Longtime community activist Gerda Peachey is launching another bid for Abbotsford’s mayoral seat – provided she’s still around in October.
In a post on her blog early Tuesday morning, Peachey, 74, said she will run in this fall’s municipal election, “if the Lord wills it, and if I live.”
An outspoken Christian who ran in 2011 and helped lead the charge to get Tradex to stop hosting the Taboo Sex Show several years ago, Peachey says politicians have failed to push back against “militant activists who seem bent on the destruction of Western civilizations, freedom and democracy.” She specifically cited council’s decision to raise a pride flag at city hall in 2015 and a lack of support for controversial anti-SOGI Chilliwack school trustee Barry Neufeld.
Peachey acknowledged that municipal governance is secular and wrote that council shouldn’t be imposing religious service or readings on the public. But she said Christian officials should uphold “eternal truths, given to us by God.”
She wrote that slates like AbbotsfordFirst are bad and that councillors should be independent, “not a group-think club.”
Peachey also condemned increased development in the city, writing that “Abbotsford is fast becoming wall to wall condos, apartments and monster houses … We apparently are determined to become a mini Vancouver, and clearly not with the altruistic intent of providing affordable housing.”
In 2016, Peachey was among the residents to call for the preservation of land use contracts in her south Abbotsford neighbourhood.
A former banker and business owner, Peachey ran for the mayor’s seat in 2011, finishing third of five candidates. Peachey garnered more than 2,400 votes that year. Victor Bruce Banman’s 13,837 votes topped those of incumbent George Peary by 1,143 votes.
Peachey also ran for council in 2014, finishing 20th of 30 candidates, with 3,291 votes.
Like in 2011, Peachey believes her chances of winning election are low. But in an email to The News, she said she will do her best “and leave the results up to the Lord.”
“It would be quite grand to be able to have some influence as to how Abbotsford is run, so yes, winning would be great, but miraculous – on the order of the parting of the Red Sea.”
