Owensboro, Kentucky Area Youth To Benefit From Verizon Wireless Grant

OWENSBORO, KY — Many girls between the ages of 6 and 18 in the greater Owensboro area will benefit from a $1,500 donation made by Verizon Wireless to Girls Incorporated of Owensboro-Daviess County.

The grant will help fund the Girls Inc. Project BOLD®, a violence prevention and personal safety program that encourages girls to analyze the violence in their lives, develops strategies and skills to increase their personal safety and partners with community resources to work toward safer environments for girls and women. The funding will be used for training staff and volunteers, purchasing program materials, recruiting participants and establishing links with local schools, faith organizations and other youth-serving agencies.

"We are very grateful to Verizon Wireless for helping us to expand this important program so we can reach more young girls in our community," said Tish Correa Osborne, CEO of Girls Inc. of Owensboro-Daviess County. "Violence thwarts the ability of all young people to grow up safe and confident; however, the violence that girls experience is distinctively different than what boys experience. Overwhelmingly, the violence girls experience is gender-based, male-on-female aggression. This gift from Verizon Wireless will help us build young girls' skills and abilities to avoid, stand up to or deflect the violence they experience."

Girls Incorporated is a non-profit organization dedicated to inspiring all girls to be strong, smart and bold by providing educational programs to young girls and teens, especially those in high risk, underserved communities.

The Verizon Wireless donation was made in conjunction with the company's HopeLine® program. This program provides funding to organizations that support domestic violence awareness and prevention and turns no-longer-used wireless phones into support for survivors of domestic violence.

HopeLine's national phone recycling and reuse program collected nearly 1.13 million phones in 2008 and has collected more than 5.6 million wireless phones since 2001. In the past two years, Verizon Wireless-along with the Verizon Foundation-has donated more than $300,000 in cash grants, phones and airtime to shelters and other organizations in Kentucky working to support victims of domestic violence and their families.

"I encourage everyone to dig through their closets, ask friends and family members for their used cell phones and accessories and donate this old equipment to our HopeLine program," said Greg Haller, president—Kentucky/Indiana/Michigan Region, Verizon Wireless. "You can help make a difference in the lives of domestic violence survivors, including our youngest survivors-our children, right here in western Kentucky."

HopeLine wireless phone donations are accepted at all Verizon Wireless Communications Stores across the nation. Verizon Wireless encourages everyone who plans to give a phone to HopeLine to make sure service on that device is discontinued and to erase any personal data on the phone. Phones given to the HopeLine program are refurbished and resold for reuse, or disposed of in an environmentally sound manner.

For more information on Verizon Wireless' HopeLine program, visit www.verizonwireless.com/hopeline.  

About Verizon Wireless
Verizon Wireless operates the nation's most reliable and largest wireless voice and data network, serving more than 86.6 million customers. Headquartered in Basking Ridge, N.J., with more than 86,000 employees nationwide, Verizon Wireless is a joint venture of Verizon Communications (NYSE: VZ) and Vodafone (NYSE and LSE: VOD). For more information, visit www.verizonwireless.com. To preview and request broadcast-quality video footage and high-resolution stills of Verizon Wireless operations, log on to the Verizon Wireless Multimedia Library at www.verizonwireless.com/multimedia.  

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