Rand Hoch founded the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council in 1988 and initially served as the organization's President until 1992. During that time, the Council was successful in having Palm Beach County extend protected status to gay men, lesbians and bisexuals in housing, public accommodation and county employment and in having the City of West Palm Beach extend basic domestic partnership benefits to City employees.
During those years, Rand served as Chairman Pro Tempore of the West Palm Beach Employment Practices Review Committee as a member of the Palm Beach County Ethics Advisory Committee and on the Boards of Directors of National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, the Florida Consumer Federation, the Florida (Gay) Task Force, the Atlantic Coast Democratic Club, and the Palm Beach/Martin Counties Chapter of the ACLU. He also served as Chair of the Palm Beach County Democratic Executive Committee and as an Executive Committee Member of Gay and Lesbian Democrats of America.
Rand has attended sixteen Florida Democratic Party state conventions and has been a member of the Florida delegation to the Democratic National Conventions four times. In 2012, Rand served on the Credentials Committee for the Democratic National Convention and in 2016, he represented the State of Florida on the Platform Committee for the Democratic National Convention.
In 1992 Rand became Florida's first openly LGBTQ+ judge when he was appointed Judge of Compensation Claims by Governor Lawton Chiles. During his judicial tenure, Rand served as President on Florida's Conference of Judges of Compensation Claims, as Vice President of the International Association of Lesbian and Gay Judges, as a member of the Volusia County Elections Advisory Board and as a member of the Editorial Boards of The Florida Bar News and The Florida Bar Journal.
When his term ended in 1996, Rand returned to his law and mediation practice in West Palm Beach. Since then Rand has served on the Board of Directors of Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, COMPASS. (Palm Beach County's LGBTQ+ community center), the ACLU of Florida, the Florida Academy of Professional Mediators, and PBCHRC Charitable Foundation (as President). He has also served on the Board of Trustees of Florida Stage (as Vice Chair and Secretary) and on the National Board of Accredited Mediators of the American Mediation Association. Additionally, Rand has served as Chair of the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Community Advisory Committee, a member of the Palm Beach County Cultural Council's Business Committee for Culture and a member of City of West Palm Beach Art in Public Places Commission. Rand is also a Charter Member of Equal Opportunities Law Section of The Florida Bar and has served as the Section’s Legislative Committee Chair.
In 2022, Rand resumed his service on the Board of Directors of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council and was again elected president in 2006, a position he still holds. During this tenure on the board, the Council was successful in having numerous local public extend protected status to LGBTQ+ individuals and offer domestic partnership benefits to their employees; having Palm Beach County and the Cities of Lake Worth Beach and West Palm Beach establish domestic partnership registries; having the School District of Palm Beach County protect students from harassment based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression; and having the County and numerous municipalities ban the practice of conversion therapy for minors by licensed professionals. (Unfortunately, in 2022, the conversion therapy bans were stuck down by the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh in Otto v. City of Boca Raton). In all, since 1988, Rand has worked with elected and appointed officials to enact more than one hundred and sixty laws and policies extending equal rights, protections, and benefits to the Palm Beach County LGBTQ community.
In recognition of his efforts, Hoch has been awarded with the Palm Beach State College Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Leadership Award, the Harvey Milk Foundation’s Inaugural Diversity Honors Award, the Key to the City of West Palm Beach, the Legal Aid Society of Palm Beach County’s Community Service Award; the Compass Public Service Award; the ACLU of Palm Beach and Martin Counties’ Harriette S. Glasner Freedom Award; and the Orlando Metropolitan Business Association Spectrum Lifetime Achievement Award. Hoch also served (twice) as a Grand Marshal of the Palm Beach County Pride Parade.
Rand is a longtime denizen of downtown West Palm Beach.