LOS ANGELES, Jan. 6, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- In 2013, Southern California Gas Co. (SoCalGas) has shown its commitment to the more than 500 communities it serves by donating $4,219,411 to various nonprofit organizations through corporate grants focused on education, the environment and local community support. Also, an additional hundreds of thousands of dollars impacted the community through employee donations and multiple fundraising efforts. SoCalGas employees have also volunteered their time and talents to hundreds of organizations and have done everything from painting new homes for military veterans to serving meals at homeless shelters to donating shoes, coats and bicycles to needy children. And SoCalGas' leadership was also honored with several prestigious awards for their commitment to the communities the utility serves.

SoCalGas and its employees have a long history of giving both money and volunteer time to diverse organizations and in 2013 that giving included:

• More than 500 employees, led by Dennis Arriola, president and COO of SoCalGas, took part as "Team SoCalGas" by walking and raising more than $40,000 for November's United Way HomeWalk, making SoCalGas the largest team raising the most money at this year's event that helps end homelessness in Los Angeles County.
• SoCalGas employees, led by Michael Schneider, vice president of SoCalGas' Customer Operations, raised over $160,000 for the programs and research of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of Los Angeles and Orange counties.
• SoCalGas is a founding sponsor of Junior Achievement's Finance Park where employees took an active part in helping students learn financial literacy and offered career workshops in addition to volunteering and raising almost $20,000 for this outreach program focused on underserved communities.
• SoCalGas employees also participated in the Sempra Energy Employee Giving Network's (SEGN) payroll deduction program. Through SEGN, employees can make charitable contributions to the charities of their choice through one-time or ongoing payroll deductions. The program, which is available to all employees of the Sempra Energy family of employees, including SoCalGas, gives to more than 900 charities and has donated more than $1.4 million.
• SoCalGas employees took part in the Season of Giving program, funded by the Sempra Energy Foundation. Season of Giving is designed to support employees who are volunteering for charities during the holiday season for holiday related projects. For SoCalGas, 60 requests totaling $78,000 were granted.
• SoCalGas awarded 61 grants impacting more than 566,000 low-income students in 11 counties through a specially targeted education initiative focused on early learning, science and math achievement, college readiness and high school graduation. SoCalGas also awarded 106 scholarships worth $91,500 to diverse graduating high school students throughout its service territory.

"I'm so proud of our company and our employees and the impact SoCalGas has on every corner of our service territory," said Denita Willoughby, regional vice president of External Affairs and Employee Communications. "At SoCalGas, we invest our energy, our volunteer time and our financial resources to improving the quality of life in the communities where we do business."

SoCalGas' leaders were also recognized for their commitment to the community throughout the year with many awards including:

• SoCalGas' Chairman and CEO Anne Smith was presented with the Anti-Defamation League's Deborah Award by the Los Angeles chapter of the group that fights anti-Semitism and bigotry. She was also recognized with the Inspirational Woman Leader Award by Los Angeles' Downtown Women's Center that serves Skid Row's homeless women.
• SoCalGas President and COO Dennis Arriola was honored by Plaza Community Services, an organization that serves Latino children, youth and families in the greater Los Angeles area.

To learn more about SoCalGas and its giving programs, go to http://www.socalgas.com/about-us/community/index.shtml

About Southern California Gas Co.
Southern California Gas Co. has been delivering clean, safe and reliable natural gas to its customers for more than 140 years. It is the nation's largest natural gas distribution utility, providing service to 20.9 million consumers connected through nearly 5.8 million meters in more than 500 communities. The company's service territory encompasses approximately 20,000 square miles throughout central and Southern California, from Visalia to the Mexican border. Southern California Gas Co. is a regulated subsidiary of Sempra Energy (NYSE: SRE).

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SOURCE Southern California Gas Co.