Learn more about businesses in the Katy and Fulshear area that have recently opened, as reported by Community Impact. 

Turan Uyghur Kitchen: The restaurant specializes in Central Asian, Uyghur cuisine with menu items including pearl noodles, kabobs and tugur dumplings.

• Opened Feb. 24

• 402 W. Grand Parkway, Ste. 108, Katy

Mind Body Optimization: The integrative mental health and wellness service provider aims to bridge the gap between mental health, physical performance and nutritional science across the Greater Houston area.

• Opened March 2

• 413 Branchwood Lane, Brookshire

360 Grills: The business offers various appliances including grills, fireplaces, pizza ovens, kitchen islands and accessories in several brands such as Kokomo, Napoleon, Blaze and Big Green Egg.

• Opened March 7

• 22010 Highland Knolls Drive, Katy

Brazilian smoothie and juice bar Acai Brasil has opened its ninth Greater Houston area location in Fulshear, owner Alex Santos confirmed.

What to expect: The health food shop has bowls and smoothies featuring the acai berry or pitaya, which is another name for dragonfruit, according to its website.

Customers can choose from several ingredients to go along with their acai and pitaya like fresh fruit, granola, peanut butter, honey or condensed milk.

• 6601 Skyline Drive, Fulshear

Forty-four ZIP codes in the Greater Houston area have childcare deserts, with 28 of those ZIP codes designated as chronic childcare deserts, according to April 9 data released by the research and advocacy nonprofit Children at Risk.

The 2026 analysis shows childcare facilities tend to open in areas where it is already attainable, whereas more rural and low-income regions are overlooked.

Zooming in: An area is considered a childcare desert when the number of children under six years old with working parents surpasses the number of childcare providers by three times in a certain ZIP code, according to Children at Risk’s website. A ZIP code becomes chronic once it is listed as a childcare desert for three sequential years.

The bottom line: During the 2026 Children at Risk’s child care desert April 13 press conference, Santrice Jones-Hare, director of the Greater Houston Strong Start Alliance at Children at Risk, said Houston’s overall childcare quality has improved; however, families' ability to access that care remains an obstacle.

The Houston-Pasadena region rose one spot, and is now ranked No. 6 out of 226 metropolitan areas for its number of high ozone days, according to the 2026 State of the Air report released by the American Lung Association on April 21.

Looking back: The region was ranked No. 7 in 2025, Community Impact previously reported. Between 2022-24, the Houston region’s annual weighted average of high ozone days was 43.3, according to the report.

Some context: Ozone air pollution, aka smog, is a lung irritant and can cause health problems, such as chest tightness, coughing and shortness of breath, according to the ALA.

What else: With regard to annual particle pollution, the Houston-Pasadena area ranked No. 8 out of 211 metropolitan areas. The region also ranked No. 89 out of 224 metropolitan areas for 24-hour particle pollution, according to the report.

More than 53,000 students will be invited to join Texas’ education savings account program this week, the state comptroller’s office said May 4.

The details: Families will be notified by email between May 4-6 if they were awarded funds in the second round of the Texas Education Freedom Accounts program, per a news release from the comptroller’s office.

To date, nearly 96,000 students have been selected to participate, with these students set to receive about $820 million of the $1 billion state lawmakers allocated for the program, an agency spokesperson said. Of the 53,000 second-round awardees, over 51,000 are from low-income families. The other 2,000 students accepted this week were found to qualify for disability-related funding, the agency said.

The background: Families accepted to the TEFA program will receive state funds to send their children to private schools or homeschool them for the 2026-27 school year.

Proponents of the new program have said it will expand educational opportunities, while critics have expressed concerns that the program will unfairly benefit students already enrolled in private schools.