Our community impact
Sharing our energy with the communities we serve through charitable giving, outreach and employee volunteerism.
We are privileged to serve natural gas and electric utility customers in our eight-state footprint. Giving back to those communities is part of our history, our culture, and will hopefully be our legacy. We continuously strive to positively impact the lives of every person, business, and organization in the towns and cities we all call home.
Providing safe and reliable energy every day is what we do, and alongside that commitment, our employees make a meaningful difference in the communities where they live and work.
We are proud to share this summary of our community impact activities.
Serving over 1.34 million natural gas and electric utility customers in 800+ communities across eight states, our direct economic impact included charitable giving, compensation for almost 2,900 employees, franchise fees, payments to suppliers, and property, sales and use taxes paid to our communities.
We know that by giving back in our communities, we are helping build a stronger and more vibrant society. At the same time, volunteers benefit by finding a sense of purpose and meaning. More than 760 employees spent over 31,000 hours sharing their energy while volunteering with hundreds of community organizations.
We supported the work of economic development organizations and chambers of commerce working to strengthen our communities. In 2023, we invested more than $651,000 to aid this development that fuels our local businesses.
Black Hills Cares
We all use energy to heat our homes when it’s cold and keep the lights on when it gets dark. Making the tough decision between paying for energy or feeding your family is beyond challenging. As the need increased, so did the giving. Last year, our energy assistance program, Black Hills Cares, helped over 4,600 families through partnerships with two dozen agencies throughout our service territory.
We match our customers’ and employees’ contributions to Black Hills Cares dollar-for-dollar, raising a total of almost $697,000 last year.
Energy in action
United Way pledges
Last year, we benefited 45 United Ways across our eight states including over $495,000 in employee pledges plus a 25% match from Black Hills Corp. Foundation.
Charitable giving
Included contributions and sponsorships to nonprofits, chambers and economic development organizations, United Way, energy assistance, in-kind donations, scholarships, investments in trees and the social impact of employee volunteer hours.
Charitable giving
Contributions and sponsorships
Our charitable impact included contributions and sponsorships for nonprofits, chambers and economic development organizations, United Way, energy assistance, in-kind donations, and investments in trees, as well as the monetary value of our employees’ volunteerism.
Nearly $2.3 million was invested by our state utilities and the Black Hills Corp. Foundation in the great work of hundreds of worthy local organizations and nonprofits.
Spreading Positive Energy in our communities
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Jan Meis and Suzie Kingery like to take walks together outside the Black Hills Energy office in Council Bluffs. Most days, these walks are uneventful, but on Monday, Oct. 7, they were surprised to see a Cooper’s hawk in the road. Several vehicles passed by before they had the opportunity to help.… -
A hot, windy day in southwest Nebraska generated $3,768 as Black Hills Energy employees, family and friends putted for a playground. The Central Region's 4th Annual Golf Tournament was hosted in McCook, Nebraska this year on Sept. 30 at Heritage Hills Golf Course. The tournament, with a field of… -
On Friday, Sept. 22, the Kearney office went to the dogs…literally! To show support for the local community and hold an event to coincide with the area Junk Jaunt, a garage sale was hosted to benefit the Kearney Area Animal Shelter. Committee members met and chose the animal shelter as the charity… -
Each year Black Hills Energy is able to support United Way in a Day of Caring event as part of the Season of Giving campaign. Several employees from the Bluffs facility in Iowa joined together to help the New Visions Homeless Services get ready for their December Community Christmas by sorting…