Golden Rule Farms v. Water Resources Dept.

Where an agency provides a process for raising issues to it, the doctrine of exhaustion of administrative remedies requires a party to present the issue to the agency through that process before a court will consider it. Tuckenberry v. Board of Parole, 365 Or 640, 646 (2019).

Petitioner failed to meet the deadline specified in its groundwater permits and applied for extensions under ORS 537.630 and OAR 690-315-0040, which were denied by the Oregon Water Resources Department (OWRD). Petitioner petitioned OWRD to reconsider its final orders, and the petition was deemed denied by operation of law after OWRD failed to act. OWRD later withdrew its final orders and issued orders on reconsideration, modifying several findings of fact. Petitioner seeks judicial review, arguing OWRD “acted contrary to statute and outside of the range of its permissible discretion” and that the modified findings of fact are not supported by substantial evidence. OWRD responds that Petitioner’s contentions are not reviewable because Petitioner did not preserve the issues by raising them with OWRD in the first instance, thus failing to exhaust administrative remedies. Where an agency provides a process for raising issues to it, the doctrine of exhaustion of administrative remedies requires a party to present the issue to the agency through that process before a court will consider it. Tuckenberry v. Board of Parole, 365 Or 640, 646 (2019). OWRD has a well-established administrative process through which Petitioner can protest the order with the agency under OAR 690-315-0060, and Petitioner was given notice of that process yet failed to use it. Because Petitioner has not offered a convincing reason to relax the exhaustion requirement, the contentions are not reviewable. Affirmed.