Homewood, CA – Owners of Lake Tahoe’s Homewood Mountain Resort plan to break ground this spring on a scaled-down expansion to the ski resort that led to a lawsuit filed by a pair of environmental organizations.

Friends of the West Shore and the Tahoe Area Sierra Club indicate that they reached a settlement last week with resort owner JMA Ventures in a 2012 lawsuit that last year halted work on the expansion. The agreement reduces the scope of the expansion first proposed in 2007 by a total of 13 residential units, although both the overall square footage and maximum building height will remain the same as initially proposed.

Homewood’s $500 million expansion from a small regional resort to a vacation destination south of Tahoe City calls for a 5-star hotel and numerous condominiums and townhomes, employee housing and 15,000 square feet of retail space. The revised plan agreed to last week by the plaintiffs in the 2012 litigation must still be approved by the Placer County Board of Supervisors and Tahoe Regional Planning Agency governing board. JMA officials expect that approval to be granted within the next two months.

Other provisions of the settlement prohibit tennis courts, ice rinks, mountain coasters and athletic fields. Homewood must also monitor and report on traffic patterns annually for 20 years.