Andrew grew up in Richmond and have lived there for most of his life. Andrew lived a very active lifestyle growing up, playing hockey and other sports. He joined the Urban Tilth’s  Summer Youth Apprentice Program when he was in my senior year of high school and instantly loved the organization. Andrew has always been a person who loves to see communities grow and thrive, and working with Urban Tilth has given him a direct link to be able to help that cause in Richmond.

Contact: accounting@urbantilth.org

Jaqueline Leal (she/her) is 21 years old and was born in Oakland CA. She identifies as a Chicana woman, both her parents are from the motherland, Jalisco Mexico. Jacquline’s family migrated here in 1999. She is a 1st generation Mexican-American, a graduate from Richmond High and the youngest in the family. Jackie is one of the Free Farm Stand coordinators and also helps with Farm to Table CSA pack and deliveries. She helps distribute free healthy food to local residents who don’t have access to it and she loves what she does because of the impact and the mission.

Contact: volunteer@urbantilth.org

Christian Parra is our new Communication Associate. He says that working at Urban Tilth has been one of the most rewarding experiences he’s ever gotten to be a part of. He is grateful to be part of a place that truly cares for the health and wellbeing of the community it is in. As a resident of Richmond, Christian believes the work that Urban Tilth is doing is essential for the future of this city.

Contact: communications@urbantilth.org

Kaivalya (Kai) Robinson grew up in Richmond, CA and Reed Island British Columbia. He is currently communications student at Camosum College. He loves hiking, being fit and active and has an interest in agriculture, social justice and spending way too much time reading fantasy novels.

Roderick, or Rod as we know him, is a Greenway Garden coordinator and has worked for Urban Tilth for over 5 years. He enjoys all work he does, from maintaining the Edible Forest, to putting on community events for the neighbors of the Greenway. He loves the fact that the healthy food he helps grow and care for goes right back to the local community. Rod loves seeing all the smiles and joy that comes through the Greenway Gardens.

Luis Jacobo has been with Urban Tilth since 2017, where he started first as a recurring volunteer with his girlfriend Tania for a few weeks and then was asked if he would like to join the Urban Tilth team. This was during a difficult time in his life when his brother had just passed away. He also wanted a change from his demolition job at the time. He stayed at home with depression for 2 months, but coming to the farm helped him see the beauty of growing compared to destroying  buildings. Luis was incremental in the early years of the Farm to Table CSA. He has also helped lead SAP programs, also tours, ran the farm for a bit with partner Tania, holding it down in people’s absence. Used to be a litterer and now has trash from 2 weeks ago because he held on to it to throw it in a trash can. This is just one of the many ways Luis has changed since being at Urban Tilth. He used to think seeds just needed water to grow but has learned it takes much more than that, like having patience and consistency.

Diana Leal was born in Tepatitlan De Morelos, Jalisco, Mexico and has lived in Richmond since the age of 6. She joined Urban Tilth in March 2017 as a staff apprentice at Adams Crest Farm, slowly building up her skills and supporting all types of Urban Tilth projects like the Farm to Table CSA, the North Richmond Farm expansion, & the Education programs. Diana currently co-teaches the urban agriculture classes at Richmond High School and helps care for the school garden, while also working on the CSA added value products like herbal salves, floral bouquets, jam, and more. 

Diana has completed the permaculture course at Soul Flower Farm and is currently enrolled at Ancestral Apothecary School, taking a 9 month herbal training course called Cecemmana. She has packed and distributed medicine for the Community Care Herbal Response Project  as well. Diana started the Healing Movement after-school club at Richmond High in 2019, which taught healing using herbs and exposed young students tpo healthier alternatives for medicine, whether that be with exercises, food, aromatherapy, horticulture therapy, etc. She is passionate about decolonizing our medicine, learning how to be in community with plants, building a more sustainable world, creating spaces for people to heal/reflect on the trauma of our people who have faced centuries of colonization. And loves to roller skate!

Alejandro Castro, or Ale as he likes to be called, is fairly new to Urban Tilth, working as a Greenway Garden Coordinator since March 2021.  He first heard about UT from his friends who are already employed there. He was born in Vallejo, California and raised in Richmond, California. Alejandro’s work includes overseeing and maintaining the vegetable garden on the Greenway. One aspect of Alejandro’s work which he enjoys the most is the community engagement. Having the opportunity to speak with new people each from the community is very rewarding and exciting!  Hobbies include daydreaming, listening to music, embroidery, gardening, and… trying different mozzarella sticks.

Bienvenida Meza has been working for close to 20 years at the Verde Elementary School garden, planting, harvesting, as well as teaching the youth firsthand on the fundamentals of urban gardening. Ms. Meza is known for her love for nature and her storytelling, both through conversation and through her endless of albums of photographs and videos. Aside from teaching, Bienvenida Meza is very active in the North Richmond community, giving away food, seeds, and plants whenever she can. She is a North Richmond Historian.

My experience with Urban Tilth started after high school with the 2018 Summer Youth Apprenticeship Program. SYAP introduced me to a type of work that could join all of my interests, including community service, plant science, and agriculture; this experience guided me to study Botany at Humboldt state. After graduating, I came back to Urban Tilth, where I now serve the Verde K-8 school community as the Verde Partnership Garden maintenance manager. This job is an opportunity to address the issues that matter to me, like environmental justice in my community and ecological consciousness through youth education and engagement. I have found this work transformative because of the relationship I’ve developed to the land and our community. In addition to maintaining the garden to support the VPG education program, I am interested in exploring the ways our stewardship of urban green spaces changes the greater ecology of California native plants, and how these spaces serve as an interface for urban communities to shape our greater ecosystem. I am a botanist, a steward, and proud to be from Richmond.

Nathalie Rivera recently joined Urban Tilth as a Greenway Garden Coordinator in 2021. They are very passionate about native plants, especially the wildlife that each one supports and the ethnobotanical uses of them. They studied Critical Race, Gender and Sexuality Studies with a Pathway Emphasis in Ethnic Studies at Humboldt State University. Nathalie is also interested in food sovereignty and community empowerment. They hope to share their knowledge and learn more from the rest of the UT team and community in Richmond.

Lu was born in Yahualica, Jalisco and raised in Richmond, CA. Lu is Queer and Non-Binary. They attended WCCUSD schools. They pursued an A.A. in Social & Behavioral Sciences at Contra Costa College and a B.A. in International Studies: Global Environment at CSU East Bay.  Their passion for environmental justice led them to work in the solar, education and government relations industries. Lu  joined Urban Tilth’s Education Team, because they are committed to empowering youth to work with the land and develop program curriculum around social justice.

Cyrus Gangei joined Urban Tilth in the Summer of 2023 to expand the Basins of Relation program with the inclusion of a water conservation curriculum. Cyrus works alongside the Watershed crew to offer laundry-to-landscape, drip irrigation, and rainwater catchment systems to low-income homeowners free of charge. Before joining Urban Tilth, Cyrus studied Environmental Design at Arizona State University where he received the Fall 2021 Program award for his work to provide water conservation opportunities to the underprivileged community of Central City South Phoenix. Cyrus grew up in Berkeley with a love for everything nature, food, and sports. He currently coaches and plays for an adult softball league to provide him with that sense of competition and team comradery. Cyrus has been inspired by Urban Tilth’s mission to empower the community through land stewardship. He hopes to educate and inspire others by creating a pathway to economic empowerment by helping families most in need become more resilient to the effects of climate change.

Marlow started on the Watershed’s Team as a Basin’s of Relations Apprentice in 2017. Since then he has become a leader and anchor of our watershed technician team.

Solwazi was born and raised in Oakland, California. He is a Berkeley Community Fund Scholar and has an Environmental Studies degree from UC Santa Cruz…a Proud Banana Slug! Solwazi joined Urban Tilth as an apprentice through the Watersheds Basins of Relations Program in the Fall of 2019 and then later joined the Watersheds crew after completing the program, and became a Crew Manager in September 2020. As a crew manager, he plans out the workday, strategizes with contacts for numerous work contracts, schedules out equipment/tools, and completes managerial reports. He’s also an avid fisherman and environmental steward, passionate sports fan, food lover, and a loving brother and son.

Jonah Landor-Yamagata grew up in Berkeley and Oakland. He has worked at Urban Tilth with the Basins of Relations Watersheds Program since 2018. Currently, he manages UT’s Native Plant Nursery to help make sure there are plenty of plants available for the sites that we steward and restore. Jonah has worked as an AmeriCorps volunteer at César Chávez Elementary School in Richmond, in school gardens in Berkeley and as environmental educator bringing  hands-on stewardship programs to many schools in the East Bay. Before joining Urban Tilth, Jonah lived in Germany for five years, where he completed a master’s degree in Urban Ecosystem Sciences at the Technische Universität Berlin.

Paola has been a part of the Urban Tilth team for over a year now. She was born in Guanajuato, Mexico and was raised in Richmond, California. She loves animals and being able to work with the community. “Catch me at the North Richmond Farm taking care of the chickens, harvesting, or washing boxes!”

Ebonay was born in San Diego, California and raised in Richmond, California. She has worked at Urban Tilth for two years and enjoys it so much. As a CSA Coordinator she helps harvest, pack and deliver the produce, free box program, and free farm stand. Before she applied to Urban Tilth she worked as an apprentice at Pie Ranch in Pescadero, California  for their CSA program. After this program, she attempted to look for a similar space closer to home and found Urban Tilth. She was recently able to tough it out and graduate from John F. Kennedy even while the Covid-19 Pandemic devastated all the schools and student life. During her time at urban tilth she has assisted in mending the greenway, and helped reactivate the Free Farm Stand Program.

Josue works as a Coordinator at CSA, where he packs and delivers 400 bags of goods weekly. He is also an invaluable assistant to the Greenway Community organizer, where he skillfully handles the Newsletter and manages Greenway Social Media and flyers. Josue is passionate about being a contributing member of his community. He is inspired by the sense of community that uplifts and supports each other.

Josue is a creative individual, and he thrives in his job’s freedom of expression and creativity. In his free time, he enjoys playing games with friends, walking his dog, hiking, exploring charming towns, spoiling his girlfriend, camping, shopping, and watching TV. Although Josue was born in San Francisco, he moved to Richmond when he was six. As he spent his entire school life in San Francisco, Urban Tilth has been his introduction to the community in his neighborhood.

Yuri born in Fresno CA and was raised in Guanajuato Mx. to Mexican parents. She learned to work with plants from her grandparents and parents since the age of 5. She came back to the U.S. with her family in 2000 and worked in a party rental company, starting as a wear house lead, then became a department manager. She loves working with peers and likes to help as much as she can. She loves to learn to cook new recipes and love to spend time with her family.

Rafa is one of two of the Just Transition organizers at Urban Tilth. He is a North Richmond resident and was 12 years old when the explosion at Richmond Chevron refinery happened. This experience made Rafa interested in the Climate Justice field and understanding that racism, the housing crisis and extractive developments are all a climate issue. The organizing he does in Just Transition focuses on educating and fighting for a better future for his community where we fight the bad and build the new. In his free time you can find him out on the water kayak fishing, playing guitar or spending time with his family!

Kiara was born in San Francisco, CA and has lived in various cities around the Bay Area. She has resided in North Richmond for over a decade and received a B.A in Theatre, Film, and Digital Production from UC Riverside. Kiara joined Urban Tilth in September 2022 in a newly established position as a Just Transition Organizer. She is passionate about how humans can heal our relationship with the natural world. Outside of work her special interests are learning about proper mental health care, sewing, and writing.