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ST. LOUIS, April 3, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- More than 500 Ameren employees across Missouri and Illinois will participate in a variety of volunteer service projects in April. Activities include gardening, community clean-ups and painting for a variety of social service organizations.

The initiative is part of "Ameren Cares," which connects Ameren with the communities it serves through charitable giving and volunteering. A key focus of Ameren Cares is to partner with nonprofit organizations to improve the quality of life in Ameren's service territory in Illinois and Missouri.

"I enjoy helping those in my community," says Toni Love, an Ameren information technology development specialist and avid volunteer who recently was named the Mathews Dickey Boys and Girls Club Volunteer of the Year. "Knowing that Ameren supports our time spent volunteering is equally gratifying."

Volunteer projects will take place throughout the St. Louis metropolitan area as well as Peoria, Champaign and Decatur in Illinois. Some of the projects include:

St. Louis

• April 5 – Volunteers will assist gardening and cleaning projects at Guardian Angel Settlement Association, an agency serving poverty-stricken residents.
• April 9 – Information Technology (IT) employees will be walking dogs at Stray Rescue animal adoption center.
• April 12 – Employees from Ameren's legal department will work with Saint Louis University students planting and weeding at home care service provider Southside Wellness Center, and corporate planning employees will be cleaning and sorting clothes for Nurses for Newborns.
• April 19 – Forestry employees will be landscaping at St. Louis Language Immersion School.
• April 22 – Ameren Missouri employees will be gathering items for food pantries at Operation Food Search.
• April 26 – IT employees will clean up Carondelet Park; members of Ameren's Gay, Lesbian, Bi-sexual, Transgender Employees and Allies Network will be gardening at Doorways interfaith AIDS housing and services; and volunteers will be mulching and cleaning at World Bird Sanctuary.

Belleville

• April 26 – Ameren's Multi-Generational Employee Resource Group will be painting and cleaning at the Violence Prevention Center of Southwestern Illinois.

Peoria

• April 25 – Employees will be gardening at Family House, a home away from home when children are hospitalized.

Decatur

• April 26 – Employees will be painting at DOVE, an organization providing a diverse offering of programs to help address societal problems and individual needs.

Godfrey

• April 26 – Employees will be at the Beverly Farms Equestrian Center to help with the expansion of their barn. The center offers an Equestrian Therapy program for those with developmental disabilities.

Champaign

• April 26 – Employees will volunteer at the Illinois Marathon in support of the Eastern Illinois Foodbank, which works to alleviate hunger in eastern Illinois.

In addition, Ameren has invited 50 nonprofit organizations to share their missions with employees at its headquarters and several Illinois offices through a series of volunteer fairs, including one at its St. Louis headquarters on April 4.

"Ameren has a rich tradition of giving back to the communities across our 64,000-square-mile service territory," said Tom Voss, chairman and chief executive officer of Ameren. "Our mission, to power the quality of life, is larger than just the electricity and natural gas we provide; it's also to help make our communities better places to live by giving back through volunteerism, sponsorships and donations."

St. Louis-based Ameren Corporation powers the quality of life for 2.4 million electric customers and more than 900,000 natural gas customers in a 64,000-square-mile area through its Ameren Missouri and Ameren Illinois rate-regulated utility subsidiaries. Ameren Illinois provides electric and natural gas delivery service while Ameren Missouri provides vertically integrated electric service, with generating capacity of 10,300 megawatts, and natural gas delivery service. Ameren Transmission of Illinois develops regional electric transmission projects. Follow the company on Twitter @AmerenCorp. For more information, visit Ameren.com.

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SOURCE Ameren