Verizon's Corporate Responsibility Report Highlights Social Benefits of Company Initiatives, Employee Commitment and Broadband Network

NEW YORK - Verizon has issued its latest corporate responsibility report, "Doing the Work," which explains how the company's major initiatives are making a difference to its customers and the communities it serves, creating a great place to work, and making efficient use of resources.

Among the examples cited in the report is Verizon's use of its broadband network to help customers and employees significantly reduce their carbon footprint. Another is Thinkfinity.org, Verizon's award-winning online educational resource, which is making it easy for teachers to bring eight academic disciplines to life for students in classrooms across the country. There is also an in-depth look at how some broadband-enabled products and services are extending the benefits of technology to people with physical limitations.

The report notes that numerous multinational corporations worldwide are using Verizon Business' communications services to go green and also work smarter.  The corporations are employing advanced collaboration solutions such as high-definition (HD) conferencing and telepresence to improve productivity across their operations, reduce employee air travel, and support their overall corporate social responsibility initiatives. Verizon's broadband networks can also enable remote monitoring and adjusting of energy use at "smart" buildings, remote reporting of traffic congestion to "smart" cars, and remote monitoring of patient health to "smart" offices of doctors. 

In addition, the report says, through Thinkfinity.org Verizon provides teachers across America with more than 55,000 free educational resources and the professional training needed to help them reach today's tech-savvy students. First-in-class content partners help bring eight academic disciplines to life in the classroom through interactive and engaging content and unlock the promise of literacy for people of all ages.

The report also explains that deaf or hard-of-hearing customers in the Northeast and Potomac regions can communicate in their language - American Sign Language - with specially trained service representatives in one of Verizon's Centers for Customers with Disabilities via video phones and a high-speed broadband connection.

"We hope to provide readers with a feel for the human impact of these initiatives," explains Verizon Chairman and CEO Ivan Seidenberg in a letter in the beginning of the report. "Our people believe passionately that what we do - what they do - makes a difference for customers and our society as a whole. This social dimension is built into our very mission as a network company - in the fullest sense of the term."

Verizon continues to be one of America's leading employers, major taxpayers and largest purchasers of goods and services. In 2007, Verizon made a record $17.5 billion capital investment to enhance the power and reliability of the company's networks.  The company spent $3.1 billion with diverse suppliers, and the Human Resources Committee of the Verizon Board of Directors implemented a change to the annual incentive plan to tie supplier diversity success to short-term incentive compensation for managers.

The 2007 corporate responsibility report also highlights these additional Verizon programs and policies:

• An employee development and training investment that reached $371 million in 2007.

• One of the most generous active military-leave programs in corporate America.
• Verizon helped Fort Wayne, Ind., transition into a center for innovation and an ideal incubator for high-tech start-ups - outpacing the rest of the state in economic growth - by investing nearly $70 million to deploy some 9 million feet of fiber-optic cable, bringing the fastest broadband data services to 130,000 households and businesses.
• Efforts to focus attention on the issue of child safety on the Internet and the tools available to parents that can make the Internet safe and enjoyable.
• Total energy conservation, waste prevention and recycling efforts that reduced greenhouse-gas emissions by an estimated 332,295 metric tons annually, equivalent to keeping more than 60,000 cars off the road.
• The Verizon Foundation increased spending on domestic violence prevention programs to $5.5 million and held the second national domestic violence summit. More than 1 million cell phones were collected via Verizon Wireless' HopeLine(r) phone recycling program, through which phones are refurbished for reuse or recycled, and the proceeds are donated to domestic violence advocacy groups or used to purchase wireless phones for survivors.

Verizon's 52-page corporate responsibility report is available online at http://responsibility.verizon.com/. 

Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ), headquartered in New York, is a leader in delivering broadband and other wireline and wireless communication innovations to mass market, business, government and wholesale customers.  Verizon Wireless operates America's most reliable wireless network, serving nearly 66 million customers nationwide.  Verizon's Wireline operations include Verizon Business, which delivers innovative and seamless business solutions to customers around the world, and Verizon Telecom, which brings customers the benefits of converged communications, information and entertainment services over the nation's most advanced fiber-optic network.  A Dow 30 company, Verizon employs a diverse workforce of nearly 235,000 and last year generated consolidated operating revenues of $93.5 billion.  For more information, visit www.verizon.com.

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