Candidate Interview: Ahmad Anderson runs for mayor of Richmond

Ahmad Anderson has lived in Richmond’s Laurel Park neighborhood for more than 55 years and built a career in community advocacy and workforce development. He is running for mayor on a platform that ties public safety, housing, and economic opportunity into what he calls a “people-centered” vision for the city.

Currently, Anderson is a block captain in his neighborhood, an honorary member of the East Shore Park Neighborhood Council, a board member at Fair Housing Advocates of Northern California, and chairs the data committee of the city's Racial Equity Task Force. He has chaired Richmond's Economic Development Commission. He officially announced his candidacy in May 2025 and has spent the months since attending neighborhood council meetings across every district.

"I've been going to the people, getting their feedback, and running with a people-centered focus on what that means," he said. "Just because I live in Laurel Park does not mean I don't feel public safety issues, or economic development issues, or what's going on with housing."

Family and background

His father, Booker T. Anderson, served on the City Council and as mayor from 1969 to 1975. His mother, Irma L. Anderson, was also a City Councilmember and later served as mayor, becoming the first Black female mayor of a major city in California.

"It provided me insight into the value of community service," he said. "During my father's time, it was the Civil Rights Movement, equity, access, housing, jobs, justice, and peace in the world. During my mother's time, it was crack, gun violence, where we were going with downtown Richmond. Those aren't different issues. They're the same issues."

Anderson's professional background includes stints as a workforce planning supervisor at UPS, a regional HR director at DHL, and a vice president at Goodwill Industries of Greater East Bay, where he worked with people returning from incarceration. For 13 years, he worked in recruitment and retention at UC Berkeley. He later served as director of people and culture at the SFJAZZ Center.

On the council

Anderson says a divided City Council would be his first challenge as mayor.

"I look at that dais, and I see RPA on one side and not-so-much-RPA on the other, and that adversarial relationship rolls out in every social media context, in every neighborhood," he said. "Stop talking about RPA. Be about the work that's going to make the city unified."

He says he would begin with a 100-day assessment, asking city staff and each council member to produce a district-by-district inventory of needs, then build a shared set of priorities with public reporting attached.

"You have to lean on your city manager and your subject-matter experts. They've gone to school in those particular fields. The mayor's job is to partner with them and ascertain what's on the docket to improve the quality of life," he said.

On public safety

Anderson says public safety and economic development are connected problems that have to be addressed together.

"If folks don't feel safe, small or large businesses don't come. And when you have safe downtown communities and corridors, that grows businesses, and then you can go out and market and say, this is what we've done to improve safety, come here," he said.

He says officer working conditions need attention before staffing levels can improve. "Right now they're on the outskirts of town, putting out more hours than any reasonable employer would ask. It impacts morale, workers compensation, and retention. If they're not getting the rest they need, they can't make the mental and physical decisions that the job requires."

He pointed to the era of Chief Magnus as a model, with officers walking neighborhoods and building ties to specific blocks. He supports expanding ROCK, Richmond's mobile crisis response team, and wants a block captain program in every neighborhood.

In the Fire Department, he says equipment, facilities, and evacuation planning all need work, particularly given Richmond's geography. "We are an island when it comes to the shoreline and the bridges. When folks think about evacuating, they immediately think about the bridge. Do we have the access, do we have the proper response mechanisms, do we have the engines?"

On housing

A grand jury report concluded Richmond should build between 3,600 and 4,000 homes by 2030. Anderson says roughly 386 are currently permitted.

"We still have no shovels in the ground," he said. "And that's not my fact. That's the grand jury's fact."

He wants to see Hilltop redeveloped with mixed-income housing built around a hospital, pointing to Summit Medical Center in Oakland as a model where healthcare, housing, and transit came together.

"Put a hospital at Hilltop. Build housing around it at the right income levels, not just affordable housing but housing that meets people where they are across a variety of incomes, because what's affordable in Laurel Park is not affordable in Point Richmond or North Richmond or Parchester," he said.

On the unhoused, he argues the city needs a clearer picture of who it is dealing with before it can respond effectively. "There are people who are unhoused but have skills. There are people who are unhoused and working from their cars, couch surfing. There are people who are unhoused and disabled, or veterans. We need to not only count how many people are unhoused, but understand what kind of support each of them actually needs."

On city services and the budget

Anderson says Measure U dollars should go toward basic city services before anything else.

"We don't have a grocery store. We don't have a hospital. We have so many meetings until 11 o'clock and don't talk about that," he said. "We have rec centers where the doors remain closed because we don't have adequate staffing. I walked out of my house in Laurel Park, and the bushes were so high I thought I was living in Tilden Park. That's not public works' fault. They don't have the staffing."

He is also cautious about the city's financial position going forward. Richmond has run budget surpluses in recent years, but Anderson says the city didn't build adequate reserves during that period.

"We didn't do the forecasting," he said. "No matter who is in the administration, what would we be prepared to meet that storm? We see uncertainty happening in front of us, and we don't have a plan. Building responsible rainy-day reserves and paying down city debts has to be part of the strategy now."

Beyond the resume

Anderson has four sons, a daughter, and three grandchildren. One son is an oncologist. One is an arts teacher. His daughter drives for AC Transit. Two of his sons are currently serving in the military.

"When people talk about Israel, Gaza, Iran, I have a personal stake in that," he said. "That's a thought I have every day, because my kids are out there protecting us on the direction of somebody who's not always thinking about us."

Anderson learned to play drums at Booker T. Anderson Community Center and to swim at the Plunge. He worked at KPFA. He says the combination of professional experience and life in Richmond is what he is ultimately offering voters.

"My father would say, mountaintop experiences don't mean everything if you don't share them with the people you come across in life," he said. "That's what I'm doing here. That's the rent I pay to live on this earth."

Anderson is facing incumbent Mayor Eduardo Martinez, Councilmember Claudia Jiménez, Demnlus Johnson, and Mark Wassberg.

Grandview Independent will publish interviews with all candidates running for Richmond City Council and mayor in the coming weeks.

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