Stought running for Purcellville Town Council

Caleb Stought moved to Purcellville in 2019 and lives in the Mayfair community with his wife Erica, who grew up in Loudoun County, and their two daughters. They are expecting their third girl in September. He served on the Town of Purcellville’s Community Policing Advisory Committee.

Stought works from home as a software engineer, and in his spare time he studies history and does CrossFit. He has also served in the military for 10 years as a linguist, speaking Spanish, French, Arabic, and Persian.

Said Stought, “My family and I enjoy serving in our church and our local community, and we also love living in Purcellville. Purcellville is a special town where you can cheer for the local baseball team and then take your kids roller skating. If we want to preserve this special town for future generations, we must be good stewards of it now. This means engaging in responsible management of our town’s resources, staff and money.

“I believe I will be effective as a council member because I am able to listen to people with different perspectives and understand their viewpoints. I always show respect to people even when I disagree with them. As a council member, I will work hard to build good relationships with town staff, the local business community, and other local governments. We can’t get the results we want by attacking the people we disagree with. We are all neighbors, not enemies.” said Stought.

Stought says he believes the biggest issues facing Purcellville “are the misconduct of its elected officials and the mismanagement of its finances. Since the start of the year, the actions of some members of Town Council have caused the departure of five senior members of our experienced town staff. In five months, we lost three Town Managers, our Town Attorney, and our Director of Planning & Zoning.

“Some members of council attempted to avoid having a legally required special election, against the recommendation of our Town Attorney. Those same councilmembers have repeatedly damaged our relationship with the County, intentionally delaying decision making, ignoring county information reports, and treating county staff disrespectfully. These actions have put funding and staffing for Purcellville’s future needs in jeopardy. Purcellville deserves better.”

He also says he wants to place the town “on a solid financial footing. This means maintaining
appropriate revenue streams and balancing our budget without relying on savings.”

Stought wants to support the local business community “while seeking to maintain Purcellville’s small town charm.

“Our focus should be on realistic solutions,” said Stought, “that have been proven to work over time, not applying a series of short term band-aids that mask problems without solving them. For years Purcellville has kicked the can down the road on issues like debt payment, by refinancing and adding $11 million to our debt to avoid rate increases.”

Concluded Stought, “We must focus our efforts on reliable, sustainable and long-lasting solutions. Purcellville deserves this.”