I don't have much of a preference between past and present, but I've always preferred the third-person. I particularly like stories from multiple points of view, and third-person gives writers the room to do that. Mary Higgins Clark, whom I've been reading since I was a kid, has lately started writing in the first-person with some chapters from other PoVs in the third-person. I really don't think it works; it's kind of distracting.

I don't hate first-person or anything, just prefer third.