La Grande URA approves loan forgiveness for local business
Published 7:04 pm Wednesday, December 10, 2025
LA GRANDE — A local business is getting a helping hand from the La Grande Urban Renewal Agency this holiday season.
The URA — which also is the La Grande City Council — unanimously voted at its meeting Dec. 3 to forgive the small business assistance loan issued to Jenny Bartell for Community Merchants. Agency members determined Bartell fulfilled enough of the criteria to be eligible for forgiveness.
“I think this makes sense,” agency member Corrine Dutto said. “It is in the spirit of this urban renewal program.”
The agency issued Bartell a $32,235 loan in 2016, district manager John O’Brien said, for the expansion of Community Merchants into a new space on Adams Avenue. The total project was estimated to run more than $64,000.
Bartell still owed just under $6,000 on the loan and entered into the forgiveness window in January 2024.
Forgiveness criteria
The agreement included that half the loan could be forgiven if the business met certain criteria at the halfway point of loan repayment. To be eligible for forgiveness, Community Merchants needed to:
- Still be in business at the end of seven and a half years.
- Have a minimum of 1.5 full-time equivalent employees who were hired and employed for at least 36 months immediately prior to forgiveness.
- Have positive cash flow for the last 12 months prior to forgiveness.
- Be current on all payments and any late fees.
Bartell recently sold Community Merchants and wanted to know if the agency would consider an exception to the requirements in the agreement.
She fully met three of the requirements, O’Brien said, and the business has consistently maintained one full-time equivalent employee over the necessary timeframe.
Agency members weigh in
Members of the agency agreed with O’Brien assessment that Community Merchants met three and a half out of the four criteria.
“I think the point of this was to have local businesses and it’s a great business,” Dutto said. “It’s doing well and that’s what we wanted to encourage.”
Agency member Rikki Jo Hickey agreed, but also expressed concern that forgiving this loan could set a precedent. She pointed out that the agency worked hard to ensure that things are consistent across applicants.
“If somebody else comes in the future with a similar situation then we’re going to have to offer them the same sort of grace is my one concern,” Jo Hickey said. “And what if the amount is more?”
While the requirements around full-time equivalent employees used to be a big piece of the program in the past, Dutto said the agency has moved away from that.
“It wasn’t really reasonable,” she said. “With the covid climate and the economy, it just wasn’t something that they could reasonably make.”
The agency only issued three small business assistance loans, according to Economic Development Director Timothy Bishop. Of those three, one qualified for forgiveness at the half way mark. The second ran into challenges during the repayment process and utilized several deferments before the loan was sent to collections for nonpayment.
Community Merchant was the last of the three loans.
“This is really a one off in terms of this particular loan program and it’s the last of only three loans,” Bishop said.