Why Not Take Your Old Phone To Work?

LAUREL, MD — This month, when colleagues cart their children into the office for "Bring Your Son/Daughter to Work Day," you can bring in something extra… your no-longer-used wireless phone. Sure, no one's going to compliment your phone on its excellent manners or adorable pigtails, but you will be supporting an important cause, Verizon Wireless' HopeLine^SM program, which benefits domestic violence victims.

HopeLine is Verizon Wireless' nationwide initiative to raise awareness and aid in preventing domestic violence. The program includes a wireless phone recycling component where no-longer-used handsets are refurbished, recycled and/or sold; proceeds are donated to domestic violence advocacy groups or used to purchase wireless phones with airtime for emergency use by victims.

As a result of HopeLine and related phone recycling programs the company has organized since 1995, Verizon Wireless has collected more than one million used wireless phones for the benefit of domestic violence victims and advocacy groups. In the last year alone, since the HopeLine phone-recycling program launched nationwide in October, 2001, Verizon Wireless has collected more than 500,000 handsets.

Now, local workplaces are jumping on the HopeLine bandwagon and are actively collecting handsets from their employees to support the program. During the past nine months, the following Washington, DC, Virginia and Maryland businesses have organized collection drives to recycle phones through HopeLine to help prevent domestic violence and neighborhood crime:

• KPMG, Washington and Northern Virginia;
• Ernst & Young's Capital Region;
• Maryland's Knights of Columbus;
• Verizon Connected Solutions, a business unit of Verizon Communications;
• Blue Cross Blue Shield of Maryland;
• Maryland Environmental Services;
• Maryland Parole Commission;
• North Arundel Hospital;
• International Monetary Fund;
• IKEA

Collections by these workplaces have helped HopeLine to provide digital wireless phones with airtime to victims; make financial grants to regional domestic violence prevention organizations, and donate free, wireless voicemail boxes for use by women in shelters to receive and retrieve private messages from potential employers and landlords. HopeLine beneficiaries in the region include:

• DC Coalition Against Domestic Violence;
• Women Empowered Against Violence (WEAVE) which operates DC's Greater Southeast Community Hospital Domestic Violence Intake Center;
• Court Supervision and Offender Supervisory Agency (CSOSA);
• Virginians Against Domestic Violence;
• Laurel Shelter, Gloucester County, VA;
• Walmsely Terrace Civic Association; Highland Park/Southern Tip; Battery Park, Barton Heights; RACE; and the Greater Jefferson Davis Community Association, neighborhood watch and community crime patrol groups in Richmond, VA;
• Maryland Network Against Domestic Violence;
• Maryland's District Court Commission Offices;
• Betty Ann Krahnke Center, Montgomery County, MD;
• SARC (Sexual Assault/Spousal Abuse Resource Center), Harford County, MD;
• Diakonia Shelter, Life Crisis Center and Good Samaritan Ministries Shelter, Maryland's Eastern Shore;
• Johns Hopkins Bayview Community Care-A-Van, Baltimore, MD.

If your workplace is interested is launching a HopeLine recycling program, please contact Sherri Cunningham at (202) 302-0280 to order materials and information.

"The HopeLine Phone Recycling Program is an easy and convenient way for local business to support local domestic violence organizations as they help abused women re-build their lives," said Patrick Devlin, Verizon Wireless regional president. "Domestic violence does not discriminate. It's all around us in places most of us would never imagine. Citizens who support the program could very well be helping their own friends or neighbors."

To ensure the HopeLine program can serve as many victims as possible, the public is also encouraged to continue dropping off no-longer-used wireless phones in collection bins in any of the 49 Verizon Wireless stores in Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia. All 1,200 company-owned nationwide stores collect phones.

About Verizon Wireless
Verizon Wireless is the nation's leading provider of wireless communications. The company has the largest nationwide wireless voice and data network and 32.5 million customers. Headquartered in Bedminster, NJ, Verizon Wireless is a joint venture of Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) and Vodafone (NYSE and LSE: VOD). Find more information on the Web at www.verizonwireless.com.

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