University Estates representatives are one step closer to final approval from the Athens Planning Commission after receiving preliminary approval for all 826 acres of the golf club community.

At yesterday’s special meeting, the city’s Planning Commission granted University Estates preliminary planned unit development approval, or PUD, a classification that allows construction of multi-purpose buildings in a single area.

Before University Estates representatives may approach Athens City Council, the commission must hold a public hearing and approve final plans. Estates representatives must present the commission with survey information, construction timetables, engineering feasibility studies, approvals with the Disability and Shade Tree commissions and other descriptive documentation.

A lawsuit filed against the city, Mayor Ric Abel and code enforcement director Steve Pierson by The Villas at High Pointe Village LLC — the company that owns 13 acres of land within University Estates — is still scheduled for a hearing Jan. 22 in U.S. District Court.

The complaint demands that the city drop the code violation charges against Villas principal Richard Conard, not interfere with the construction of the company’s 25-building condominium neighborhood and award more than $1 million in compensatory damages.

Abel said the city never told University Estates developers to stop building, but Lantz Repp, senior vice president of University Estates, said yesterday that the company has stopped constructing the condominiums in High Pointe Village.

The code violations against Conard, also the owner of University Estates, were dismissed by the city Jan. 5.

The charges were dismissed because the city chose not to go to trial, not because there was a lack of evidence, said city prosecutor Lisa Eliason.