By Donald Gilpin

About 750 Princeton homeowners will receive checks this week, almost $2,500 per eligible home, in accordance with a settlement reached a year ago in a lawsuit over Princeton University’s property tax exemptions.

The checks will be mailed from a property tax relief fund administered by the Community Foundation of New Jersey (CFNJ) to which the University contributed $2 million this year and agreed to contribute $1.6 million a year for the following five years.

Princeton homeowners who received a homestead benefit under the New Jersey Homestead Property Tax Credit Act in 2014 (the most recent year for which homestead benefits were paid by the state), and continue to own the home, will receive annual aid payments. They may use the checks for any purpose.

Beginning in 2011 area homeowners had argued that Princeton University is a profit-making institution and should not be exempt from property taxes. A year ago, three days before the suit was set to go to trial, the University agreed to settle the case. Both parties asserted that they would have won the case in court.

Lawyer for the plaintiffs Bruce Afran explained that the settlement, including the checks going out this week, “is the product of the tax exempt litigation. We settled the case to help take care of the most vulnerable homeowners. Many are working people, minorities, disabled, or seniors, and all of them have high taxes. The settlement was designed to protect this group of families.”

Afran went on to express his satisfaction with the settlement. “I’m proud of this,” he said. ”This program is delivering many times more in relief to these families than any politician has ever achieved. The checks will be very meaningful to these families.”

The distributions will probably be a couple of hundred dollars less in the following five years of the program, and any excess funds after all eligible distributions have been made will be donated to 101: Inc., a nonprofit organization providing need-based scholarships for graduates of Princeton High School attending post-secondary institutions other than Princeton University.

As part of last year’s settlement, Princeton University agreed to make three contributions of $416,700 to the Witherspoon-Jackson Development Corporation, to be used to aid housing and related needs of economically-disadvantaged residents.

The University also agreed to make a $3,480,000 annual voluntary contribution to the town in 2020, 2021, and 2022.

Eligible homeowners will receive checks directly from CFNJ in the first week of November. Questions should be directed to Joyce Jonat at CFNJ at (800) 659-5533, ext. 225.