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County Executive Isiah Leggett sent a memorandum to the County Council last week urging it to implement development districts in Clarksburg.

Development districts are special taxing districts created to fund roads, parks and other public infrastructure needed in new communities above and beyond what a developer would normally be expected to provide.

"I am concerned that the council has taken no action in the past two years to proceed with the next steps and determinations called for under the county's development district law," Leggett wrote.

Council President Nancy M. Floreen (D-At large) of Garrett Park said Tuesday she had not yet had a chance to read Leggett's letter so she could not comment on it.

The county expected developers of the three largest projects in Clarksburg to build the infrastructure in the new communities and be reimbursed for anything built beyond the basic essentials through a tax on the residents of their communities only.

"I don't know how, in this economic climate, you can tax people who are already in dire straits and whose houses are worth less than they purchased them for," Councilman Michael J. Knapp (D-Dist. 2) of Germantown said in a phone interview Tuesday.

The County Council defeated his proposal to rescind the tax two years ago in a 5-4 vote.

It created a development district in Clarksburg Town Center in 2003 but has not taken the steps to implement it. The County Council also plans to create development districts in Clarksburg Village and Arora Hills.

"I was pretty disappointed with his taking this action," Clarksburg Town Center resident Barry Fantle said of Leggett's memo. "It's really a hard time economically for us to be implementing a new tax."

Many residents of the districts told council members at a hearing several years ago they were unaware of the potential tax burden when they bought their homes. They argued it is unfair to ask them to pay for necessities that everyone will be using.

Leggett wrote that implementing the tax was crucial to the completion of Clarksburg Town Center. Now that the county Planning Board is poised to approve a site plan for the community by the end of the month, "We should now move forward with certainty towards financing the infrastructure needed for the project to proceed," he wrote in the memo.

For several months the council and county executive have argued that the next step in creating the district was the other's responsibility, said Patrick Lacefield, a county spokesman.

"They were saying you need to give us something, so we did," he said.

Funding has never been the holdup in completing the community, Knapp said. Construction was halted in the community five years ago when the county Planning Board found hundreds of site plan violations. The developer, residents and the county have been working ever since on correcting those plans so development can proceed.

Leggett sent the council a list of road work and park projects totaling $11.6 million in January 2008 that he recommended for funding through the development district tax. The list includes completing work on Stringtown Road, extending Clarksburg Road from Frederick Road to Snowden Farm Parkway, completing Snowden Farm Parkway to Clarksburg Road, and constructing hiking and biking trails.

Leggett recommended the council remove some work from the list to "lessen the burden on taxpayers in the district."

"All of that is infrastructure that should already have been agreed to by the developer," Fantle said, citing a 2007 report by the County Council's Office of Legislative Oversight that came to a similar conclusion.

Homes prices in Clarksburg have gone down in recent years, Fantle said. If potential buyers know they will have to pay extra taxes in Clarksburg Town Center, they will buy elsewhere, he said.

The next step is up to the County Council. It will have to hold a public hearing if it wants to implement the development district taxes, Knapp said.