RICHMOND — The former co-chair of the Richmond LAND board has been accused of embezzling up to $205,000 from the organization, according to the nonprofit’s executive director.
Randy Joseph, who served as a Richmond LAND board member from 2021 to 2024, has been accused of signing off on checks to himself worth between about $79,000 and $205,000, according to a public statement by Executive Director Princess Robinson.
In the statement, Robinson said she discovered on Sept. 5, 2024, that Joseph allegedly wrote, signed and cashed multiple checks from Richmond LAND’s checking account without approval between January 2023 and September 2024 while acting as board president.
Robinson, who became executive director in late June 2024, said she requested that Joseph resign and repay the lost funds immediately after making the alleged discovery. A police report was also filed and the alleged embezzlement was reported to all required regulatory bodies, she added.
The public disclosure of the alleged financial misdeeds, about eight months after they were reportedly discovered, allowed the organization time to “take appropriate action before making this information widely available,” Robinson said.
“As the new Executive Director, I believe it is essential to acknowledge this matter and reaffirm our commitment to integrity, accountability, and long-term sustainability of our organization,” Robinson said in a statement. “While this has been a difficult chapter for Richmond LAND, my focus remains on ensuring accountability, learning from past challenges, and strengthening our organizational foundation.”
Since taking her role, Robinson said the organization has welcomed a new team of employees “dedicated to analyzing and improving our internal systems,” and implemented a new comprehensive financial policy with safeguards and processes in place to prevent similar financial misconduct from reoccurring.
Joseph did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
He has been linked to other Richmond-based community groups. As of Monday, he was still listed as a team member for Reimagine Richmond, a coalition advocating for alternative approaches to community policing. By Tuesday, Joseph no longer appeared on the website. The organization declined to comment on the allegations.
The Ryse Center, a nonprofit providing a variety of youth services and programming, did not respond to a request for comment. Joseph’s LinkedIn states that he’s a Housing Justice program manager there and has worked for the nonprofit for nearly four years.
Joseph also served on the city’s Community Police Review Commission from October 2020 to June 2024.
Lt. Donald Patchin confirmed a police report with Richmond LAND listed as the victim was filed with the Richmond Police Department but was unable to provide additional information because the report is still under investigation.
Richmond LAND’s 2023 Form 990, filed Dec. 10, 2024, indicates that Joseph was accused of embezzling about $79,000 that year. Those funds had not yet been recouped at the time of filing, according to the tax document.
Joseph first appears in Richmond LAND tax filings in 2021 and is listed as a board member who worked about five hours a week and did not receive compensation. The same goes for 2022, according to that year’s Form 990.
By 2023, Joseph reportedly worked about 20 hours a week and was compensated $95,460 that year, according to Richmond LAND’s 2023 Form 990. But workloads for almost all board members had jumped that year as staffing had decreased, according to Robinson’s statement and the nonprofit’s tax documents.
Board members Elissa Roy worked about 15 hours a week and was compensated $22,000 that year and Alex Acuna was paid $18,000 that year for working about 15 hours a week. Board Co-Chair Sasha Graham worked about 10 hours a week and was paid $18,000. And Board Treasurer Leslie Lindo was paid $16,500 for an average of about 10 hours of labor a week. The only member not compensated was Secretary Regina Celestin Williams, who worked about five hours a week.
Despite a staffing decline, the amount of money going toward staff salaries, compensation, benefits, payroll taxes and fees grew substantially between 2020 and 2023, according to the nonprofit’s tax filings.
In 2020, the organization’s total revenue was $869,635 while total expenses were $200,963. Of those expenses, $5,600 was for compensation that was allocated to two members, another $111,235 was spent on other salaries and wages, $8,385 was spent on employee benefits and $9,621 went to payroll expenses.
By the end of 2023, Richmond LAND had brought in almost $1.5 million in total revenue and spent $808,942, of which $304,856 went to employee related expenses – mostly compensation. Fees for services totaled more than $311,000 in 2023 compared to the $48,645 spent in 2020.
A vast majority of the Richmond LAND’s funding year over year has come from non-governmental grants, according to their Form 990s.
The Contra Costa County nonprofit purchases residential properties and puts them in a trust to keep rents low and eventually transfer ownership to the people living there. The effort is an attempt to prevent development companies from buying buildings and raising rents.
So far, one such property has been preserved by Richmond LAND, a triplex on South 24th Street.
The nonprofit was also part of a coalition of community groups working on the North Richmond Community Resilience Initiative, a collection of projects meant to improve green infrastructure, housing and mobility options.
Contra Costa County was awarded a $19 million federal Community Change grant from the Environmental Protection Agency in 2023 to fund the initiative but was informed in May that the grant was being revoked under the Trump administration.