A lawsuit-resistant environmental-impact document is certified for the proposed Gold Rush Ranch subdivision in Sutter Creek.

City council members Wednesday unanimously backed the document that concerns a controversial 1,330-house golf-course development.

A packed house of around 130 people attended the session that saw the first of a series of expected votes on a long-planned project hoped by many to arise as a cure-all for a troubled city economy. Additional elements of the project, such as a development agreement, could be voted on at the Jan. 4, 2010 city council meeting.

Council members signed off on an increase in motor traffic from the development that - even with proposed mitigation measures - consultants on the basis of a traffic study predict will be "significant and unavoidable."

Resident Bart Weatherly said he talked with a state Department of Transportation official recently about the traffic study and said the Caltrans official had called the study insufficient.

"I think we're past that," said Mayor Gary Wooten in response to Weatherly.

The town has moved with notable caution on the proposed development, which would double the Sutter Creek population. As proposed, it would cover some 945 acres of scenic oak woodland west of historic Sutter Creek.

As officials' remarks indicated, the Environmental Impact Report certified by the city council might be targeted in a lawsuit. In the years of discussion already logged on the proposed project, conservation interests have been sharply critical.

"If litigation develops, it's the developers' job to defend, not the city's," Wooten said.

Councilman Pat Crosby said he was convinced the EIR was "defensible."

Residents evidently are split on the project, with some objecting to what could be a drastic change in the character of the mining-era town at the hands of a large modern development erected on its western border. Others find various reasons to favor the project, with some citing a hoped-for increase in city revenues that could ease funding concerns for costly public services, such as public-safety departments.

In it for the long haul, members of development company Greenrock Holdings LLC have demonstrated patience in the city's take-it-slow approach to handling the project application.

Development partner Troy Claveran called the certification of the EIR "a good step."

Sutter Creek could realize from the development a new Amador County Main Library building, a public-school campus, several parks, beefed-up property-tax revenues to fund services, a destination-class golf course and other benefits.

However, the project's proposed size has never sat entirely comfortably with the full city council or the entirety of the town's citizenry. Residents of Amador County have decried the project's size, calling it the opening of a door to concerted subdividing on a large scale of scenic foothills acreage such as occurred in El Dorado Hills.

Still to come is a vote on what is called a specific plan for the project, in which could be seen some discussion of cutting the project size down from the proposed 1,330 homes.

"We're grateful for the city council's careful consideration and unanimous approval of the EIR," said project managing partner Bill Bunce. "We're happy that they are in decision-making mode. Getting that first vote is a big milestone."