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Montgomery County questions its Clarksburg policies
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Montgomery County (Map, News) - Members of Montgomery County’s Management and Fiscal Policy Committee said Tuesday they are troubled by the council’s approval and lack of oversight of a controversial special tax district for Clarksburg Town Center and now question whether using similar methods to pay for future development is good government.
The committee on Tuesday began what is likely to be a several-months-long review of the Clarksburg project. It comes two weeks after the Office of Legislative Oversight issued a report that said the council should re-evaluate its policies for establishing the special tax districts, though it found Clarksburg was created legally.
Chairwoman Duchy Trachtenberg said the committee will develop recommendations about Clarksburg but would not say what she expected them to be.
“I see a very ripe discussion that needs to happen around implementation and oversight,” Trachtenberg said.
The council has not given its final approval to the establishment of the development district, and residents have not had to pay the tax, which is estimated to be between $1,500 and $2,000 annually.
The special tax, called a development district, is used to pay for infrastructure improvements within the district. Clarksburg residents have said they were not told about or given the chance to vote on resolutions in 2000 and in 2003 giving preliminary approval to it.
“It’s robbery,” said Kim Shiley, who held a small sign reading “Don’t Tread on Clarksburg” during Tuesday’s meeting. “It’s robbery from my own pocketbook.”
Council Member Marc Elrich said he still questions whether Clarksburg’s development district is legal, despite the OLO report. He called its creation “fundamentally flawed” because homeowners were not informed.
“There’s no transparency,” Elrich said. “That’s a way to describe it.”
cmabeus@dcexaminer.com
Comments from Examiner Readers
2:19 PM MST on Thu., Dec. 27, 2007 re: "Development’s residents say they are facing bankruptcy"
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2:43 PM MST on Wed., Sep. 26, 2007
re: "Montgomery County questions its Clarksburg policies"
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Robin Ficker, Broker Robin Realty said:
As one who has visited every home in Clarksburg several times, I can testify that residents were not told of this 30 year development tax when purchasing their homes. Sure there are costs in new developments. But there are huge costs in existing communities too. New high schools cost $100 million+ and we have had them at Whitman, Blair, Northwood, Woodward, BCC, Wheaton, RM, Rockville, Kennedy, etc. The communities surrounding these schools were not asked to pay for them; for, the county did with some state help. It is not fair to drive my neighbors in Clarksburg into bankruptcy or foreclosure.
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Tim said:
This resident and homeowner attended the County Council Management & Fiscal Policy (MFP) Sept. 25th session mentioned in Miranda's Blog. I spoke to Kathleen Boucher, Council Senior Legislative Attorney... I asked, "why did the staff and council fail to connect the dots from the infrastructure site plan conditions of regulatory approval (building the "stuff") to a contractual promise to REPAY the developers?” The answer I got was shocking. “There is no contract to pay back the developer for the “stuff”. The need to pay the developer stems from a “policy” that the council will vote on.” In other words, MoCo Council & Exec need to get the message from ALL the citizens of MoCo that it’s NOT A GOOD POLICY to just give the money back to the developers because the developers ASKED for it!!! I ask that everyone who reads this calls each council member to tell them you want them to vote against passing a DD tax. This will be easy to fix: Council "VOTE NO!"
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