Lisa Blanchard, founder of the Grateful Garment Project, is calling on Santa Clara Valley residents to bring support to sexual assault survivors.

Last month, the nonprofit launched its latest program, Operation emBRAce, as an effort to bring in more sports bras for sexual assault survivors. The new program aims to collect 20,000 sports bras of all sizes to distribute.

“We never have enough,” Blanchard said.

Blanchard said the 20,000 number came from calculating how many people are assisted by the nonprofit each day in a year. According to Blanchard 25-50 sexual assault survivors are assisted each day.

According to the nonprofit’s website, 25,145 items were distributed to victims during the 2015-16 fiscal year.

“It’s a nice round number we want to get to,” Blanchard said. “We want to be able to have sports bras for survivors and some on reserve.”

Blanchard said undergarments are one of the most requested items from medical centers the project partners with. She noted used garments cannot be donated as it is against the law for health reasons.

Thus far, Operation emBRAce has collected 1,300 sports bras. More than 300 of those were collected during the Women’s March that took place on Jan. 21 in San Jose.

“People kept telling me they had no idea what sexual assault survivors went home (wearing) from hospitals,” Blanchard said, adding the nonprofit is looking for businesses and other nonprofits to host donation boxes for bras. “It will take many more people to accomplish our goal.”

The Grateful Garment Project has been helping sexual assault victims since 2011. Blanchard started it as an undergraduate project. To date it has partnered with 29 counties throughout the state to provide toiletries, clothing and snacks to victims.

People can donate new sports bras or money in a variety of ways. A monetary donation can be made by texting “sportsbra” to 843.606.5995. Donors can visit the nonprofit’s Amazon wish list and have a package of sports bras delivered to the Grateful Garment Project. People can also host a sports bra collection drive of their own with support from the project.

For more information, visit joinoperationembrace.org.