Lori Parrish vying to become Southwest Ranches’ next mayor

Lori Parrish, the politician who served for more than three decades as a school board member, county commissioner and property appraiser, is now entering town politics.

Parrish is running for the mayor’s seat in Southwest Ranches, known for sprawling homes and horse pastures. The election will be in November 2024.

There are three council seats up for reelection: the mayor’s seat now held by Mayor Steve Breitkreuz; District 4 now held by Vice Mayor David Kuczenski; and District 3 now held by Council member Jim Allbritton. Of those incumbents, only Kuczenski has so far filed his notice of intent to run in 2024, according to the town administration Tuesday.

Breitkreuz served on council since 2006-2018, then stepped down waiting for the mayor cycle to come up from 2020 to now. He plans to seek reelection. “I’ve done what I promised to do,” he said. “I preserved our rural lifestyle.”

This week Parrish opened her bank account and filed her preliminary paperwork at Town Hall.

Parrish was first elected to the School Board in 1984-1988, then came the County Commission in 1988-2004, and the property appraiser seat was most recent, for which she was sworn in, in January 2005, and served until 2016.

She said she has lived in Southwest Ranches for eight years and decided to come out of political retirement to make changes.

“We have five of the nicest people elected,” she said, but finds the town “reactive, not proactive.”

She finds fault with the contract for police officers — “we need more” — and wants “high-quality customer service” for residents. She said she was experiencing “sheer frustration.” “It’s not a matter of ‘they aren’t nice people,’ they are. It’s we can do much, much better,” she said.

Lisa J. Huriash can be reached at lhuriash@sunsentinel.com. Follow on X, formerly Twitter, @LisaHuriash