Just call it the stalled project tax penalty. Except the ones paying it will be owners of long-established downtown Boston towers and suburban office complexes, not the aspiring builders whose dreams have been delayed or killed by the recession.

From Boston to the New York border, cities and towns across the state are headed into a development drought which will see few if any new commercial buildings open in the next few years.

And local officials who have relied for years on new development to help keep their coffers full will have no choice but to double the burden on local commercial property owners, from Boston skyscrapers to Route 128 corporate campuses.

Skeptical? Look out the window next time you are driving through downtown Boston or along 128 or Interstate 495 and tell me how many cranes and bulldozers you see putting up new office buildings.

Real Money

The first shoe is about to drop, with Boston officials expected to bump up the city’s commercial tax rate. It is likely to be merely the opening salvo, not just in the Hub but in other cities and towns statewide that had been hotbeds for commercial development.

“We are OK this year, but there is really nothing in the pipeline for the future that I can see,” said Joe Goode, Waltham’s tax chief.

Thanks to a twist in timing, the full brunt of the delayed project tax penalty won’t start hitting Boston towers until 2012.

The last major development projects commissioned during the boom, including the Russia Wharf office tower and bankrupt W Hotel, have just opened their doors. That, combined with an expiring tax break deal, will mean $30 million in new commercial taxes for Boston in 2011.

“I think new construction has been averaging about $30 million [in revenue] a year,” said Larry DiCara, a top Boston real estate lawyer and a former Boston City Council president. “In Dorchester, that is real money.”

But the roster of new commercial developments is starting to get pretty thin. While there are a growing number of college dorms and hospital expansions in the works, they don’t pay taxes.

The Filene’s fiasco, which left a hole in the middle of Downtown Crossing, has robbed Boston of millions in new taxes that could have offset the coming lean years.

There are a number of proposed commercial developments on the drawing boards, but no one has begun the arduous task of winning city approval.

Because it takes years to win project approvals, nail down financing and build new downtown high-rises in Boston, we are automatically looking at a blank slate for at least the next four to five years, notes David Begelfer, chief executive of NAIOP Massachusetts, which represents developers across the state.

Long-Term Impact

But Boston is hardly alone.

New York’s Related Cos. ambitious plan to turn the old Polaroid campus on Route 128 into 1.7 million square feet of new office and retail space ended with the lenders taking over the property and selling it off.

Ditto for the sweeping Westwood Station plan, which called for a new, “planned community” of offices, shops and condos to be built around the Route 128 commuter rail station. At 4.5 million square feet, it was the largest proposed mixed use project anywhere in the country.

Unimpressed and out of patience, the lenders also pulled the plug on this one.

That is a whole lot of suburban development – and tax revenue – wiped off the board.

Goode is hoping to see a smaller version of the old Polaroid site plan eventually open at some point down the line.

But the city is still out millions in new taxes thanks to the collapse of Related’s 1.7 million-square-foot redevelopment plan. It’s a tough loss for any city, with new growth helping ease many a budget shortfall.

“New growth is great for cities and towns,” Goode argued. “If you don’t have growth and you can’t balance a budget with your spending you would have to go for a tax override.”

This coming dearth of new growth couldn’t come at a worse time.

Municipal tax officials are finally catching up with the plunge in overall commercial real estate values, which has wiped out untold billions in value since 2007, when office rents and tower prices peaked.

That means towns and cities are facing a suddenly shrunken commercial tax base, forcing local authorities to compensate for the loss in value by raising rates.

While Waltham homeowners saw only a modest boost this year, the city’s office property owners are dealing with a more than 6 percent increase – to more than $30 per square foot of assessed value.

Burlington, another suburban office hub, also edged up its commercial tax rate, though with an eye to keeping the increase modest amid competition from office parks in nearby communities.

There’s a tendency on the part of some developers and veterans of the industry to be almost dismissive when it comes to rising taxes.

After all, these costs are most often simply passed through to tenants – large and small.

But such a cavalier attitude is a big mistake. The damage is worse than simply hitting a few developers in the wallet – what we have is the potential for blanket tax increases across the Greater Boston corporate community, putting another roadblock in front of hiring and growth.

That, in turn, could come back to bite landlords in the form of slack demand for new office space.