Turf Wars: Neighbors Gone Wild

In another dispute, Primavera brokered the following deal: The developer paid the dues for each new condo resident to enjoy—get this—a year-long membership in the neighborhood association!

It felt less like robbery that way.

THERE’S A TREATMENT coming for this disease. In May 2007, city residents overwhelmingly voted to redo the zoning code, and Nutter has supported the effort. The new rules governing development in Philadelphia should be finished by early next year. After that, we still face several years of planning meetings, during which community groups will be able to lobby for accepted and non-accepted uses of literally every square inch of their neighborhoods. The planned result is that developers won’t need to get the community groups’ approval. If the buildings they purchase are zoned for the activities they intend, they’ll receive the appropriate paperwork. This would be a fundamental change in how Philadelphia does business. And there has already been a fundamental shift in the city’s zoning board.

For example, in Manayunk, developer Rob Nydick couldn’t win community support to keep his wine bar, Agiato, open past 11 p.m. The residents there are tired of cheap bars and vomiting college kids. But Nydick isn’t planning a cheap bar for college kids, so he went to the zoning board without the community’s approval—and won. In response, the community group has appealed the zoning decision and challenged the liquor license—setting back Agiato’s opening by many months. According to Nydick, the civic association is asking him to limit his hours because it wants to establish a precedent at the location: If his restaurant fails, there would already be a proviso on the books closing down the next business’s operation at 11 p.m.

This is, then, nothing less than a fight to control the future — and it’s fundamentally legalistic. In fact, as the city moves toward changing its zoning laws, community associations are also calling upon the power of the Philadelphia Lawyer.

The South of South Neighborhood Association, the Center City Residents’ Association and the Society Hill Civic Association are just a few of the numerous neighborhood groups that ask developers to sign legal agreements governing their properties’ current and future uses.

I got a copy of the agreement Alex Plotkin signed at his second Chops, at 7th and Walnut. Some provisions of the agreement seem strange: “This restaurant shall be an upscale restaurant, in terms of quality of atmosphere, quality of training of employees, quality of food. … ”

And according to the Plotkin agreement, should he decide to sell Chops, before he can transfer the liquor license to another operator, the new owner must accept the agreement. Does this mean he can only sell Chops to another upscale-restaurant operator?

Plotkin declined to comment on the agreement he signed. And another restaurant owner, in another neighborhood, admitted he was asked to sign the same kind of agreement. “I sank everything into this restaurant,” the owner, who refused to sign, says. “And if I need to sell it at some point for health or business reasons, why should anyone be able to tell me who I can sell it to? I own it.”