Fort Worth Now Announces 'Strike Force' to Help Businesses Recover from COVID-19

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Fort Worth Now, the nonprofit being launched and chaired by Mayor Betsy Price, banker Elaine Agather, and businessman John Goff, said Thursday it’s raised $425,000 in gifts from the business community in less than three weeks.

The organization on Thursday named Jarratt Watkins, a Kelly Hart & Hallman lawyer in Fort Worth, to take the staff lead and run day-to-day operations. The organization’s mission will be to help existing businesses recover and expand, grow jobs, and identify new economic development opportunities for the city. The organization will be guided by a “strike force” of business and community leaders, also named Thursday.

“People are really excited,” Price said during an afternoon news conference via Zoom, which she billed as City Hall’s first-ever news conference using such a platform. Reporters were invited to ask questions using Zoom’s chat tool.

Fort Worth Now’s fundraising goal is $500,000, all in private gifts, which will go to pay for salary, travel, and marketing materials.

Watkins, the organization’s only staff member, is an associate at Kelly Hart and said he is taking a 12-month leave of absence to take on the Fort Worth Now post. “The firm is being extremely supportive of me coming to do this, and, hopefully, they’ll have me back,” he said during the news conference.

Watkins, whose practice focuses on mergers and acquisitions, has represented clients in manufacturing, aerospace, technology, retail, financial services, energy, entertainment, and other industries. A graduate of the University of Texas and SMU Dedman School of Law, Watkins has been a lawyer since 2013.

“I’ve worked with companies of all shapes and sizes,” he said. “I’ve gotten an opportunity to see the challenges that businesses face on a day-to-day basis.”

The strike force members named Thursday:

· Bob Jameson, CEO, Visit Fort Worth

· Bobby Ahdieh, dean, Texas A&M School of Law

· Brandom Gengelbach, president, Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce

· Charlie Royer, co-owner and new business development director, Royer Commercial

· David Endicott, CEO, Alcon

· David Nolet, president, JP Morgan Chase Fort Worth

· Dee Kelly Jr., attorney, Kelly Hart & Hallman

· George Popstefanov, CEO, PMG

· Greg Bird, CEO, Jetta Operating Co.

· Jeremy Smith, president, Rainwater Foundation

· Jon Bonnell, owner, Bonnell’s restaurants

· Jonathan Morris, Fort Worth Barber Shop

· Jyric Sims, CEO, Medical City Fort Worth

· Larry Autrey, managing partner, Whitley Penn

· Leonard Firestone, distiller and proprietor, Firestone & Robertson Distilling Co.

· Matt Avila, CEO, Byrne

· Matt Carter, vice president, Fine Line Investments

· Matt Rose, chairman, Read Fort Worth; retired CEO, BNSF

· Michael Williams, president, University of North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth

· Mike Berry, president, Hillwood

· Pat Linares, former interim superintendent, Fort Worth Independent School District

· Paul Dorman, CEO, DFB Pharmaceuticals

Price, Agather, and Goff on May 7 announced the formation of Fort Worth Now, to help the city’s businesses emerge from COVID-19 and identify opportunities for corporate relocation, moving business to the U.S. from countries such as China, and development of new technologies in the city in the virus’ wake.

Goff and his wife, Cami, pledged $100,000 to the nonprofit as a match for other gifts. The nonprofit, which aims to complete its business within a year, has the potential to augment the economic development plans the city and Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce implemented in recent years, Price and the business leaders said.

Goff is chairman and CEO of Crescent Real Estate Equities in Fort Worth and a longtime investor with his wife through their family office. Agather, a longtime Dallas-Fort Worth banker, is chairman of the Dallas region for JP Morgan Chase & Co., chairman of Fort Worth’s Bass Hall, and board member of the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame and Fort Worth Stock Show. Her husband, Neils Agather, is executive director of the Burnett Foundation.

The nonprofit is to be fully privately funded, Price, Agather, and Goff have said. The Schaefer Advertising Co., for one, donated design of the organization’s logo.

Near-term, the nonprofit will focus on “getting the city back in business,” Goff said at the May 7 news conference. Longer-term, it will look at how the community can lever its assets to foster growth.

Industries and segments such as medical and pharmaceutical, legal, education, real estate, banking, aviation, and small business are examples, Price said.