PURCELLVILLE — Summer R. Wilkes, the Town of Purcellville’s director of planning and community development and zoning administrator, has resigned, Purcellville News has learned. Her last day with the town will be June 12.
Wilkes submitted her resignation Thursday, May 28, and notified the planning department Monday, June 1. She has accepted the position of planning director for Ranson, West Virginia, the Jefferson County city adjacent to Charles Town, where she lives.
The town has not publicly announced a successor or interim arrangement for the planning department.
Background
Wilkes joined the town as its part-time zoning administrator. In May 2024, the Town Council voted to establish a standalone Department of Planning and Community Development and appointed her its first full-time director.
The restructuring followed the retirement of longtime Planning, Engineering and Development Director Dale Lehnig, whose office was divided into separate engineering and planning departments. Wilkes continued to serve as zoning administrator, a position that reports to the Town Council, while the director’s role reports to the town manager.
A credentialed planner (AICP, CZA and CNU), Wilkes served as the staff lead on two of the town’s major land-use efforts: the update of the zoning ordinance and the five-year review of the 2030 Comprehensive Plan, which the council launched in February 2025. She estimated the comprehensive plan review would take at least nine to 12 months, citing staffing changes and turnover on the Planning Commission. Most recently, she had been guiding the Planning Commission through that required five-year review.
In late 2024, Wilkes presented proposed revisions to the Planning Commission’s draft zoning ordinance, including changes to provisions on density, infill development, special-use permits and creek buffers. The proposals differed in several respects from the commission’s draft and prompted extensive discussion among council members, commissioners and residents about the direction of the town’s land-use regulations.
