there were about 40,000 Ismailis in the area. The Ismaili Jamatkhana and Center, which serves as the headquarters of the Ismaili Council for the United States, is located in Sugar Land, along First Colony Boulevard, on a plot of land. The center, built for $10 million and designed by Indian architect Ramesh Khosla, opened in 2002. The Aga Khan, Governor of Texas Rick Perry, Mayor of Sugar Land David Wallace, and other politicians of the State of Texas attended the opening ceremony. The center includes prayer rooms, a cultural center, a conference center, and a gallery of Ismaili art. In 2006, the Aga Khan Foundation purchased an plot, including the Robinson Warehouse on Allen Parkway, in order to build an Ismaili Centre. The group planned to demolish the warehouse. The building, designed by Nimmons, Carr & Wright, opened in 1929 as the first Sears store in Houston, but Sears moved out in the 1930s. The Baylor College of Medicine used it temporarily in the 1930s. In the 1950s an individual with a storage business, Arthur Robinson, purchased it for that business. In February 2019, Ismaili Muslims of the Aga Khan Development Network hired architect Farshid Moussavi to construct the first U.S. cultural center for the city of Houston adjacent to Buffalo Bayou Park to bring “Houston’s diverse communities together in a unique space for cultural, educational and social activities.” Like most other Ismaili centers in Texas, the cultural center will incorporate space for courtyards and greenery. While the project is expected to take years, the new center will include a Jamatkhana for spiritual and religious services as well as an ambassadorial mandate to put forth public programs and missions. "" It is the Ismaili Center Houston. The Ismailis annually run the Houston Partnership Walk in order to raise funds for antipoverty initiatives. The Aga Khan Foundation Walk occurs annually as method of creating awareness and funding programs for developing nations around the world, especially in Asia and Africa. With more than a million raised at the Sam Houston Park in the 2017 walk, the foundation has helped raise more than $98 million since 1995. "" It is scheduled to open in 2024. Some Ismaili Muslims belong to the Dawoodi Bohra sect. Mariya Karimjee, a Bohra Muslim who lived in Houston, wrote that the Houston Bohris were more religious than those in Karachi, her city of origin. Karimjee also stated that