Nick Green, former John Day city manager, and his wife on April 22, 2025, petitioned the Grant County Circuit Court to compel the city of John Day to grant him more than $7,300 in urban renewal incentives. (Blue Mountain Eagle/File)

Nick Green pushes for more than $7,300 in incentives despite program pause, plus court costs

JOHN DAY — John Day’s former city manager is seeking a court order to compel the city to grant him incentives through the city’s urban renewal agency.

Nick Green and his wife, Morgan, on April 22 petitioned the Grant County Circuit Court for a writ of mandamus seeking URA incentives they believe they’re entitled to despite the city pausing the incentives program in April 2024 due to insufficient funds. A writ of mandamus is a court order directing a government official or entity to perform a duty they are legally obligated to do.

Nick Green claims he submitted a URA application in May 2023, but the city contends it never received a proper URA application from Green prior to the suspension of the incentives program.

The Greens seek a waiver of $7,354 in system development charges for his home in the Ironwood Estates development within the URA, according to the petition. Homeowners typically pay system development charges when a government initially connects the home to water and sewer services.

The Greens also seek recovery of a prevailing party fee, along with attorney fees, costs and disbursements.

The incentives

John Day formed its urban renewal agency in 2018 to boost home construction in the city. The heart of the strategy is a pair of incentives to motivate the construction of new homes.

The first incentive is a 7% rebate on the assessed value of new homes  on an incentive plan parcel within the URA, payable after the homeowner puts the home on the city’s tax rolls. Green’s petition does not mention the rebate but does allege entitlement to all incentives.

The preproject assessed value of the Greens’ new single family home was $401,732, according to a URA application in the court filing. That assessed value would put the Greens’ rebate at just more than $28,000.

The second incentive is the city paying all the system development charges through the URA for new homes that require a connection to city services.

The application

At issue is when, or even if Nick Green submitted his URA application and whether or not that submission came prior to the pause of the incentives program.

The city insists while it received application fees, it never received a proper URA application from Green.

The city’s attorney in this case, Garrett Chrostek, of Bend, questioned whether Green’s application being received or approved would change circumstances given the incentives pause.

“However, even if received, or even if approved, I don’t see how that would change anything as the suspension extended to approved applications other than those subject to a pre-suspension development agreement,” he said in email correspondence in state court records.

Green’s attorney, John R. Roberts, of Eugene, responded that Green already submitted all the necessary paperwork and the city cashed a check from Green when it accepted his application.

Roberts gave the court a sworn statement from former John Day city records clerk Savannah Lovell asserting she processed Green’s land use review application and his URA application for benefits on or about May 23, 2023.

Lovell alleges she verified all of the applications were complete before placing them in a designated URA folder for then interim City Manager Rick Allen to approve.

“To the best of my knowledge, these applications were handled in compliance with all applicable procedures and were properly recorded in the city’s records at the time of submission,” she said in her statement.

Chrostek insisted the URA would not cover Green’s system development charges and said the application Green submitted to the city was a land use review application and not a URA application.

“Filing a land use application with the URA is not the same thing as making an application with the URA,” he said.

The city has 30 days from May 29 to answer the petition. Failure to do so by the city will result in the Greens applying to the court for the relief they outlined in the petition.