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A group of Clarksburg Town Center residents who are frustrated their community has not yet been finished says it would like to be the voice for action in the development.

Known as the Clarksburg Town Center Community Progress Council, the group is meant to be a counterbalance to the Clarksburg Town Center Advisory Committee, the residents' group that uncovered hundreds of site plan violations in the community four years ago and has been involved since in mediation to remedy the problems.

Although the advisory committee was elected by community residents, it has been under court order not to hold a community meeting or talk about issues since mediation began.

"[The committee] worked very well with the county to get the development improved," said Emily Lederer, who was among the first to move into the community in 2002. "I'm glad [they] and Newland worked together to get that done. [However], when all is said and done, there had to be more compromises from both sides and there wasn't."

The mission of the new group is to keep plans for the community moving along.

"We just want to get it over and done and built," Lederer said. "I just want to keep things moving in a positive manner."

Developer Newland Communities brought together about 15 residents for regular updates on the community, she said.

"They contacted a couple of us who they knew were active and we suggested names and moved on on our own," she said.

The group plans to meet regularly with the developer and "act as a network to share this information throughout our community with other residents," according to an e-mail from Lederer. "Our council is also designed to be a forum for sharing thoughts and observations, as well as empowering us to act as community ambassadors, playing a positive role in our community's future."

The council began meeting earlier in the year and plans to meet every three months. The last meeting was in May.

"Newland approached Emily and said they wanted to invite some people to see all the information that's available … come up with ideas to get everybody in the neighborhood involved," said Scott Stokes, another of the original residents of the community.

The council has yet to elect officers, but Stokes is its spokesman.

Newland has met with the Progress Council just as it would with any community group, said Peggy Molloy, marketing director for Newland's Washington, D.C., division.

"They're a good group, they want to see the community move forward in a positive way," she said.

Newland does not have a role in the council other than to give it information as it would other organizations, Molloy said.

Although Lederer said she tries to be neutral, "I tend to side more on positions with Newland," she said. "[Clarksburg Town Center Advisory Committee] has done a great job, but there are some aspects I feel we have different opinions."

For one, the council is willing to accept compromise, Stokes said.

"We were saying it's OK not to have live-work [housing] or boutiques if the developer says, ‘We can't sell this shopping center,'" he said.

The community will be happy with a safe, beautiful, livable place to raise children, he said.

"The community council just wants to make things better with the hands they've been dealt," Stokes said. "There's no way to make this neighborhood perfect now. There's no way to live up to what they promised us."

The Community Progress Council does not think the advisory committee is representative of the community any more, he said.

"[They] became an official group of people with a clear purpose to hold the builder and developer to task," Stokes said. "It came to a point, if you wanted to talk with them and have information from them, it was obvious they didn't want anybody to see what's going on."

Lynn Fantle, president of the advisory committee, said she has invited Lederer and others to look at plans and discuss the development on numerous occasions over the years and they have never accepted her offer, preferring instead to get all their information from Newland.

The advisory committee has tried to determine what the community residents' want and be their voice in negotiations, Fantle said.

"We spent two years coming up with ideas and asking the community," she said.

The advisory committee is demographically different from the council, which is made up mostly of parents of young children, and may not understand the desires of families, Stokes said.

The advisory committee's recommendations to Newland have included adding playground equipment, ensuring the pool would be the right size for swimming meets and adding play areas for children, Fantle said.

The Progress Council has talked with some county agencies, but has not met with the Clarksburg Civic Association (CCA) or the Clarksburg Town Center Advisory Committee (CTCAC).

"We were just trying to talk to [the advisory committee] and let them know how we felt as a neighborhood," Stokes said. ‘[They] didn't listen, didn't have their tendrils out, didn't listen to what's going on."

But Fantle says that is not true.

"I wish they were willing to come to talk to us, but they never have been," she said. "They made a lot of assumptions about CCA and CTCAC that are wrong."

Stokes said the council plans to reach out to others in the community as soon as it gets more organized.