Yellow Cab Houston and other Hotel and Lodging Association of Greater Houston Members
help bring holiday cheer to Houston area children

 

Houston (Dec. 29, 2005) – Children across the greater Houston area will enjoy a Christmas surprise – a shiny, new bicycle – thanks to more than 100 volunteers, including many from Yellow Cab Houston, Houston’s leading taxi fleet, who built 60 bikes at an annual bike building event held by the Hotel and Lodging Association of Greater Houston (HLAGH).

“We are proud to mark another great year of participating in this worthwhile event,” said Raymond Turner, president of Texas Taxi, the parent company of Yellow Cab Houston. “Our goal is to always assist those most in need within the communities in which we live and work. It pleases us to know that these children will have a better holiday because of volunteers from Yellow Cab and the other Hotel & Lodging Association members that participated in the event.”

On Dec. 5, 2005, the Hotel and Lodging Association of Greater Houston formed teams of eight from supporting HLAGH members,including Yellow Cab Houston, Coach USA, ARAMARK, AVW-TELAV Audio Visual Solutions, Greater Houston Convention & Visitors Bureau, Freeman-Houston and The Houston Chronicle, who assembled the bikes at the George R. Brown Convention Center. The teams competed to see who could build their bikes the fastest and be the first to pass the safety inspections. The winner of the bike building competition for 2005 was the team representing the George R. Brown Convention Center.

In addition to the bike building fun, other members of the teams, along with the children, created holiday cards for the children to take home with their new bikes as well as gift certificates for new helmets.  To make it even more entertaining, following the bike building competition, each team competed in a bike relay race on a course set-up in the George R. Brown Convention Center for this event.  Three members from each team, outfitted in helmets and knee and elbow pads, raced around the curvy course while trying to stay on the child-sized bikes. Winners of the bike relay race and the Christmas card competitions were the teams from AVW TELA Audio Visual Solutions/Freeman-Houston and Marriott Greenspoint, respectively.

The bikes were donated to children in the programs of Child Advocates, Inc., which mobilizes court appointed volunteers to break the vicious cycle of child abuse. The organization speaks up for abused children who are lost in the system and guide them into safe environments where they can thrive. As part of the annual event, many of the program’s children also attended the competition and helped create the holiday cards with the teams that were building the bikes.

            Yellow Cab Houston’s participation in the annual Hotel and Lodging Association of Greater Houston bike building event is just one of many charitable outreach initiatives that makes up the Yellow Cab Cares program, which provides a combination of monetary donations, volunteer time, event sponsorships and public awareness support to Houston-area charities to raise awareness about their cause and promote fundraising activities.

Yellow Cab Houston’s vast community involvement ranges from working with local charities and events, including the Houston Police Foundation, Child Advocates, Inc., the Chevron Houston Marathon, the Susan G. Komen Foundation and Fiestas Patrias. The company has also created programs such as annual scholarships, mentoring partnerships with local schools, underwriting local youth athletic events and building community awareness campaigns concerning drinking and driving.

For more information on Yellow Cab Cares, contact yellowcabcares@houstonyellowcab.com.

 

 

About Yellow Cab

Yellow Cab is Houston’s only computer dispatched taxi fleet.  With more than 1,200 independent contractor-operated cabs in the Houston area, Yellow Cab’s taxi service is available 24-hours a day, 365 days a year.  All cabs are equipped with digital cameras as well as Global Positioning Systems.  For more information, log onto www.yellowcabhouston.com.

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