By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
The Princeton Battlefield Society sued the Institute for Advanced Study and two of its subcontractors in federal court on Thursday to stop 15 units of IAS faculty housing from being built on part of the battlefield site.
The lawsuit alleges a violation of the Federal Clean Water Act, namely that half of a wetland on the IAS property has been filled in with dirt and sand where housing is due to go.
Battlefield Society attorney Bruce I. Afran said Thursday that the Society wants a judge to halt the project, require the IAS to fix the damage and assess the IAS, its engineering firm Van Note-Harvey Associates and its construction company, Pillari Bros Construction Corp., fines of $37,500 a day for every day the violation remains in place as federal law requires.
For its part, the IAS had no comment.
This is the latest effort by the Battlefield Society to derail a 15-unit project that it says would destroy a section of land where the battle of Princeton was waged in January 1777.
Last week, a coalition of nine groups including the New Jersey Sierra Club urged the IAS to reconsider an offer from the Civil War Trust to buy the property for $4.5 million.
