But since April 29, those pegs have given the hidden helper a face. A new sign recognizes Sunnyvale-based Advanced Micro Devices as Community Services' guardian angel, benefactor and business partner.

On May 10, Sunnyvale Community Services held an official ribbon cutting on the building.

After a long, complex process of land sales and donated space, community services finally became the owner of a home building, with much of the thanks going to AMD.

"We try to give what we have, and we have money, people, time and 'stuff,'" said AMD Global Community Affairs Director Allyson Peerman.

She said AMD had kept its involvement quiet because it didn't want to go public until the deal was sealed.

Once split between offices in the former Sunnyvale Senior Center and storage space in the empty Town Center Mall, Sunnyvale Community Services now lives at 725 Kifer Road. The almost-12,000 square feet is divided into warehouse space, meeting rooms and offices, allowing Nancy Tivol, the executive director, to oversee every facet of the operation simply by strolling through the halls.

"We're moving 20,000 pounds of food every month, and we used to have to move it three times," Tivol said. "Now all we do is roll up the back door and the food is in."

Community services--which provides networking, food and other necessary items to 1,150 families each month--used to have to unload trucks of food into the rented mall space, package it there for individual families and then transport it to the senior center offices for distribution to clients.

Although Sunnyvale Community Services has been working with AMD for almost 15 years, the relocation process began five years ago. Seeking to consolidate its operation, community services began searching for a permanent location.

"I think we went around to every vacant lot in the city and asked 'Will you sell this land to us?'" Tivol remembered.

AMD was in the middle of a surplus land study at the time and offered community services a 3.25-acre parcel at Arques Avenue and Lawrence Expressway.

The space was much too large for community services to use effectively, so Tivol and several other nonprofit groups--including the Council on Aging--formed a group to share the space. The group planned to use 60 percent of the donated space for their own needs and rent out the rest to similar groups.

This sort of donation was not rare for AMD. The company, founded in Sunnyvale in 1969, has made community assistance a focus of its global operations.

"We take a look at what the most crucial community needs are. We try to focus on education and basic needs, and Sunnyvale Community Services definitely provides [for] basic needs," Peerman said.

In 2004 in the Bay Area alone, AMD contributed more than $1.6 million in financial gifts and in-kind donations. In 1994 it gave the city a $1-million grant to build the Columbia Neighborhood Center adjacent to Columbia Middle School. In the past two years, the high-tech company has also given $15,000 in funds and supplies to the Columbia Middle School after-school boxing program, a gang-deterrent program run by social workers and police officers.

Employees of AMD have given more than 22,000 toys to community service's annual Community Christmas Center efforts.

Once the land issue was solved, Tivol turned to Jane Vaughan of Menlo Equities, whom she had met through the Sunnyvale Chamber of Commerce. Vaughan--who is currently working on the plans for the new downtown--has worked on a number of Sunnyvale development projects and had connections that Tivol needed.

Vaughan brought in architects, attorneys and contractors to work on the project, donating her own services at reduced or no cost. Tivol was able to line up foundations eager to fund this nonprofit collective.

And then the dot-bomb exploded.

"Most of the potential sponsors said to come back two years after the stock market recovered, and that wasn't happening then and still hasn't happened," Tivol says.

Even though the original plan failed, Tivol said AMD was determined to help.

The company stuck with the plan and donated the land to community services, telling Tivol to sell it and use the money to purchase a more suitable piece of land.

"It was always a question of 'when,' not 'if,'" AMD Corporate Vice President Mike Woollems said. "But it was frustrating when it took longer than expected."

AMD recognized that the taxes and expenses of owning a large piece of land were too much for community services. So AMD agreed to retain ownership of the land until just before any future sale, and give the money from that sale to the nonprofit group.

With Vaughan's help, Tivol says they eventually found the 12,000-square-foot Kifer Road building.

Tivol and Vaughan agree the building was a rare find because most space in the area was either less than 5,000 square feet or more than 20,000. The building is also close to public transportation, a vital part of community services operations because many of clients are low-income residents who may not have their own transportation.

The owner wanted to lease the property to community services, but Tivol says Vaughan was able to convince him to sell it.

There was, however, a problem.

Community services didn't have the money to buy the building because the original 3.25-acre plot had not sold.

That's when the third member of Tivol's "dream team" appeared. The city of Sunnyvale gave community services a $1,755,000 bridge loan and a 35-year Community Development Block Grant loan of $400,000. The first payment on the loan was not due for 15 years, and the full loan didn't have to be paid back until 20 years later.

Had the city not made the loan, it would have held onto the money to earn interest. In order to make sure the city was not losing money, community services paid the $127,333 interest to the city.

"The city and the citizens did not suffer in any way," Sunnyvale Mayor Dean Chu said. "So we were happy to do that."

With the city's loan, the organization bought the building and began transforming it into the operation it is today.

Vaughan donated more than $300,000 worth of her own time to help, and her team--including Russ Nichols of RMW Architecture and Interiors, Jim Fowler, an attorney with Bingham McCutchen and Glenn Gabel of Webcor Builders--donated services or greatly reduced their prices to finish the building. Vaughan donated leftover ceiling tiles from another project to community services, and Mike Caplan of KBM Workspace sold the agency office furniture at a discount.

"Our chairs are good for 295,000 'double-rubs,' " Tivol said. She said a "double-rub" is a person sitting down and getting up from a chair.

Vaughan was also working to sell AMD's donated land. The first potential buyer stalled for too long, so Vaughan found another buyer. On April 29, TWC Storage purchased the property for $2.6 million with plans to turn it into an upscale mini-storage facility.

After the sale, community services paid off the $1,755,000 loan from the city and held the official ribbon cutting of the building they already occupied.

"Here we are in a dream, in a building we own, and we didn't have to deplete our resources to get it," Tivol says. "Now we have a building that is perfect for us, configured for our use."

Of the entire $3-million project, Tivol estimated that community services had to pay only 10 percent.

The agency was left with just over $600,000, the amount required to keep the agency going for three months. A reserve of at least that much is crucial to community service's operations because financial backers require a reserve.

Tivol estimates that rent or mortgage payments on the building would run $105,000 to $175,000, depending on the market.

"Not having to pay rent means we can put all that money into serving our clients," Tivol said.

Tivol estimates they'll pay around $30,000 a year for maintenance, insurance and other fees on the land.

"I still think we're the only nonprofit in the area that has never had to turn away anyone, and we would not be able to do that if we were paying for rent and all those other expenses," she says.