The Results Are In! Lunches of Love Awarded $100,000 to Fight Child Hunger

—Reliant Gives Voting Campaign Reaches $1 Million Mark—

HOUSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Texas ranks third in the nation for food insecurity and many children facing hunger rely on school lunch as their only meal of the day. Fort Bend nonprofit Lunches of Love helps fill the gap when children are out of school and would otherwise not know where and when their next meal would come. Lunches of Love will be able to serve more than 4,300 children in Fort Bend County after receiving the most public votes during the Reliant Gives public voting campaign. Reliant employees surprised the nonprofit today with a donation of $100,000.

Launched in 2016, Reliant Gives Vote, Reliant’s crowd-sourced, charitable giving program reached $1 million in donations with this campaign. Since then, funds have been awarded to 24 deserving nonprofits, impacting over 140,000 lives across the state of Texas.

The program allows the public to vote and direct company donations to three nonprofits, which are nominated by employees. The nonprofit with the most votes receives $100,000. The organization with the second most votes was Shriners Hospitals for Children-Houston and the organization with the third most votes was Bo’s Place.

“These three organizations each make a powerful and unique impact in Houston, filling needs in our community that are so critically important,” said Elizabeth Killinger, Reliant president. “I’m so grateful to our thoughtful employees for nominating such deserving organizations and I’m thrilled our company can support causes that are important to both our employees and communities.”

Final Voting Results

• $100,000: Lunches of Love provides free nutritious sack lunches to children in Fort Bend County that depend on breakfast and lunch provided by their school, during extended school holidays (spring break, summer, Thanksgiving and Christmas) and weekends. Hunger impairs children’s health in significant and long-lasting ways, including impeded growth and development, poor immune systems, mental health and lower test scores. The $100,000 donation will provide 133,333 lunches to children in Fort Bend County and allow the organization to add a sustainable garden at the facility to teach children about fruits and vegetables.
• $30,000: Shriners Hospitals for Children - Houston provides care for children in the specialty areas of orthopaedics, spinal cord injury, and cleft lip and palate, regardless of a family’s ability to pay.
• $20,000: Bo’s Place delivers a variety of grief support programs, information and resources for bereaved children, families, and adults at no cost. Bo’s Place operates on the belief that it is helpful and healing for grieving children and adults to share their stories, memories, experiences, thoughts and feelings with those who can understand their journey. The organization offers the only free on-going grief support program in the greater Houston area for children and their families.

About Reliant, an NRG company

Reliant powers, protects and simplifies life by bringing electricity, smart energy solutions, residential services and security to homes and businesses across Texas. Serving customers and the community is at the core of what we do. Reliant is part of NRG Energy, Inc. (NYSE: NRG), a Fortune 500 company that creates value through best-in-class operations and reliable and efficient electric generation. Backed by a diverse portfolio of power generating facilities, NRG’s retail companies, including Reliant, power more than 3 million customers in 10 states and the District of Columbia. NRG retail brands collectively are the largest providers of electricity in Texas. For more information about Reliant, please visit reliant.com and connect with Reliant on Facebook at facebook.com/reliantenergy and Twitter @reliantenergy. PUCT Certificate #10007.