Last night, the Richmond City Council selected Ada Recinos to replace Gayle McLaughlin on the City Council. Although the vote was unanimous, there were indications that Melvin Willis and Eduardo Martinez would have voted for Marilyn Langlois if she had been nominated first.

Ada Recinos is a member of the 28-member Richmond progressive Alliance Steering Committee. She now joins Jovanka Beckles, Ben Choi and Melvin Willis as the fourth member of the Richmond City Council serving on the RPA Steering Committee.

She is 26 years old, the daughter of Salvadoran immigrants and a 2014 graduate of the University of California , Santa Cruz, with a Bachelor of Arts, Global Information and Social Enterprise Studies. Ada grew up in Torrance, CA, and after graduating from UCSC, interned with “Causa Justa” in Oakland as a community organizer with the Immigrant Rights Campaign, doing surveying and canvassing work regarding immigrant populations in Oakland’s Fruitvale District.

Recinos’ first paid position was as a research analyst with the Migrant Legal Action Program, focusing on health and nutrition initiatives or migrant children and their parents. Recinos then began working for a non-profit 501(c)3 based in Oakland called Prospera Community Development, first as a community engagement coordinator, then an advancement manager. Prospera’s mission statement describes them as a group raising money and resources to support and train Latino women in the Oakland community.

On January 12, 2016, I appointed Recinos to the City of Richmond Human Rights and Human Relations Commission