What hasn't changed is the organization's commitment to ending domestic violence.

The agency received two grants to help in that effort: $20,000 in November from Community Foundation Silicon Valley and a grant of $32,000 from the city of Sunnyvale.

The city grant will support the emergency shelter, hotline, counseling program, legal services and outreach program.

Interim executive director Desa Bubnovich said the unrestricted funds provided by the foundation grant will support a wide range of services and programs, such as La Familia, a program within Support Network that focuses on domestic violence in the Latino community.

"Culturally there is more of a desire to keep the family unit together [in the Latino community,]" Bubnovich said.

La Familia provides counseling for women and children, emergency shelter in apartments, information and referrals, support groups, safety planning, legal services and help with job interviews. The program also helps women who want to stay in their relationships but want the abuse to end. To that end, the program teaches the difference between a healthy and unhealthy relationship.

La Familia also reaches out by sending counselors out to talk to women who might be involved in an abusive relationship. To find these women, Support Network is using a word-of-mouth campaign and has partnered with police departments, which alert the nonprofit organization when a 911 domestic violence call comes in. This enables Support Network to reach out to people who might need crisis counseling.

Although there is a 24-hour crisis hotline for English and Spanish speakers, Denise Henderson, director of client services, said it's not easy for abused women to make that call.

"It's hard for folks to pick up the phone. It's scary to break that silence," she said.

Sometimes the abuser makes threats to keep the abused person quiet, other times the abused woman is ashamed or embarrassed, and some abused women feel they have no safe place to go.

Henderson said the organization teaches women about "safe planning." If an abused woman does not feel safe in the environment in which she is living, Support Network helps her, for example, learn how to send a message asking for help to a neighbor if danger arises.

"The most dangerous time for a woman is when she decides to leave," Henderson said.

When she does leave, Support Network has a place for her to go.

The program houses clients in apartments, not dormitories. In fiscal year 2003-04, 177 women and children were sheltered by the organization.

Previous experience dictated that getting a woman to a shelter is the best practice, but that is not always the goal now.

"The answer isn't that somebody goes to jail and somebody goes to a shelter," Henderson said.

If it is safe, and both partners want there to be change, Support Network provides wraparound service to help them. Though the organization does not provide services to men, it does have referral information available.

The toll-free 24-hour crisis line is 800.572.2782. For more information on how to donate or volunteer for Support Network for Battered Women, go to www.snbw.org.