Houston nonprofit grows to provide more resources to underserved communities in Houston

Innovating food deserts

Urban Harvest is introducing a new location and a new program that accepts government assistance. Erik Scheel/Pexels

For some Houstonians, fresh foods are far away and too expensive to incorporate into their diets regularly. A Houston organization is looking to change that.

Urban Harvest, a 25-year-old nonprofit focused on bringing fresh produce and education to underserved communities, received a $347,000 grant from the Rebuild Texas Fund earlier this year to expand their services across town. The expansion also means a new community farmers market in northeast Houston that opens on Saturday, August 17, at Kashmere Gardens Elementary School (4901 Lockwood Drive).

The farmers market was created to serve a food desert continuing to recover from Hurricane Harvey, according to a news release. Urban Harvest is partnering with Northeast Houston Redevelopment Council and Common Market to create and run the market.

The new market will accept Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits, which offer nutrition assistance to over 637,000 low-income individuals in Harris County. With the addition of the Double Up Houston program, which launched in April 2019, SNAP shoppers receive a dollar-for-dollar match, up to $20 per day, that they will be able to use to purchase fresh produce. In total, there are 13 farm stands across Houston that can access the Double Up SNAP incentive.

"Double Up is new to Houston, this is the first time we have had a Double Up kind of program here in the metroplex, ever," says Janna Roberson, executive director of Urban Harvest. "It is something that is very common in a lot of states."

Fair Food Network, based in Michigan, assists in working the Double Up program in 22 states across the country, including their partnership with Urban Harvest in Texas. "It gives people the opportunity to be able to purchase fruits and vegetables, which are very expensive," said Roberson.

"Last fall we received a grant with a large group of partners for Double Up Houston," Roberson tells InnovationMap. The grant was gifted by Rebuild Texas, a fund created by the Austin-based Michael & Susan Dell Foundation after Harvey.

"Initially, they did not do a lot of funding in Houston because we have a lot of resources here in our city, so their primary task was to fund in other places that had been hit by Hurricane Harvey that didn't have that foundation," adds Roberson. "They were really interested in areas of Houston that had been hit by Harvey and impacted, and how those places related to food and food access."

Urban Harvest, founded in 1994, is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization providing community garden programming, farmers markets, gardening classes, and youth education. The farmers markets, launched in 2014, bring in farmers and producers from within 180 miles of Houston, offering the freshest, local produce and meats available. The organization has a staff of 11 and is located in east downtown Houston.

"There is programming also going at these markets where we are working with the University of Houston and the Houston Food Bank's nutrition office to have people come out to the markets and actually prep fresh produce to be able to show people, with very simple recipes, what you can do with the extra vegetables that you are purchasing," says Roberson.

In the past year, Urban Harvest has been working to strategically grow in the greater Houston area. In September of last year, the organization's main farmers market moved to its current location at 2752 Buffalo Speedway, tripling in size.

"We moved the market and expanded it, presenting some 72 vendors at the market location," Roberson tells InnovationMap. The Buffalo Speedway market operates 52 weeks a year every Saturday from 8 a.m. to noon.

Urban Harvest has over a dozen spots where it has weekly farmers markets around town. Courtesy of Urban Harvest

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Houston museum showcases America's founding documents in rare exhibit

Experience History

As the United States prepares to celebrate its 250th birthday, Houstonians have a chance to see rare documents from the founding of the nation. Freedom Plane National Tour: Documents That Forged a Nation, presented by the National Archives Foundation, will be on display at the Houston Museum of Natural Science through Monday, May 25.

The collection includes a rare engraving of the original Declaration of Independence; official Oaths of Allegiance signed by George Washington, Aaron Burr, and Alexander Hamilton; a draft of the Bill of Rights; the Treaty of Paris, the documented that recognized America's independence from Great Britain; and the tally of votes approving the Constitution.

The National Archives specifically chose Houston as one of only eight cities in the country to host the exhibit as a means to help the documents reach a wider audience outside of the main hub of semiquincentennial events in New England and the Washington, D.C. area.

"One of the things we decided when we put the tour together because we wanted to be off the East Coast," said Patrick Madden, CEO of the National Archives Foundation, who was onsite for the exhibit's opening in Houston. "There's a lot of 250th celebration stuff happening in the original 13 colonies. How do we get it to major markets where larger numbers of people can see it? So in the case of Houston, obviously, [is a] major market in this part of the country, but also we've partnered with the museum twice before with National Archives exhibits, so we knew that they would be up to the task of handling the exhibit and the crowds."

The star of the collection is a rare engraving of the original Declaration of Independence. Secretary of State and future president John Quincy Adams commissioned 200 exact replicas of the document from engraver William J. Stone in 1823. Less than 50 now remain. Madden joyfully pointed out that there are errors in this document, a potent reminder that the men who forged a nation made mistakes.

"There's a couple of typos in it where they had to make corrections," said Madden. "So even the founders, you know, they're all human. That resonates because here these people are making this move against the most powerful nation in the world and putting their lives on the line for a country based on ideas."

Other impressive parts of the collection include official Oaths of Allegiance signed by George Washington, Aaron Burr, and Alexander Hamilton, as well as one of the drafts of the Bill of Rights. Many states would not ratify the Constitution until certain rights were included in the document, leading to Washington going on a national tour assuring state leaders enshrining protections was first on the list. The draft copy on display specifically shows the First Amendment in progress.

Houston is the fourth stop on the exhibition's tour, which will take the documents to Denver, Miami, Dearborn, and Seattle through the summer. Freedom Plane is just one part of a larger patriotic celebration at the HMNS, which includes a film series celebrating American science and culture and general Americana decoration throughout the main hall.

Admission to Freedom Plane is free to the public, but separate from general admission to the museum. Space is limited, and passes are available on a first-come, first-serve basis. Non-members should expect long waits or the possibility that the day's passes are sold out. Only museum members can reserve passes for specific times. Flash photography is prohibited due to the fragile nature of the documents.

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This article originally appeared on CultureMap.com.

Houston quantum energy chip startup emerges from stealth with $12M round

seed funding

Houston-based Casimir has emerged from stealth with a $12 million seed round to commercialize its quantum energy chip.

The round was led by Austin-based Scout Ventures. Lavrock Ventures, Cottonwood Technology, Capital Factory, American Deep Tech, and Tim Draper of Draper Associates also participated in the round. The oversubscribed round exceeded the company’s original $8 million target, according to a news release.

Casimir’s semiconductor chips can generate power from quantum vacuum fields without the need for batteries or charging. The company plans to commercialize its first-generation MicroSparc chip by 2028.

The MicroSparc chip measures 5 millimeters by 5 millimeters and is designed to produce 1.5 volts at 25 microamps, comparable to a small rechargeable battery, without degradation and no replacement cycle.

“Casimir represents exactly the kind of breakthrough dual-use technology Scout Ventures was built to back,” Brad Harrison, founder and managing partner at Scout Ventures, said in the release. “This is based on 100 years of science and we’re finally approaching a commercial product … We’re proud to lead this round and support Casimir’s journey from applied science to deployed technology.”

Casimir says it aims to scale its technology across the ”full power spectrum,” including large-scale energy systems that can power homes, commercial infrastructures and electric vehicles.

Casimir's scientific work has been supported by DARPA-funded nanofabrication research and its technology was incubated at the Limitless Space Institute (LSI). LSI is a nonprofit that works to innovate interstellar travel and was founded by Kam Ghaffarian. Technology investor and serial entrepreneur Ghaffarian has been behind companies like X-energy, Intuitive Machines, Axiom Space and Quantum Space.

Harold “Sonny” White, founder and CEO of Casimir, believes the technology can power devices for years without replacements.

“Millions of devices will operate for years without a battery ever needing to be replaced or recharged because we have engineered a customized Casimir cavity into hardware capable of producing persistent electrical power,” White added in the release. “I spent nearly two decades at NASA studying how we power humanity’s future. That work led me to the Casimir effect and the quantum vacuum, where new tools have allowed us to build on a century of scientific knowledge and bring abundant power to the world.”

Houston leads the way in innovative brain research and more news to know

Trending Topics

Editor's note: The top Houston innovation news for the first half of May includes an initial round of brain research grants from Rice and FDA approval for clinical trial of a Houston startup's brain implant. Below are the five most-read InnovationMap stories published May 1-14, 2026:

1. Rice Brain Institute awards seed grants for dementia, Alzheimer’s research

The recently established Rice Brain Institute awarded 12 seed grants last month to support research on dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and other neurological disorders. The grants are part of the Rice DPRIT Seed Grant Program, which aims to help faculty members generate preliminary data, test and teams that would be supported under the Dementia Prevention and Research Institute of Texas. Continue reading.

2. Houston startup’s brain implant for depression advances to clinical trial

Houston-based Motif Neurotech has received FDA approval to move forward with its first clinical trial for its innovative way to fight treatment-resistant depression and other mental health disorders. The company has developed a brain-computer interface technology based on research from Rice University. The blueberry-sized, wirelessly powered implantable device known as the Digitally-programmable Over-brain Therapeutic (DOT) stimulator delivers electrical stimulation to brain circuits linked to depression. The DOT stimulator sits in the skull above the dura without touching the brain and is considered an alternative to transcranial magnetic stimulation, which requires multiple treatment sessions and can cause headaches. Continue reading.

3. Houston legacy planning platform secures $2.5M investment, adds to board

Houston-based Paige, a comprehensive life planning and succession software company, has secured a $2.5 million investment to expand the AI-driven tools on its platform. The funding comes from Alabama-based 22nd State Banking Company, according to a news release. Paige says it will use the funding to expand automation, AI-driven onboarding and self-service tools, as well as add to its sales and customer success teams. Continue reading.

4. 7+ can't-miss Houston business and innovation events in May

Houston is living up to its nicknames as Space City and the Energy Capital of the World this month with a lineup of insightful talks, pitch days and industry conferences. Plus, there are opportunities to network over crawfish, learn about brain health and more. Continue reading.

5. Houston rises in 2026 ranking of best U.S. cities to start a business

Houston has reaffirmed its commitment to a business-friendly environment and now ranks as the 26th best large U.S. city for starting a business in 2026. The city jumped up eight places after ranking 34th last year. Continue reading.

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