of this year, Thomas Jefferson

University signed a lease for the property for the Lehigh Valley campus of Jefferson Sydney Kimmel Medical College. Big news in Allentown. I'm assuming everybody heard of it. Great for the city, great

for downtown. Now Jefferson wants to utilize a significant portion of the first floor of the building for medical school uses, specifically for its anatomy department, which as you'll hear from

Robert, all has to be on one floor. However, that use triggered two things that we need relief for. First, as I mentioned before, the 2025 decision was based on the testimony presented, which included

retail and restaurant for the first floor. We're asking the board to modify that decision to allow restaurant and college university use on the first floor. That's number one. Number two is a variance

from a section of the new zoning ordinance, section 66034B4. That provides a college or university use as a permitted use in this zone. However, pursuant to that section, the use is only permitted on

the ground floor of a building only when located in the rear of the ground story at least 20 feet behind the front facade. It's a permitted use, it's permitted on the ground floor, but it's got to be

20 feet back from the front facade, presumably to allow some other use in that first 20 feet. We're asking for a variance of that from that section to allow the college use all the way to the front

facade of the building. Now, as a threshold matter, to us it's pretty clear that Hamilton Street is the front facade of the building. If anybody doesn't agree with that, we can kind of go through the

ordinance. To me, that's pretty clear. Okay, we'll go down that road then. I have one witness tonight, Robert DiLorenzo from City Center, and I handed you a packet of five exhibits which include the

notice of appeal that we filed, the 2025 zoning decision, the first floor plan from 2025, the new first floor plan, and renderings and elevations of the property, all for reference during Robert's

testimony. So with that, I'll call Robert, unless you want to... Before you do, maybe I misheard. Did you say there were three items that were before us or just two? Two. That's good, because I only

wrote down two. There you go. All right, we're good. Modifying the 2025 decision and then the variance. Is it okay to call Robert up as a witness? Please. Robert DiLorenzo? Yep, you got it. Now, you

all know him, but for the record, Robert, can you give your name, your employer, and your business address? My name is Robert DiLorenzo. I'm the director of planning and construction for City Center

Group. And are you familiar with this property and the proposed project and the appeal that's in front of the board tonight? Yes. All right. Let's get into the Jefferson Project, just to kind of

explain to everybody what's going on. Let's start with the building itself. Can you describe how Jefferson is going to use the building? Sure. So Jefferson will be occupying floors one through four.

I'll start with sort of a breakdown of the program of how they intend to use the fourth floor, and I'll work my way down. So on the fourth floor of the building, they are planning to build simulation

lab space. This essentially is like mock exam rooms that doctors would meet patients in their debriefing room, and they'll also have faculty offices on the fourth floor. The third floor of the

building will have classrooms. There'll be a large auditorium space, some study areas for students, as well as a student lounge. And then on the second floor of the building, there'll be computer

labs, classrooms, a library, more study areas for students, some more faculty office space, and they'll also have their assessment and testing areas, along with counseling, on the second floor of the

building. The first floor of the building will be the anatomy department, along with lab space that serves the anatomy space, as well as advising. And then there's a portion of the first floor that's

still carved out for restaurant type use, correct? Correct. And there still will be a space along the corner of 7th and Hamilton Street, anchoring the corner of the building for still restaurant

retail use, sort of undetermined as far as what the final end use of that space will be. Right. So that's the building, but the medical school operations, so having a higher ed component to downtown

is critical. So we have that here. As far as the operation, can you kind of walk through what Jefferson is envisioning for the site? Yeah. So the site is going to serve as their Lehigh Valley campus

for Sydney-Kimmel Medical College. It's an existing medical college located in Philadelphia. This will be their main location up here in Lehigh Valley. They will be serving upwards of four classes

initially upon year one. Each class will have 45 students, so they'll have up to 180 students upon year one. Over a four year period, they're going to be growing the class size up to 60 students per

class. Over four years upon opening, they'll have up to 240 students that will be enrolled in the program here. Beyond just students, there will be approximately 155 to 175 faculty that serve this

school that will be employed by the school. And yeah, it's going to be a significant facility. They're taking over 70,000 square feet of space in the building, so it's a substantial investment that

they're making. It is a long year, long term lease, a couple decade lease. So significant investment, significant investment in Downtown Allentown. Now, that's their commitment here, but Lehigh Valley

Jefferson has a major footprint downtown already, don't they? Yeah, they do. Yeah, so existing Lehigh Valley Health Network, Jefferson Health, they occupy space at one city center, which is directly

across the street from this facility. They have also space in three city center, a couple blocks down the street, along Hamilton Street from this facility. So between those two spaces, they have about

1,000 employees that work in Downtown Allentown currently. And then beyond that, they have about 158 residents that live in the immediate apartment buildings downtown. So I think a part of the

investment they're making as they look at this is really sort of an expansion of the campus that they're establishing here in Downtown Allentown. Now, the good thing is they have the people, they have

the students, they have the faculty and staff, but as far as the operation of this building and its ability to activate the area around it, what's unique about the medical school compared to maybe an

office building? I'd say one thing that's a positive of the medical school is that it's 100% in person. So we've seen, especially with some of our more recent office developments post COVID, there

isn't as much foot traffic necessarily Monday through Friday with office occupancy or utilization, we call it. So this is all in person. It will be a 24/7 building. So classes will be occurring

between 8am and 6pm. But in the evening time, students will still be using the facility. They have 24/7 access to the facility. As I mentioned before, there will be student lounge space. There's

computer labs that students need access to. There's libraries in the building that students will need access to to study and prepare for exams. So it will be a 24/7 facility. Now there's already a lot

of Lehigh Valley Hospital Jefferson folks living downtown. Did the city center make any commitment to kind of incentivize more of these students to live downtown in the apartments? Yeah, we have an

ongoing relationship with them for that. So we talked about the building. We talked about the operation. Let's talk about the first floor. So to kind of set up this discussion, if you look at Exhibit

3 of what I gave you, that's the first floor layout that we showed you in 2025. So that's kind of the starting point. And then Exhibit 4 is the new first floor layout that Robert can walk us through.

So with that, do you want to walk the board through the new first floor? Sure. So we're looking at Exhibit 4? Exhibit 4. Great. Okay. So Hamilton Street on this page, I apologize, it's not labeled.

It's on your left-hand side of the page, it was Hamilton Street. And 7th Street is at the top of the page. So if we're looking at Hamilton Street, the building's about 115 feet wide along Hamilton

Street. And the space that currently shows the educational anatomy lab space coming out to Hamilton Street, that's about 42 feet wide, just to give you a sense. So the main lobby of the building is

located at the center there along Hamilton Street. You can see there's a vestibule that you come into the lobby. You'll be greeted by, there'll be a staff security personnel there to greet people as

they come into the building. You'll be able to pass through turnstiles, security turnstiles to get to the elevator landing and stair tower landing there. Admissions is located immediately off of that

lobby space. You can see it labeled admissions there. And then as you pass through those double doors, you're now entering into the anatomy department on that sort of that pink color there. Anatomy is

made up of a few different functions. So if we start sort of in the bottom right hand corner, there will be a cadaver storage on the first floor. All the loading will be occurring in the rear of the

building off of Hall Street. From there, there will also be the embalming suite. There will be two open dissection labs located along 7th Street. And there will also be an advanced dissection lab

located sort of near that stair tower at the bottom of the plan. And then along Hamilton Street will be the wet lab. So again, the open dissection labs and the advanced dissection labs, those are

spaces that students will be working directly with cadavers. And then the wet lab will be smaller, smaller organs that students will be working with. And then Robert, is it important that all the

elements of the anatomy department be on one floor? That's it. Yeah. It's absolutely important. Okay. All right. So if we're looking at this from Hamilton Street, we have, you know, the restaurant up

at the top, which is to the east. And then the area that we're looking for the variance, can you kind of talk the board through that just so everybody's on the same page? Sure. So the area we're

looking at is along Hamilton Street. It would be on the western side of the main lobby doors. And it's essentially that space that says wet lab that currently comes all the way out to Hamilton. We're

looking for a variance for that first 20 feet along Hamilton Street in order to have that use. Okay. So that would be roughly a 42 foot wide by 20 foot deep area. Correct. About 840 square feet. Got

it. And on the other side of the wall there is where the L. Tri-C building is, right? Correct. Okay. Let's just stop there for one second. Any questions so far? I don't think so. Okay. Go ahead. I do

have a question. And if this is coming later, please let me know. Could you speak a little bit to the transparency of the windows and like what that means for the open dissection, dissection lab and

the wet lab and just like how people will be interacting with those windows and those spaces from the outside? You want to make sure you have a good spot, right? Or avoiding it. Yeah. So, so yeah,

that of course, and Jefferson is also sensitive to that, of course. You know, that's kind of the one thing, you know, with the medical school does come the anatomy aspect of it, of course, the intent

would be to put a tinting or frosting on only the windows that are impacted with direct dissection immediately behind it. So the intent would be to put a frosting on the windows along Hamilton street

there where the wet lab is shown. And then also on the, I guess it's one, two, sort of those three larger windows there along seventh street as well. And then the south, south side of the building.

And you spoke to the importance of keeping all of the anatomy space or department space on one floor. Can you speak to why it wasn't possible to maybe have it on another floor and have like student

study space on the first floor? Sure. So as Dennis mentioned previously, we were before, we had gotten this project approved initially as an office building. It was a speculative office building. At

the time we did not have a tenant lined up to occupy the building. So also we were doing an adaptive reuse of this existing historic facade as a part of the bank. And what we had done is we demolished

the third floor of the building at the time. We kept the first and second floor and we added a new third and fourth floor, all new structure, but all of the second and first floor is existing

structure. What we found out early on in conversations with Jefferson is that the anatomy department has unique pounds per square foot requirements for the cadaver storage space. So these cadavers are

very heavy and they're stacked five high, they can have upwards of 50 of them. In this location that you see where it says cadaver storage, given the existing constraints of the building structure, it

was designed for 100 pounds per square foot, which is very common for an office type building, 200 square, 200 pounds per square foot was excessively high. So we only had one area on the first floor

of the building that was slab on grade that could accommodate that type of load. So when it became apparent that that needed to be on the first floor, the rest of the department program sort of ended

up around that. And then also just the fact of using the elevator, then it became easier for them to keep it on the first floor, keep it near the back loading, so they weren't using the elevator to

transport these upstairs. So once they figured out where the cadaver storage was going to be, the rest of the program sort of, you know, grew from there. Any questions, Scott? No questions at this

point. Okay. Thank you. So now let's talk about utilizing that first 20 feet for something other than the medical school. So if that's carved out in this 840 square foot area is required, what issues

arise with that? So one of the issues that arise with this sort of smaller condensed retail space is the original, we were a little bit constrained. We had a hardship where we're constrained to use

the existing facade. If you look at the way that the stone of the facade is, it comes up about four feet high. So there's limited transparency for this to be like a real traditional mercantile retail

shop that sort of depends on having primarily majority storefront glass to, you know, advertise their merchandise. So we see that the sort of smaller space is a quite harder space to lease for

traditional retail. And with reference for that, if you look at exhibit five, you'll see on the renderings and the elevations, you know, the elements of the front that we were required to maintain

based on Harb's recommendation and the board's previous decision. And I'm sure you all know it from site. But if you want an illustration of it, you'll see that I'm guessing it's like four, maybe five

foot granite slab along the bottom and then keeping the existing windows, right? Yeah, there's an existing black granite slab that's preserved. That's about four, about four or five feet high. So you

know, I'm six three, so I can see over it, but it might not necessarily be easy for everyone to see over it. You know, keeping in mind that the building was originally designed as a sort of an

institutional bank office building. It wasn't necessarily designed to be traditional retail. Right. Right. So the facade we're required to maintain would be an impediment to using this 840 square foot

area, correct? Correct. You know, in addition to that, are there other issues with creating this little space? It definitely creates, you know, inefficiencies and challenges with some of the per

permitted requirements of having a small space like that, needing to build more sort of common area restroom facilities so that those retailers have a space to use. Whereas when you have all of the

retail space in one contiguous area, it just makes it more easier for leasing and also the build out of the space. So it's hard to put everything you need to in there. Does that impact the cost and

the rent and the affordability of the space for a retail tenant? Yeah, absolutely. You know, we have found with our retail portfolio here in downtown, you know, you really have to lease the space

almost for nothing, essentially, on a return on your investment for what it costs to build out the space. You know, previously in the original plan, the retail space was shown, I think, at

approximately 4,000 square feet in that location. So the intent there was that this was going to be really a destination driven use that could occupy sort of a larger footprint on the first floor.

Whereas this smaller 840 square foot space, it's just really drives up overall cost per square foot to build the space and, you know, you're never going to see a return on that. I know, you know, you

and your, you know, the whole team at City Center has been looking at this. And based on our discussions, I think you've concluded it would be a very, very difficult space to lease. Is it fair for me

to say that? I would say it's fair, yes. Now the variance test. Let's talk about that. You know, in order to get a variance, we have to show certain things. So given your extensive experience

downtown, if this variance is granted, would it alter the essential character of the neighborhood? No. Would it impair the use or development of adjacent property? No. Would it be detrimental to the

public welfare? No. And is this the minimum variance that will afford relief? Yes. Now, let's talk about, you know, the old versus the new and the ability to modify the decision. You know, the 2025

decision of the board was based on conclusions that the existing building could not be feasibly reused. Denial would result in an unreasonable economic hardship. The project would have a substantial

public benefit and the design would be a net addition to the streetscape. Does the change of the first floor or would the change of the first floor use impact any of those conclusions in your view?

No. I don't have any additional questions. I'm sorry. I would like to just clarify and add one thing just for the record. The existing space that's labeled restaurant food service, it's still

undetermined as far as what that use is going to be. So I think that the intent would be, you know, whether it's restaurant, food service, retail, mercantile, some type of, you know, it's some

permitted use, some permitted use just because I know with the use changes, I want to make sure that we have flexibility around what that is. Good point. That's all. Sorry. Any, any questions for

Robert? I definitely have questions and we'll see how we move forward with those. So the, based on the floor plans in exhibit four, the new floor plans, it appears that if it were a restaurant or a

retail store, the 3200 gross square foot space on the corner, it appears that that would be accessible in three different ways. And of course, maybe, maybe some of these would be emergency egress

points, but it looks like there's a set of doors out onto 7th street, a set of doors directly out into Hamilton and it also looks like that would be accessible through the main lobby of the entire

building. And then another set of doors into the restaurant. Is that the intent? That's the potential. Those are all the opportunities, I guess I'll say the door, the internal doors that go between

the lobby and that space, it would be, if there was another use, let's say, that benefited the school for them to have access directly into that space. We have the opportunity to add those doors

there. The doors along Hamilton street and 7th street, we are proceeding with those doors. Those doors were a part of the original plan approval. You had indicated that the building will be accessible

to the students 24/7, so if it were a restaurant space, if the restaurant were open at the same time, I guess them accessing through the atrium would be, I guess, is the security turnstiles at the

midpoint of the lobby or at the front door or is that still undetermined? Good question. But the security turnstiles are just on the page, to the right hand of the security desk. So you would have to

come in through, get permission to pass through the turnstiles or you already have access granted to get through those turnstiles. Whereas if it was worked out this way, you could also come through

potentially and just go right into the restaurant. Potentially. Potentially. Understand that we don't know it's a restaurant, we don't know if it's a retail store, but that potential exists because

that leads to my next question. So I see, and without squinting or asking you to hold this drawing, I can't read, looks like it's about 66 feet, maybe 67 feet of frontage along 7th that is occupied by

the medical school. And we already talked about the 42 feet on Hamilton. Yes. The front facade on Hamilton? Yeah, about 42 feet. And so the ordinance might correct me or help me out here, the

ordinance prohibits anything other than, well, prohibits a university on either frontage or just on Hamilton. In this case, the frontage would be prohibited on Hamilton Street. It's prohibited in the

front facade of the ground story. When I issued the Nile, I did do a review of both facades since there is relatively similar frontage along both facades. If there were the possibility to offer a more

favorable interpretation, treating 7th as the facade or as the frontage, I would have explored that, but I reached the conclusion that the matter was academic. Got it. So the prohibition only applies

to Hamilton? Correct. The prohibition only applies to Hamilton. The use can exist at the frontage along 7th as a side. That's a derivative of the fact that we all agreed at the beginning that Hamilton

was the front facade. Right. Yes, that's correct. All right. So that leads to my next question. So the dimensions that are not shown, and I'm sure it's reasonably, it's a scaled, well, I think it's a

scaled drawing, do you know what frontage along 7th Street the restaurant occupies? I'm going to say it's not shown measured on here, but I will just say looking at the 66 feet roughly, I would say

it's probably close to 70 feet. I mean, we could, it's, if you look at the bottom, I guess the wet lab is 52 and the advanced dissection lab is 32 and that runs a little bit past. So if you call it,

you know, it's at least 60 feet for sure. Yeah, probably about 70 feet, I would say. Yeah. Roughly. So while you're asking for a variance that applies to essentially 42 feet of frontage, unknowing

what we're doing with the atrium space, the proposed use will offer 60 feet of foot traffic generating permitted use on 7th and also wraps around the most prominent corner of the, of the building at

an intersection that's on a street that's one way south. That's correct. And then the last question I had, we talked about, we talked about the on Hamilton Street, the water table being a marble up to

a certain height. Was that, wasn't that water table along the 7th Street side that same height? It is, and that's a good point. So as a part of the original zoning hearing board approval in 2025, we

did request this board to extend four of the window openings along 7th Street and cut that water table out of the building facade to extend the windows down to the ground level. So in exhibit, I

believe it's exhibit five, there is an elevation shown on the last second, the last page on the right hand side is the East, East 7th Street elevation. The first four windows, if you're working from

right to left, were cut down to ground elevation so that we could have glass come all the way down to the first floor or onto the ground floor. And then you also see there's that added door there,

which will be a glass, you know, storefront door system as well. So, so 7th Street, it's still challenging, but we have other things going our way there to sort of help mitigate some of the lack of

transparency. Those, those are all my questions. Okay. Anything? Yeah. Any more questions? I have no questions. Okay, Robert, thank you. Thank you. Um, if I can move all the exhibits into the record.

They're accepted. Um, they're admitted. So I think Robert really covered everything. I have a memorandum of law I can hand up to you and there's case law that talks about historic preservation in

similar regulations and restrictions forming the basis for hardship. Um, so I think here that really satisfies the hardship element, um, for the variance and then I think Robert's testimony covers

everything else. So tell us, tell us again, your case law indicates that historic preservation regulations can be held to create unnecessary hardship. Hardship, right. If they're applicable to a

specific property and not general, right, um, can be the basis for hardship. Um, and I'll, I'll hand that up to you in a second. So with that, you know, I believe we've, we've met our test for the

variance and on the other request for relief, the change really doesn't impact your, your ultimate decision of whether it was appropriate to, um, allow for the partial demolition of this building. So

we ask that you modify that decision accordingly. All right. And thank you very much. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Are we ready for discussion? Yes. Who'd like to start? Um, I think there's a number of, uh,

unique features about this particular property and project that are, um, pertinent to the, the relief being requested. And I think the first one, um, I think revolves substantially around the, um,

case law that attorney Davis or, uh, attorney McCarthy, um, provided to us and that, and as he indicated, this is his third pass at this particular property. Not always for the same thing, obviously,

but, um, both the first two times were specifically related to the historic demolition overlay, um, and the conditions of this board which permitted a portion of the building to be demolished and yet

required that, as you can see in the actual photos that, um, the substantial portion of the, uh, historic facade be retained. And, and that I think does create some limiting factors that are unique to

the property that I think do rise to the potentially, at least to the, uh, to the level of, uh, of a legal hardship. Um, I will read these cases very thoroughly when we're not currently, uh, in the

middle of a hearing, but, um, so that's the first piece. I think that establishes the hardship, uh, and then as far as, um, some additional discussion as to how that, you know, that impact is

mitigated or how, um, the witness determined that it wouldn't create a negative impact on the neighborhood. And obviously one of the goals of the, the ordinance and of the city is to activate as much

foot traffic on Hamilton street, um, or at least within the downtown as possible. Uh, and I think a mitigating factor in this particular case is while there is, if we were to grant the relief on the

front facade, which is Hamilton, uh, you heard in my questions, that's about 42 feet of frontage that will not have retail space or restaurant space in the first 20 feet. But in lieu of that, um, the

seventh street side is providing 60 feet in addition to the 42 feet, I'm guessing it's symmetrical, the 42 feet on Hamilton street. So you're getting a hundred feet of facade that is potentially

activating in the form of a restaurant or retail when to meet the ordinance would have only provided possibly 84, um, feet. Uh, and I think that's even further, uh, improved by the fact that the

location of those two facades at the corner, um, are in a really unique and positive, um, exposure to one way traffic on seventh street, which is a state highway. Um, so you know, you can have, and I

think some of the original renderings and again, we don't know that it's a restaurant, but if it is a restaurant, um, there's patio space potentially out on the seven street side. So I think it, while

there is a hardship, I think the proposed design more than mitigates any potential negative, um, to that particular, uh, focus on pedestrian traffic due to the combination of facades that are going to

provide some level of, of retail foot traffic. Yeah, I would agree with all that and just add to that. I find the fact that, um, there is 24 seven access and the amount of students that will most

likely be living downtown because the partnerships between, um, the developer and the medical school to me will generate similar foot traffic as a potential retail establishment in that, that 20 feet

of facade space. So, um, in addition to everything you said, Scott, I would just add that well thought out, I think, uh, I agree a hundred percent with what both of you have said. I think this is a

great project. I think they've modified the loss of, uh, front facade space by having more on seventh street and, um, that meets all the criteria that we're concerned with. So do I have a motion, I'll

make a motion to do two things. One to amend the conditions of the previous, um, 2025 decision, um, as they are necessary to, to provide what's proposed today. Um, and, and I think that specifically

was about the floor plans, but I'll, I'll leave it more open ended so that if there's anything else that conflicts about the 2025 versus what's proposed now that, you know, we'll just make that part

of the mission, the motion. This will supersede it. Correct. To, um, provide the, uh, the relief necessary in the form of, uh, I guess it's a dimensional variance, um, relative to the, um, front

facade being Hamilton street and not providing for an extended frontage of about 42 feet, not providing the required, um, retail or restaurant space where I guess the alternative is allowing for, um,

a university or college to occupy that, that space, um, subject to the, uh, project being constructed and operated as testified to understanding that the ultimate use of this corner, um, the Northeast

corner of the building is still speculative and we don't know that it's a restaurant or a retail, but, um, that it would not be whatever the future use would be a use that is in compliance with the

ordinance. All right. Do I have a second to that? I second. Okay, the, this matter is going before the planning commission or it's returning the planning commission next Tuesday. This was, this was

initially proposed as land development project. The planning commission determined the, some of the revisions to be enough significance that would constitute a revision to land development to be heard

by the planning commission. I know that the licenses permits and authorizations as a standard condition, but I'd suggest making specific mention in the conditions to that all approvals deemed

necessary by the Allentown city planning commission be furnished. And I'll defer that question to Jennifer Gomez, the director of planning and zoning, but it is my understanding that it has been

placed on the upcoming planning commission agenda. So you're suggesting language that's that incorporates the requirements, the particular requirements of the planning commission as to what? Or just

simply that the revision to the, simply that the revision to the previously or that the applicant obtain all approvals required by the Allentown city planning commission for modification to previous

land development approvals associated with the project. Hesitate on that. If we approve this, they're still going to have to go to planning and land development. And that's determined by the city. So

go ahead. I mean, I, Mr. Chairman, I think I agree with you. I mean, obviously we have to get all the other approvals, you know, this is focused on the use. Yeah. So yes, we have to get whatever

permits and whatever the sounder requires and all of that. So I'm not sure exactly what that adds to this decision, what it adds and does it just create some kind of ambiguity or something I will

comply with all applicable ordinances. Of course, to some extent feel like we don't know the details of any of that. That's not our jurisdiction. And if the city has in its current ordinances, the

capacity to require you to go to land development, they can do that. But I don't feel it's our role to require that specifically because I don't know if it is. I think that the standard language we

use about all permits, licenses, and authorizations is adequate. I would agree. And I think Mike that really covers your concern to compliance with any applicable saddle requirements that may be or

that maybe is the is the primary concern or is the primary matter since the planning commission would be the appropriate regulatory body there. Right. All right. Without that suggested modification by

the zoning supervisor, do I have a motion? I did. I did make a motion. I did make a motion. I second it. I second it. All in favor. Aye. Aye. Okay. Thank you very much. Let's see. We will take. I

don't think counsel I've seen counsel for the first case yet. Oh, you are here. Oh, there you are. You made it. All right. Shall we take the Allen Street matter then? Good evening. Good evening. So

city star management is applying for an appeal from September 8, 2026 determination of the zoning officer concerning the banquet hall at 170 West Allen Street. We request that the classification be

proposed that is proposed under the use of restaurant rather than indoor small entertainment. We believe that restaurant includes the subcategory of banquet hall actually says that it includes it in

the code and we believe this is this falls more under it which is which is it's by right. It doesn't require any special exceptions in the alternative. We do request that if the zoning board

determines that the proposed banquet hall is classified as indoor small entertainment. We request a special exception identified in the zoning officers letter move forward then do you want to hear why

we believe it falls under restaurant. Yes, you can point out the sections and the activities that are planned there. Sure. So the activities it's basically will be used for parties birthday parties

weddings graduation parties and in all of these these events may be catered we have we will have a kitchen but not like a full kitchen so warming station with a kitchenette. We're looking at section

660-37F, and it defines restaurant as an establishment that serves right to eat food and beverages. An expressly states restaurant subcategory includes banquet halls. The entertainment spectator

participant category does not displace the express classification. 660-37G describes that category as gathering places for recreation, entertainment, or assembly activities "that are not more

specifically identified under the description of other use categories." It gives the examples of stadium, sports arena, auditoriums, cinema, theater, bowling centers, and video arcades. Banquet halls

are specifically identified in the restaurant subcategory. It just makes more sense that it falls under that than the entertainment category, which doesn't include banquet halls. The proposed event

center may have music, dancing, or other customary activities that happen at weddings or receptions, birthday parties, or similar banquets, but those don't change the character of the establishment

from banquet hall to something like a theater or an auditorium. The principal use remains hosting of catered banquets and private events. Table 664 identifies restaurant in the GXN district, and that

restaurant is permitted as of right when the lot has frontage on a mixed used corridor. The zoning officer already determined that the property has frontage on Ridge Avenue, which is a mixed use

corridor. We also request for, if there may be special exception under 660-37F, for eating and drinking places in the GXN district if it's open to the public between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. Our proposed

closing time is 10 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 10 p.m. on Sunday. So under those rules we would need, because it goes past 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, special

exception standards may need to be applied. All right. Do you have any witnesses? For the sake of time, I'm not presenting a witness because he would need a translator, so I'd be happy to answer any

questions regarding hours of operation. So what would the earliest in the day be for the operation? Probably sometime after noon, 12 p.m. So around noon to 10, Monday through Thursday, noon to 10 on

Sunday, and noon to 11 on Friday and Saturday only. Correct. I'm sorry. Elizabeth Salib, S-A-L-E-B. Also this was a social hall before, so it's not changing the character of the existing property. It

was a social hall. It served similar purposes. A lot of people from the community talked about how they had birthday parties there, so it's basically keeping, preserving the original and use of the

building. And how much of the, is the first floor only? It's just the first floor, yes. But there is a basement. There's a basement that we use for storage. It'll be closed off. And there's not a

second floor, I guess? No. Just a high front there. I did attach pictures as an exhibit to the appeal. I also have copies, if you'd like, printed pictures, but they're black and white. My apologies. I

can pass those around. These are photographs of what the interior would look like with tables and chairs, you say? Yeah, correct. We're just renderings. I also have a layout. And we also have a zoning

request for the sign. You say you do have a request for the sign? I didn't see that, I don't think. But there's no issue with the sign, apparently? Correct. Okay, all right. Oh yeah. Any questions,

Samantha? I think I'm, could you please kind of reiterate or explain all the types of activities that could, that you are proposing to allow in this building? I think I'm still a little unclear. I

heard events, catered food, but that it would be open to the general public, it seems like. So can you just clarify what you're proposing? Okay. It's not open to the general public. It's by

appointment or reservation only. And it's a place to provide, it's an open space to provide the community an area to hold birthday parties, baby showers, bridal parties, a wedding reception,

anniversary, possibly religious events, things where you would expect people to bring food or would want to have some refreshments. And that's what the previous use was very similar to. And all the

work that is going to be done in there is just basically to bring it up to code. There's no additions, there's no major alterations, just basically bringing up electrical systems, upgrading the

electric, upgrading, painting, flooring, HVAC. Some walls are going to be removed to make the space more open, and some will be added for privacy, upgrading bathrooms. So basically everything inside

is the same layout. There's no major changes. How long has your client owned the property? I don't have the deed, but a few years. And do you know what the present use is? It's just vacant. There's no

present use. You know how long it's been vacant? Since before he purchased it, I believe it was vacant for maybe three or four years. The previous owners, I think they owed taxes and it wasn't being

used. But it was basically a social hall before. Can you explain with an event venue of this type, there will be a large amount of people probably arriving around the same time compared to, say,

another restaurant use where people are coming and maybe in smaller groups. Can you explain kind of the traffic pattern and parking and everything related? Sure. Off of Ridge Avenue, there's a

driveway that enters, brings you behind the building. And there's about 15 parking spaces back there. Yeah. Well, no, keep going. Yeah, right there. In that too. Right there, that's the driveway. It

brings you to the back of the building. There's 15 spaces there. We also own that building there too, so we don't have a problem with parking. How about the capacity? How many people, for example, for

a bridal shower with the room hold? It looks like he has 116 based on the space on square footage. Maximum, huh? Yeah. So with these uses, I asked the zoning supervisor, there's no issue with parking?

Yes, that's correct. There would have been no issue determined with parking. So is 15 spaces enough or does that include some non-conforming parking for what was a social hall? And the parking would

have been compliant with the existing parking lot for the social hall. Any other questions? Okay, thank you. And we have some objectors. Do they want to say something? Yes, you have to come up here,

please. My name is Joe Coley. I'm 42 years old. Joe, J-O-E. Last name, K-H-O-U-L-I. And she's going to swear you in. Okay. O-U-L-I. Yes, yes. And the last name is what, Coley? Yeah, Coley. Of Syrian

heritage, but born and raised here in Allentown. So that's what's the last name. You said A-H. K-H-O-U-L-I. And what's your address? 178 and a half West Allen Street. So I live right there on Allen

Street. Relative to the subject property? Yeah, that's 170. So we would be, the house is going to your right of the picture. Their house is immediately to the right. They're with me here also. To the

right of the St. Nick's? Well, if you look at the picture to the right, but we would be to the left of the building if, from the picture. All right. So your next door over that, was there, was that a

street I saw? If you keep going to one of the pictures, keep going. That's right there. You see those houses going down? Yes. The first silver one, those row homes. Okay. They live in the first one.

They would be the immediate neighbors. Okay. And we are two doors down from there. Okay. My father is there also. All right. And I also brought another neighbor who lives across the street from us.

All right. How long have you lived in this neighborhood? I've lived here my whole life, 42 years. How long has that building been vacant? It's been vacant for a few years, but we've seen a lot of

people come and go. What's a few years? I guess over three, four years now. Okay. We haven't seen like any real activity in it. Okay. Other than somebody purchased it, I think before them, trying to

do something with a pinball arcade hall. Okay. We never saw it. Okay. All right. So what do you want to tell us? Just basically my experience with that social hall being in a residential neighborhood

for all these years, it's, we've had nothing but problems come from that social. I'm nothing against them because they're the new owners. Like you said, it's, if it's for banquet hall type parties,

receptions, anything of a large gathering, if you see there's, he said there's 15 parking spots. If there's going to be a large gathering there, you know, 15 parking spots is not going to fit a

hundred people. So we already fight as it is just to find parking on the street. And with large gatherings like that, you know, sometimes they can get out of control, depending what time of night. I

know she stated that they don't plan to have anybody there past 10, 11 PM. But even then, like, how can you guarantee these large gatherings will not have people right outside these steps? And we used

to find broken bottles, broken, you know, anything trash outside, just loud music. You can't sleep. It's just, we don't think a commercial building should be in a residential neighborhood. So I don't

know if we can really do anything about it, but it's just, I'm here to speak my opinion because I've lived there my whole life. And we just don't think a commercial building like this should be

occupied in our neighborhood. All right. Thank you. Okay. Does anyone have anything to add to that? We don't have to hear the same thing again. May I ask that object or question? I'm sorry, you just

sat down. May I ask you a question? You know, I understand your concerns about a commercial use in a purely residential neighborhood. You know, but that, that building exists. What would you envision

in that space if it wasn't to be kind of continued? How about apartments? You know, can it be switched over to residential? I guess they could do two, three, four or five apartments. But like I said,

I've been born and raised there my whole life. I've seen a lot of different occupants come and go from that area. Sometimes shootings that night, sometimes large disturbances, you know, it's downtown.

So thank you. Okay. I don't see anyone else who wants to speak. Am I correct? All right. Okay. Let's, we've got these photographs in the submissions already, but I'm going to mark them collectively.

There's three photographs, A1. And you're moving them into evidence. Yes. Anything you want to add? Just to address some of his concerns. We don't plan on making this like an area where people will

congregate and break bottles. We want the building to be something nice on that block. We also want something where people can enjoy it and use it for celebrations. That's why we're not opening past

11pm. We're also going to have a lot of lighting outside and security cameras and maintenance people and not let it get out of hand. So I think it's being used is better than sitting vacant where more

problems can happen. Just to clarify, I'm seeing now in the narrative that the days and hours of operation are slightly different than the 12pm to 10 and 11pm starting at 9am. But my question is about

the sentence that comes right after, which says that cleanup activities may occur approximately one hour after scheduled events. So are the hours of operation inclusive of cleanup? No, because we

would assume that people would be gone by then. Do you mean cleanup? If the person who's holding the party is going to clean up, maybe yeah, the person holding the party would have to clean up by 11.

Okay, so all activities would be finished by 11 or by 10? Yes. Thank you. Well, right behind the building is an elementary school. So if you're thinking of operating there in afternoon hours, you have

to think about the kids coming out of the school at 3pm every day in a bus schedule going through that alley. Okay, did you want to add something? Just a question. Go ahead and answer it. So we did

request for bring your own. The code does allow for that if it's if it's between certain hours. I believe it is if it can comply with the ordinance and city requirements 66037F, a private party is not

treated as BOI OB establishment when the facility is rented for no more than six hours, no more than once in 24 hour period, not between midnight and 8am. And we would be willing to accept reasonable

conditions conforming, confirming compliance with those limitations. But we will we would not be serving alcohol. No, we would like for parties to have that option to bring their to bring their own.

If I may, for benefit of the neighbors and for benefit of the public, there are a couple issues at play with BOI OB. BOI OB is an articulated use in its own right, but that primarily is meant to

regulate establishments that that would have that as a persistent feature of their service, whether that's that's a restaurant where every sitting they may be permitting customers bring their own wine

or if it if it might be some kind of music club charging a corkage fee or a bottle fee or an establishment of that nature. There is a limited carve out so an establishment that may occasionally have a

have a have a retirement celebration or a wedding reception where where guests may bring in their own their own alcohol has some limited room to be able to carry on that activity. That said zoning

isn't the only the only city arm that would regulate any kind of activity involving alcohol. Obviously, they're they're peace and good order ordinances in the city. There's a section of the nuisance

code dedicated to nuisance uses for for when you start string outside the parameters of of what it may be permitted for causing challenges for neighbors. There also are there's also obviously the

liquor control board. So anytime alcohol service or any anytime you use involving involving alcohol is proposed but it gets review but the BYOB designation is only extended if that's if that's a core

and central pattern of the pattern of the proposed use rather rather than the private party this weekend may be bringing in some bottles of wine and and some beer for retirement celebration. Okay any

other questions to clarify none of the supplemental use regulations for BYOB including proximity to a primary or secondary school would apply in this case since there it's not every party that's

having BYOB. Yes, that's that would be correct. Obviously, if they were to extend that the outcome there was creep in the alcohol service and if there if this were to essentially start function as a

as a club where there's DJ playing every night and where there's where there's bottle service being provided with alcohol brought in by patrons obviously that would that would be an enforcement matter

for our office that would that would not be acceptable but if it if it was the use is testified if it if it was that the wedding reception has has beer and wine being furnished on Sunday but the next

event with alcohol isn't for another another week or two when there's not a successive pattern of use then no those supplemental standards wouldn't apply. And that's what the what the venue envisions

some party may want to bring something on in some private event but not every single event obviously if it's a kid's birthday party no one's going to bring anything like that. It would be important to

establish on the record that the onus would be on the operator to maintain to make compliance at all times and to to keep control and to maintain a proper establishment. Correct and those things will

be in the in the contract that the that the party signs with the venue. If we were to approve this I think we would establish some conditions like if there are music it can't be heard outside the

premises there could be no consumption of alcohol outside the premises it could be no part of the party outside the premise it has to be all interior the hours of course that the I think I think it is

appropriate to say that the owner of the property must have a way of supervising the activities so that they don't spill out into the street or they don't last after the hours correct and they will

have staff for that it won't be here's the key go have your party there'll be staff so be staff staffed by the owner at all events correct okay has to be otherwise who knows what will happen yeah

thoughts discussion um sure uh so I think there's two things in front of us there's an interpretation of the use and then uh well let's deal with that first and then we'll get into the second because

I don't I don't know that we need to deal with the second one depending on the first so um I reviewed what the uh what the applicant has presented or at least led us to in the zoning ordinance um and

I'm inclined to agree with with her interpretation that a banquet hall is clearly a subset of the restaurant category I didn't see anything or hear anything in the testimony that was presented or in

the written description that was provided um previously um that made me feel like this was an entertainment venue like no one's they they may if the group coming to have a child's birthday party hires

a clown or something like that that's ancillary to the banquet it's not like they're not selling tickets to a clown show um so I think for all those reasons I would I would tend to um interpret that

or conclude that this is indeed a banquet hall um because it seems to appear that way to me and the and the section cited um by the applicant in reviewing those tend to support that in my opinion yeah

I would agree with that especially in um you know the renderings um that were included um you know in terms of the setup there's no like gaming tables or anything that we're seeing right now that

would um lend itself to being more of like an entertainment hall it really does truly look like a a banquet hall where you know instead of tables there could be food you know a band playing for an

event um so I would I would agree with that interpretation and it's in it's in black and white it includes banquet hall and I think as testified is is a banquet hall if I may for the for the sake of

the record the one piece of the interpretation that was the most crucial to the city and the determination was was the lead-in language of an establishment that serves ready to eat food and food and

beverages as classified as a as a restaurant our understanding is that there will be while there may be warming and reheating capacity there is no type of food sir food prep capacity necessarily being

offered at at this space there is also some concern that that we do have we do have operators who are right concerned who just want to provide gathering space for the community but there are also

issues where their establishments that that may identify themselves as a banquet hall or an event space but that that's a use creep into essentially becoming nightclubs that that see enforcement so

the city does want to make the city does see some merit to keeping some kind of distinction in in some cases the indoor entertainment category is is also intended to be flexible it's not just it's not

just a bowling alley there's language in that category that indicates that it's a gathering place for entertainment that that's not more specifically identified under the description of other use

categories that's under section 660 37 dash g so for some integrity of abuses the city would have some preference that the the use remain being being treated as a as or as indoor as an entertainment

spectator and participant use rather than a restaurant use given the absence of a dedicated food service function that said the city wouldn't have any kind of position to articulate on the on the

special exception requests and obviously testimony has been been presented to the suitability and has fleshed out the the business concept well i i looked at that thank you mike um that's helpful i

did look at that definition and it says ready to eat but it doesn't say anything about where it's prepared so if you have a caterer that to me still i mean because i've participated in wedding

receptions or um showers or things of that nature um engagement party or whatever that was catered um so that the meals were prepared somewhere else and brought but as far as the customer is concerned

it's ready to eat like they don't have to to do anything so i mean unless there's a different interpretation of ready to eat it doesn't to me that the ordinance doesn't specify where it was prepared

so to me catering um would again and it's a it's a subset of restaurants so i can understand that you certainly couldn't have a very it'd be a really unique restaurant that didn't have its own cooking

facilities to to prepare the food on site but because banquet hall is listed within the restaurant category i think it's very common for banquet halls to have the capacity to support food service but

not necessarily generate the full production or preparation on site i guess the testimony was it would not be prepared here was that right in this instance no we we envision um more catering uh but

there is a kitchen i don't know how far preparation would go but if somebody wanted to bring vegetables to make a salad they don't need a stove for that they can do it themselves in the kitchen some

prep maybe um but not full that's an awful kitchen so that'd be i did look at that and that'd be my interpretation that the ordinance doesn't specify where the food is prepared the testimony is that

that they would rely again as the whether it could be a tea party in which case there really is no need for a full-blown kitchen um any number of things and banquet halls tend to be flexible and i

just feel like the the definition lends itself pretty clearly to the way it's written um to being a banquet hall much more so and i understand that the open interpretation of the indoor um event

facility or spectator participant facility i just feel like the restaurant banquet is pretty straightforward and i just don't see anything in the definitions as provided in the ordinance that would

have me real determined that this was anything other than a banquet hall within the restaurant category okay do i have a motion oh a question so if it's a if it's a banquet hall it's permitted use

we've heard that the parking is theoretically adequate although we know that in many many spots throughout the city it's uh parking's evolved to a problem and i and i think that you know as some of

the objectors alluded to this has been a um this facility's been here for a very long period of time and has a variety of users over the years and i think for any um banquet hall to to have any love

especially if it's 106 seats for them to have any level of success they're going to have to provide some solution to that and that might be um having a parking lot somewhere else and having a shuttle

service um to the facility which would cut down on traffic and keep the guests arriving and departing on a schedule um but again if if if all we're doing is the interpretation which i believe that

we're about to do i don't know that there's really any lawful way for us to attach any conditions because we're just making an interpretation of definition and you know while you can if you're

granting the variance or even in some cases a special exception you can attach reasonable conditions i don't believe that we can enforce any conditions simply on a interpretation of definition there

there is one other thing we can do to put some ease to it um there is another parking lot that the funeral house owns and uh in the past for other properties they've let us use it when they're not

using it um and it may be uh free in the evenings we can't we can talk to them and send you send cars over there too and i think there's even a little city parking space a couple blocks down that we

could talk to the city about using uh the parking authority okay all right thank you thank you so where do we stand i think we are agreeing that this is a banquet hall under the as has been testified

to so i as has been testified to so i think it's appropriate even though it's permitted that it's been testified to establish that it is a banquet hall not an entertainment facility and i think in

that case we could attach the condition that it shall be as testified to i that makes sense i mean that it that it just to confirm what our interpretation of definition was based on yes i think that

that makes sense exactly so as testified meaning the hours that you know the activities available parking elsewhere if needed yeah all right so do i have a motion i'll make a motion to indicate that

we determined the use as described was a banquet hall which is a subcategory of restaurant and that um our that interpretation is tied directly to this use as it was testified testifying okay i second

all in favor bye okay now we have dolphin street it's been a letter from you or who i'm the owner of okay my name is tarek my own 210 212 south dolphin 212 and you're the present owner okay uh this is

from the creek okay but let's before we get going i want you to raise your right hand and the uh stenographer's gonna swear you in yeah i'll say yeah my name is tarek shihab t-a-r-e-k-s-h-e-h-a-b yes

and you're the owner since when july this last july july 2026 you acquired this property okay and you want to convert an office into a child care center but there are dwelling units on the property

also correct how many there are existing two apartments right now okay and they were they were created before you bought it i take it even before the previous owner brought it too they were created

okay and so there's two apartment units there what else right now the rest of the building is vacant uh do you know what it was it used to be the home of chef niskey electric it used to be his office

in his warehouse okay what electric was it chef niskey chef niskey okay and so how long has it been vacant and unused do you know probably about a year right now okay yeah he he outgrew the building

he bought another property in allentown okay all right all right go ahead okay can i give that letter uh this is from the owner you said yes from the previous owner and what's the point of it just to

give him the history of the building what he did and all that's uh let's see if we need it okay you guys have plans i have half size copy plans if you want i also have a full one scott if you want a

full one thanks are these what we're submitted with your packet yes okay or with your application yeah so currently what we like to do is from what mike stated in his in his review the daycare is

allowed by special exception but not because it cannot be because it's attached to a dwelling unit now the way we look at it it's technically almost two separate buildings it's 210 212 south dauphin

they are on one deed but they do have two separate addresses the upstairs units and according from the way pp and l has it the upstairs are 210 unit a unit one and 210 unit two downstairs is all unit

212 and that's when and the apartments have a separate entrance from the outside they do not you cannot go into the building to go up to the to the apartments if if you look at the photo that's there

right now the burgundy door with the light window right above it that goes straight up to the apartments that's the only entrance and exit to the apartments so this this building that we're looking at

the whole building is the property we're talking about sorry so just to get my addresses straight you've got the looks like there are two buildings like one has the two bay windows and kind of has the

tan and then to the on the on the photograph it's on the screen right now the there's a brick building with a garage door in it those to me look like those are two buildings that were built at

different times and for different purposes right now the apartments are in the upstairs of the building with the bay windows correct and what's what's on the first floor of that building and what's

that address so the first floor is 212 south dolphin but the apartments are 210 south dolphin and what about the brick building in the back same thing it's part of 212 okay so what happens is when you

go if you look at your sheet um a one sheet a one is the existing layout of the building right now so that's when you enter the door it would be the glass door with the picture that says for sale on

there right now that's the entrance to the old chef niski electric office has his reception conference room uh his office and a couple other offices and some storage but if you go by the kitchen the

kitchen opens up to the warehouse so there is a divining wall between them at some point i don't know when they were put together on the same deed i don't maybe they were like that the whole time and

there's also a parking lot to the north of the building as well too sorry to interrupt man copy of the small plans they were cut off all right so and the proposed use would occupy the entire first

floor of both buildings yes and then what about the the second floor and it's on the photograph i never would have noticed but on the plans i can see that the building and the brick building with the

garage door the second floor only extends parkway back correct and then it's a higher elevation so we're trying to make another apartment on that there because it has its own separate entrance from

the outside as well if anybody wants the large-scale look at i'll be happy to pass it then so the the apartments because it was existing this big second floor yeah a2 is the existing second floor of

the apartments and the existing second floor says roof yes that's only one story one and a half story i don't know if you have the photos of the side of the building the north side that's the north

side of the building that's where the parking lot would be and then over to the left is the second floor which would be this area right here and that just is to remain storage that's going to be an

actual apartment you're going to put an apartment there but you want the preschool you go to page a4 a4 that would be its own one-bedroom apartment with its own separate entrance from the outside over

here and so the uh child care would be the entire ground floor of both we'll call them both the buildings yes and there's a okay there's a connection there but there's no way to reach the apartments

from the ground floor there are no interior steps to reach the apartments from the ground floor for the two existing and the new one that we are going to be making there's a door out here that would

be scared to go up to that unit and the existing two units the entrance is the entrance is off of dolphins three which is here okay so this is dolphin here yes sir this door is existing we can go back

to the first photo i'm sorry so here's the glass door that has the shafiski electric okay the next door to the right of that the room door that takes you up to the apartments upstairs it says okay

then the double door right now that would be that's just another door that they have to be able to go into the building and then the door to the right of that that takes you into the warehouse area

right now that's going to be we are going to be taking out the garage door and adding a window in there to match the existing windows all the windows are being replaced on the warehouse side to have

double hung windows to match and get it to like the commercial warehouse look there'll be probable back windows double hung page 514 is probably what you're looking for now we've had since i've owned

it i've had a bunch of people call me about downstairs they want auto repair tinting stereos it doesn't fit the area in my opinion the area where it fits there is a day care it's across the street

from an elementary school i don't think the other uses that were that came by will do the neighborhood justice and we all know when you get these mechanics they're in they're changing the engines in

the park a lot so i don't i don't need that i don't need the headache i don't want the neighbors coming after me was a narrative submitted did i say that in the uh was that my question was a narrative

submitted i am reviewing the file we did submit a narrative with the package i have the the potential um owner well of the operator of the daycare and also the old uh realtor that was here that sold

me the building he's day i like about a year it was for sale building was for sale yeah what was that the building was for sale for a year and i know mr shafniski personally him and i've been friends

for almost 40 years um and i won't do him on justice to make it into just a whatever kind of building he actually lived upstairs in one of the units when he opened up his business and scott you can

correct me if i'm wrong but i believe when i was a younger kid um woody's started their business out of their their catering business woody's pizza okay and there was um there was a rudimentary

operational narrative that was submitted but the applicant pretty much left it at the level that they're willing to provide information upon request so this may this may be the opportunity to make

that request here all right any questions so far this witness in the premises okay maybe we need to hear from the proposed operator sure miguelina de la cruz hello hello and we just say your name so

we can hear it miguelina de la cruz okay okay so i'm here regarding the proposed establishment of twin star learning center my goal is to provide a safe structured and high quality child care

environment for children in the allentown community i believe this location can provide an important service to local families by offering child care and early childhood education i'm committed to

complying with all applicable zoning building fire safety and child care licensing requirements i respectfully ask the board to consider and approve or request for special exception thank you for your

time if you have any questions can you describe the drop off and pick up yes plan so because we have the parking space we will be dropping off and picking up from the side then we have uh obviously

the main entrance where we can have parents also picking up and dropping off so do you envision most of that activity happening in a parking lot or on the street i will say uh parking lot but mostly

on the street because drop off they're gonna be dropping off in the morning 6 a.m going to work then drop off again or pick up again in the afternoon or been when they pick up for you know when they

the shift is done at 6 p.m because we will be open from six to six monday to friday i have a business plan but i also have one copy how many children maximum 54 are me 54 54 yes and there would be at

sometimes 54 present it could be yes when there's no school when there is no school correct and when there is school those some of those kids would be in school you're saying correct so children will

come in in the morning uh wait until their time to go to school they will will have transportation to school we'll drop them off so we'll have basically less children during the day and uh how many uh

staff would be there um it depends but i'll say approximately maybe 25 staff yes or less yes define staff go have we could have staff in the morning shift afternoon shift so at any one time the

maximum staff would be how many um 12 and um do you presently operate child care center i do not but i work for the department of education so what i do is basically cover the food program department

for child care providers here in allentown other areas luzern philadelphia so basically what we do we make sure they're in compliance with the department and the location so we can provide the money

for the food so i go out check the daycares make sure everything is correct make sure everything is up today i make sure documentation for the children is up today signatures parents dates and we

provide the money at the end of the month so right now in your program i have 235 home daycares that we work with and perhaps it's shown on these drawings but where would the recreation area be is it

indoor outdoor first of all it will be indoor okay okay gym resource what are the the ages i forgot to ask you that the ages of the children you would service it will be from three months to 13 13

years correct of course you know you need an operational certificate from the city bureau of health and licensing correct yes any other questions any other questions okay i don't think we have any

more questions at the moment i'm going to give this back to you okay oops there you go thank you all right okay thank you and i'm gonna mark the you have one please did you get one if or i believe

those would have been submitted to the city along with uh or along with the application so so the city doesn't need another copy you know correct so i'll just call these these submissions a one

through a five four plus one up front a one a five all right we're ready for discussion yes i guess the real hurdle now is the question about the being let's let me look up the exact terminology cow

care center may not be within or physically attached to any structure containing one or more dwelling units okay how do we read that i mean it's obviously it's part of it's within the correct

structure containing one or more dwelling units and i mean my interpretation would be that you know even if this were an unusual large structure wedged in between row homes on both sides but you know

having a shared party wall that would be uh physically attached to any structure containing so it would be even that would be prohibited but in this particular case the dwelling units are in the same

structure um regardless of the address um the fact that i think maybe an argument could have been made if it was there's there's been at some point in time a connection between the the older brick

building and the the other build i don't know if it's older but the other building um but they're currently on one deed um but at least there might be an argument that those are two separate

structures but again they're still attached so i think um i just agree with you that that's the primary issue i think the the concept of a child care center here does make logical sense um so that's

not the issue it's just the we run into the specific very clear definition in the ordinance that there needs to be relief for and i i'm not seeing a unnecessary hardship to alter that other than i

mean he's indicated that the yeah the other uses you could put there would be less beneficial to the neighborhood but it might just be that the um the property owner simply needs to make a choice

about you know what the use of the property is going to be i mean it sounds like the i don't know what the the math of the equation is but it sounds like the child care facility would use up the vast

majority of the of the footprint um i don't know if the if there could be some other office use upstairs or some conversion of the apartments into something else but um you know my concern is if we

without a specific hardship relative to this question if we provide relief here we're essentially rewriting the zoning ordinance so that this this section we should just would have to basically just

cross it out and we can't do that um because that that would apply to every property in the city potentially so yeah and no i i agree and i'm just looking at the buildings and i potentially could have

been a different discussion if the daycare use was going to be confined to say the the portion on the right and there was a you know case made that like you can't get between the two buildings i know

it's attached but but that's not what we're dealing with like the there will be dwelling units in in both buildings there will or they're proposed to be daycare in both buildings There's a number of

different child care facilities or definitions and some allow for, I mean many of them are based out of dwellings and it's only when you get into micro child care centers and child care centers where

it goes the other way and prohibits it from being attached to a dwelling whereas you could do a family child care home or group child care home, both of those are specifically in dwelling units so the

ordinance does give flexibility for that depending on the scale, but when you get up to 54 that clearly puts you in a child care center. Can I add something? Yes. Go ahead. Okay so one of the options

we did look at was to utilize only the right side of the building like you were saying and actually build onto the roof if necessary if we needed to but we were told that it's still attached so I mean

I just don't see how you can, what if you had a strip mall attached next door to a residential then really you're confining that strip mall from putting anything in there then is that correct is what

I'm reading? No, that strip mall would be prohibited from assigning that adjacent, well the strip mall wouldn't be able to have a child care facility but it could have other retail uses so this

prohibition is specifically on child care centers and it derives out of the table, I should just put a tab on this because I'm never going to. But what is the reason that you can't have it attached,

like what's the? You are asking the quasi-judicial court who is interpreting the ordinance, the intent of the authors which is the legislative branch and the executive branch of this government so you

would have to ask either the planning department or city council as to what the intent of that, I think it's a carryover from previous ordinances and I could make some presumptions about what the

purpose of it is but that's not our particular role, but yeah it definitely comes out of the use classification system on 660-35 page 5-3 child care center in the GXN zone and then there's additional

regulations in 660-37C and that's where you get into the cannot be attached to or within any structure so it not only prohibits the specific structure but also structures on either side that are

physically attached which I think these buildings even though they're all in one deed even if they weren't they'd still be attached so even if you re-established the firewall and subdivided them I

think you'd still have this particular issue and this issue would probably occur in many other locations in the city so unfortunately I don't think there's anything that's specifically unique about

this, it's a struggle for you financially potentially but our issue is that if we grant you the relief without there being something really atypical about this we would I think unlawfully be striking

that section out of this brand new ordinance that's only 10 months old, 11 months old. I think too as I look at the use table we heard testimony about repair or maintenance auto repair types of uses

maybe not being congruent the surrounding neighborhood but there are a selection of other uses business support services, business training, instructional services, personal improvement services, art

gallery that are I believe permitted by right is that what the full circle means? Along with some other uses that have more like our special exception you know catering uses, etc, admin, business,

professional office, walk-in office, live work so while we did hear testimony that like a repair service is maybe not great from the neighborhood there are a variety of uses that the ordinance does

accommodate and permit in this district. Daycare center is not the only way and interestingly thanks for pointing that out all the vehicle sales and service none of them are permitted in this zone. So

you are correct that it would not be a good fit for this. So in that respect can I bring up Mike Doriliter from because he's had it for like he like I said for a year and he's had other people acquire

about if you want like to hear from him about that too. There are times when the vacancy and the attempts to sell or occupy a property for a period of time will have a bearing on our decision but not

a year. Got to be more than that. So for the sake of the record if I may to add on some clarification on the specific use of child care within the GXN zoning district a family child care home a group

child care home and the micro child care center permitted by right within the zoning district so there is all ample allowance made for child care facilities within the within the zoning district just

not a child care use of this level of intensity has been highlighted as a as a special exception use. It's worth noting conceivably that this building could be occupied by a or by family or by a group

child care facility or it could be occupied by right by a there are other child care facilities that could conceivably occupy this building albeit on a smaller scale. See but that even makes it even

makes no sense then to me either because you can allow it for less kids but you're saying now because we have more kids you can't allow it at all because it's attached to a dwelling unit. The micro

difference if they're both attached to a dwelling unit. The micro child care center it's also worth noting does not have the requirement attached to it. Right but that's a maximum of what seven that's

a maximum of that's a maximum of fewer children in care but there would be there would be nothing in the code necessarily that would prevent the space from from being demised somehow in the in the

multiple micro child care facilities. It's a matter I'm assuming it's a matter just of a constant just a matter of concentration just a matter of a concentration of concentration of children within or

a constant concentration of individuals within within one large and fairly open space. The code makes the code is similar prohibitions on attachment to dwelling units for for places of worship adult

day care centers have some have some similar considerations. So the code does have some some general through concern of spaces where the spaces where where there may be a congregation of individuals

in an attached in an attached building where there may be some some spell over of noise vibration et cetera if it's attached to if it's attached to other residential uses. All right. I think I'm ready

for a motion who'd like to make it go ahead. So I would make a motion to deny the variance request for a child care center that's attached to a dwelling unit based on what we had discussed that there

we did not hear a hardship of the property and then I guess we don't really need to make any further motions for denying that and yeah so we're not I would agree with that not because I don't think

that the applicant has good intentions I just for the reasons mentioned I just don't think we really have a lawful way to amend the ordinance given that we have to follow the municipality's planning

code and case law I would just take one step further that it's a special exception but you're correct that we're denying the variance because the application meets the special exception criteria up

until that point in which we need a variance to remove that requirement which which I would I'll second that I don't think we have a legal basis to remove in this particular case. Okay I have a motion

and a second all in favor. Aye. Aye. That is another question even though you guys voted this is just for my own personal use if I would take the whole building make it a daycare that's fine right. We

don't give you legal advice here but you can call him and ask him well I mean by special exception though because it would be there's no we we would consider that if it's before us we can't tell you

what to do and what you just okay ask ask your lawyer that question it just did I'm your lawyer I'm kidding okay thank you very much thank you have a great night. When's the next meeting? November

16th. 16th all right November 16th what's that's two weeks correct yeah two weeks November 16th then another two weeks to November 30th then again on December 7th okay okay any other business no

further business all right therefore the meeting is adjourned. I can unlock this week already it was 10 o'clock almost I'm glad you said that they need to change that I'll let them know oh yeah it's

10 it's 9 o'clock on the dot oh yeah thank God right across the street I could do it I could just like walk downstairs yeah I'm like craving a groceries oh really I swear I don't even know the last

time I had a groceries I literally I love them but it's been I mean long but I'm really tempted to stop this door it's like all we have is the rings and bread you live far I live in McCungee I could

be probably a little weird but oh she's 13 oh yeah my dad too my son is 20 he's in college he's been gone and they graduate all over here I can't time to strike so like he just left and my son is a

senior my daughter graduated ready to have two lives well I have one in college two in college one graduated one is one where did your son go? Millersville University does he like it yeah he's just

starting running back out there I don't know that's cool yeah he hasn't been going too good but he's having a great season you know and it's he is there in like a transfer portal they're trying to

build these profiles and but uh no but his educational wise he's doing good he's doing a sports mag with a minor in accounting oh that's awesome not that far I mean football season I don't see him

unless I go up there cause they'd be so busy he came down last Thursday but um I see him every week in North Carolina so is it is it it's not over yet is it? No you got what for about three more weeks

you're not going to make it to the playoff but yes that's all alright see you