Business & Tech
Supporting Houston restaurants, frontline workers
TX Restaurant Relief Fund supports restaurants, feeds heroes with $100K boost from ExxonMobil
HOUSTON — Houston’s restaurant industry continues to struggle as a result of the pandemic, and as COVID-19 cases remain on the rise, the community has found ways to support frontline and restaurant workers alike.
The restaurant industry is the fourth largest employer in the Houston area with more than 300,000 employees. Since the pandemic began, the sector has lost three times more jobs than any other industry and is down 700,000 jobs statewide.
To help, ExxonMobil donated $100,000 to the Texas Restaurant Association’s TX Restaurant Relief Fund and partnered with Houston restaurants, including Revival Market, to prepare and deliver thousands of meals to frontline responders in the Texas Medical Center.
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At the same time, Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner launched the "Take Us to Your Table" campaign in partnership with the Houston and Texas Restaurant Associations.
"Houston is a foodie town, and our restaurants reflect the city's diverse culinary tastes and vibrant culture. The COVID-19 public health crisis is having a devastating effect on the men and women who work in the foodservice industry," Turner said during the statewide stay-at-home order. "I applaud ExxonMobil for its generous donation to assist restaurants and to feed first responders.
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ExxonMobil’s donation, committed in April, enabled participating restaurants to bring back up to 50 percent of employees furloughed during the statewide shutdown.
“We want to thank those teams and individuals working around the clock to look after the people of the Greater Houston area,” Linda DuCharme, president of ExxonMobil Upstream Integrated Solutions, said. “In addition to supporting health care workers and first responders, we also want to help out area restaurants and their employees who’ve been hard hit by the pandemic.”
In addition to 6,000 meals, ExxonMobil’s $450,000 Houston-area relief donations helped provide protective equipment for Houston-area health care workers, police officers and firefighters responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.