Visual Eyes - The Community & Collaboration Podcast

S2 Ep 19 - Saving Mothers & Babies: Dawn Liberta on Breaking Cycles & Community Impact

• Visuals by Momo • Season 2 • Episode 19

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🚀 Maternal health, nonprofit leadership, and breaking generational cycles—Dawn Liberta shares how prevention, community collaboration, and social services are shaping a brighter future for families.

🔎 What does it take to save lives, support mothers, and create real change in underserved communities?

In this powerful episode of Visual Eyes Podcast, host Chris Baker sits down with Dawn Liberta, the Executive Director of Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies, to explore the critical work being done to prevent infant mortality, support vulnerable families, and transform communities.

With over 25 years in social work and child welfare, Dawn has seen firsthand the impact of both reactive crisis intervention and proactive prevention strategies. She shares her personal journey, from working in foster care and social services to now leading a nonprofit dedicated to improving maternal and infant health outcomes.

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📌 Guest: Dawn Liberta - Executive Director, Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies
🌍 Website: https://www.hmhbbroward.org/
📞 Phone: (954) 765-0550
📘 LinkedIn: Dawn Liberta
📷 Facebook: HMHB Broward

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📢 Support Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies here: https://www.hmhbbroward.org/
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#HealthyMothersHealthyBabies #MaternalHealth #NonprofitLeadership #CommunityImpact #DawnLiberta #SocialWork #InfantMortalityPrevention #PodcastInterview #NonprofitFunding #GriefSupport #FosterCareAwareness #WomenEmpowerment #PreventiveCare #ChildWelfare #Philanthropy


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Special Thanks to Stacy Daugherty for the beautiful wall artwork in the background. Socials: @artographybystacy

Chris Baker:

Chris Baker, and each week we'll explore incredible connections between nonprofits, businesses and the community. This is a space where we highlight inspiring partnerships, uncover strategies for creating meaningful impact and share stories that show how working together can make all the difference. Whether you're a nonprofit leader, a business owner or someone just passionate about building connections, this podcast is for you. Welcome back to Visual Eyes. I'm Chris Baker and today I have Dawn Liberta and she is with Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies here in Broward County. So, dawn, tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got to the executive director of Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies.

Dawn Liberta:

Well, first of all, thank you so much for having us, or for having me Having us as an organization. Absolutely, I'm so excited to be here and happy to talk about the organization. So, on a personal level, I've been married 25 years. I have two wonderful boys. I'm definitely a boy mom and was a soccer mom, but now they're adults, so 18 and 23.

Dawn Liberta:

Okay, and then how I kind of got into this world of social service and kind of giving back is I was in school for my bachelor's degree for social work, okay, and I interned with the Department of Children and Families in the foster care system and I think really what pushed me that way was because my mom was abused as a child and we know that in order to kind of move on with your own family you have to break that cycle and my mom is or was she's passed away now a huge inspiration of that of breaking that cycle on how she was raised um. So I worked in the foster care system with dcf and child net for 25 years, um, and then I had an opportunity to come over to healthy mothers, healthy babies, um, as their executive director and I thought that would be amazing to work in the prevention part of social services instead of kind of the crisis area. All of that are important, but I just felt like I can make so many different changes in the prevention part.

Chris Baker:

I think when you start looking at ways to prevent something from happening, instead of just looking at it as like, oh, I'm treating the symptoms, but you're treating the root cause, it makes a huge difference, and I think that's where we can all benefit, and I think a lot more organizations and, you know, just the government as well needs to look at how do we fix the root problems, not just the symptoms.

Dawn Liberta:

Right, not just like throwing everything at it and working on a crisis mode because it's stressful.

Chris Baker:

No, and it's not sustainable, right? So, yeah, no, I really appreciate that Awesome. So today I want to talk a little bit about like we met just over a year ago.

Dawn Liberta:

Yes.

Chris Baker:

And one of the things that I love is you guys have this amazing round table, so I would love you to talk a little bit about it, because I've been there probably about six or seven times now over the past half. Yeah, our favorite really.

Dawn Liberta:

Yes, absolutely. And every time you come you bring, bring something new. So it's amazing. And then you get to meet other amazing people and they get to meet, you bring people in from our community, all different walks of life and careers, where we're able to kind of sit down and talk to each other about what we do for our community and in our community. So, absolutely, it's a great time for us to share kind of what Healthy Mothers, healthy Babies, does in Broward County, but it also is so helpful because we get to learn what they are doing in our community and how we can collaborate, how we can help each other make our community better.

Chris Baker:

And I love that. That's honestly so valuable. So, so, so valuable, because when we start looking at communication and collaboration that's the word I'm trying to say there collaboration you are literally changing the community around you because now you're opening it up and expanding it instead of just one, one view right, I have multiple views. Uh, and at the last luncheon that I, or the round table that you guys had, I met the vice mayor of Lauder Hill and he was on our show he was.

Dawn Liberta:

He told us all about it, yeah.

Chris Baker:

I'm so, so glad that he was able to be here. So definitely go back and watch the previous episode of Ray Martin. That would be fantastic. He's got a great pieces of information.

Chris Baker:

If you have not seen the episode yet and just to like also talk about the way that the city can give money to non-profits. That was, like this, most in, most valuable piece of that entire episode. I was just like, wow, this is perfect. So thank you again for that introduction. So that was a beautiful collaboration effort from both of us. So I would like to talk a little bit about what other collaboration opportunities or different ways that you have brought into Healthy Mothers and Healthy Babies, either from other nonprofits you're working with the city or for-profit businesses that are really kind of helping you make a huge difference.

Dawn Liberta:

Yeah, so Healthy Mothers, healthy Babies, really works. Our doors are only open because of the grants that we get and the donations from foundations, from government institutions, from cities. We have private donors. All of our services are free, so we could not do what we do without those people and those organizations, and so, for example, the city of Lauderhill. They give us money in order to help individuals in our community, um, any individual. I know we're healthy mothers, healthy babies, but that is our one program that you don't have to be a woman or pregnant or have children, um that if you need help with rent or um your light bills, um food, gas, card, bus pass, any of those things, you can apply and if you qualify and you live in with that funding, we will help you well that's fine so we do have amazing, amazing folks like that.

Dawn Liberta:

but we've luckily been able to really um connect with our not only only our nonprofits, our corporations within our community and even outside of it. So we have great relationships with the Children's Service Council, with Healthy Start Coalition we have. We receive funding from Holman and the Jim Moran Foundation and AD Henderson and the United Way. So we are so lucky to be really surrounded by the community that we are. I mean, we're very lucky here in Broward County because we are extremely resourceful, because we are extremely resourceful and we know that it really does take a village to be able to help the families in our community, especially now right, and we get together and we figure out how to solve those issues. And funders like that help us do what we're doing today.

Chris Baker:

So I know a lot of, you know a lot of. There's a lot of organizations here in Broward County. On a recent episode we had Cathy Brown and she mentioned there is 10,000 nonprofits registered in.

Dawn Liberta:

Broward County, that is a ton of nonprofits.

Chris Baker:

Now how are? How are you able to connect with United Way and how are that collaboration work, because I'm sure there's other people out there like don't even know how to even consider. You know, having these conversations with these other nonprofits and I know that there's a doorway, that a lot of these smaller grassroots ones they need an intro or figuring out how to approach it correctly.

Dawn Liberta:

They absolutely do. And you know, sadly, all the nonprofits. We work in the same way and we work through those donations and fundraisers and grants, so sometimes we are kind of fighting for that same funding. I think that there's so many different websites that you could actually belong to. That kind of help go through who has funding or grants that are coming available For me. I think it's all about relationships, so it's so important that you're having those one-on-one conversations with other people in your community.

Chris Baker:

Sure.

Dawn Liberta:

Because at some point we're going to be able to help each other Right. And so if I need help with something or one of my programs or maybe I lose funding, then I'm going to reach out to those connections I have and those relationships just to see if there's anything that they have available at that time. Do they have a grant coming out? And if they do, then apply for those grants or even reaching out to a donor. But really I think it's all about connecting and all about the relationships that you have and just really educating yourself on the community you're in.

Chris Baker:

Yeah, and a lot of you know a lot of organizations out there or businesses that are looking to try to collaborate with a nonprofit. Sometimes they don't have the actual money or the funding to actually help, but what type of services or products that they might have in storage that could be very valuable for healthy mothers, healthy babies.

Dawn Liberta:

Absolutely. We will pretty much take any donations because we want to make sure that our families have what they need. So we have folks that may not be able able to help financially, and that's okay. I completely understand. I wish I had the ability to help every um nonprofit or organization that I truly believe in. We just don't. But people may have clothes for women or maternity clothes, um, that are gently used, that they'll bring in, or toys for children, baby clothes, formula that they no longer need, or diapers that they have left over. I mean, those are all things that our families really need that aren't as resourceful and are underserved, and so we want to make sure they have everything and their children have everything and that they're stable, and so any of that is amazing. The only thing we're unable really to take are car seats. Car seats actually do expire and because they're used, we don't really know what's happened to them, and we don't want to put a baby in an unsafe situation 100%, but I didn't realize that car seats have an expiration date.

Dawn Liberta:

Yes, and there's many that don't take use. There's a few here and there that I'll connect if people reach out, but it's the only thing we don't take.

Chris Baker:

That's a very interesting piece of knowledge there. I didn't actually understand Is it because it actually gets clipped in and out? Is there a manufacturer? Do you know anything more about that?

Dawn Liberta:

I don't know anymore. I could send you information on it.

Chris Baker:

That'd be interesting to, but I mean it's a manufacturing expiration date okay so I'll, yeah, I'll absolutely yeah, that's some information. Um, I'll throw that in the link in the description as well, just so that other people are listening and they're also curious, because now I'm curious, I know listen, no one should feel bad about it.

Dawn Liberta:

I have two children, and luckily they're adults now, but I had no idea that there were expiration dates on car seats when I was raising children.

Chris Baker:

So yeah, it's not something you normally would think about, that Like oh yeah, but I guess I mean it makes sense.

Dawn Liberta:

Everything has an expiration date.

Chris Baker:

It does, but I guess I mean it makes sense. Everything has an expression. It does so you. You mentioned a lot of like clothing and diapers and a lot of other things that potentially you know are perfect, because you know, once you actually are pregnant and you've went through it, you may not need those clothes right then and someone else in the community could definitely use it. Kids grow up. They're out of their clothes.

Dawn Liberta:

Quickly, quickly.

Chris Baker:

And so you know, finding an amazing place to actually give them to. I think that's a fantastic way to look at other ways that they can't do financially.

Dawn Liberta:

Absolutely, or even hygiene products. Cleaning products is a huge thing baby wipes so, um, cleaning products are really expensive, um and so, cleaning any of that stuff is amazing okay, yeah, no, I think that's anything that is yeah, not being utilized, perfect okay I never thought I would get excited about cleaning products. But I mean, you don't realize? Well, you don't know what somebody needs. Because it really is like one of the top three things that we get requests for.

Chris Baker:

Really yes. So what are the top three things that you get requested for?

Dawn Liberta:

So we get aside from the funding for this stuff. So diapers is typically number one, and wipes then hygiene products and then cleaning products.

Chris Baker:

Oh, interesting. Okay, that's an interesting order. Okay, wonderful to know. The next kind of like topic that we love to bring up on the show is to talk about some of the challenges that you have either faced when working with other companies or other nonprofits, and or the lessons that you have learned, because what we're trying to also do is have that conversation of let's just make sure that we're all thinking outside the box and making sure that we're hearing what the nonprofit actually needs, so when we're asking the right questions and we can actually talk about it, we kind of prevent those mishaps or, you know things, challenges from actually happening that we haven't really had any major issues with any of our foundations or organizations that have given us grants.

Dawn Liberta:

I would say that some of the issues that I have since I've only been with Healthy Mothers a little over a year now as their executive director, that I've seen is one that you do have and I had mentioned it before you do have quite a bit of nonprofits kind of fighting over some of that same funding, right and so, and not any one person deserves it any more than the other person. We're all trying to make our community better, so from a funder's standpoint, it's a hard job, right to go through those applications and try to figure out who's getting that funding, I would say. The second thing is that it's important that for me, going into it, it took me a couple of months to realize this. You would think someone wants to give you money, I'll take it, Give it, Give me the money, I'll take all the money.

Dawn Liberta:

But there's such a big picture to taking money when it comes in right One, what are you doing with it? What program are you putting towards it? And if we take $10,000, but we need to see more clients but it's not enough money to hire a new staff member. We're not going to be able to meet that goal right, Because your staff, for the most part, are already at the top of their caseloads at the top of their caseloads and so you have to be careful that you're taking in and understanding what the funder is wanting from it, but what the organization needs from it.

Chris Baker:

It's interesting that you bring it up that way, because one of the most reoccurring topics that has actually come up on the show so far is the idea of overhead. Yes, and while, like everyone's thinking of, okay, we need to put the money towards volunteer, you know the money needs to be going to these programs and you need to go here and just use volunteers. But who's managing the volunteers and who's handling all this and how can we keep it consistent and how do we do that if it's, you know, a volunteer? Does you know 14 different volunteers do the same thing, because they can't be consistent, isn't always going to be the same. Is it going to help the organization grow? Uh, and so that's actually, I think, one of the biggest challenges right now that I'm foreseeing is a lot of people think that the overhead, because you're a non-profit, shouldn't be there, but it it's so valuable if you think about it.

Chris Baker:

A non-profit is a business it is, it, it's just where the funds go is shifted from a for-profit and in truth, overhead is like a normal part of for-profit businesses. We need to shift that, we need to pull it back into going. Non-profits are also businesses. They have employees, they have staff we have administrative costs there's administrative costs.

Chris Baker:

There's all of this other extra overhead is what they put it under. Yes, and while, yes, you want to keep your numbers high to the program, you can't keep them high unless you have the right team in place right and enough of the team, because it's not fair to the families or the staff.

Dawn Liberta:

You want to make sure every family is getting exactly what they need from the program that they are in and we can't do that if we don't have the right staff or the right amount of staff to be able to provide that service.

Chris Baker:

And you guys have a lot of different programs.

Dawn Liberta:

We do.

Chris Baker:

So why don't you talk a little bit of different programs? We do, so why don't you talk a little bit about the programs? Because I think it would be very valuable.

Dawn Liberta:

So we have six programs. We have our emergency basic needs is what I mentioned earlier. We have our Forget Me Not support group, which is for families that have lost a child under the age of one years old, and it is a support group run and facilitated by someone that has also gone through the same kind of loss and we have found that individuals going through this aren't necessarily ready for that grief counseling. Individuals going through this aren't necessarily ready for that grief counseling, but a support group of peers is very different. So you're in this group with other people that have gone or are going through the same thing you're going through, so it leads to that kind of extra support that is really needed.

Chris Baker:

It takes time to grieve and get to the point where you can actually do the inner work yourself.

Dawn Liberta:

So having that support group is very important, absolutely, and it's okay. You know you, I have a staff member who lost their son to stillbirth 30 years ago but and she's still grieving that loss and that's important, that it's okay to continue to grieve that and you have the supports in the community to be able to help you.

Chris Baker:

And I know who we're talking about and her story is so deep.

Dawn Liberta:

Yes.

Chris Baker:

And so emotional, and I'm so grateful that she's a part of Healthy Mother.

Dawn Liberta:

Healthy Baby, oh me too.

Chris Baker:

Because, honestly, there is so much love to you know, like you said, find a way to prevent it from happening to other people.

Dawn Liberta:

Because it shouldn't still be happening.

Chris Baker:

No.

Dawn Liberta:

For the same reason, 30 years later, we need to make sure we're making those improvements, which is exactly why we put the services in place, and that is to decrease maternal and infant death. Yeah, hypertension. We have a doula, we provide medical education, parenting education, and we have a mental health provider program also that provides mental health counseling for depression, anxiety, postpartum depression, childhood trauma if needed, and we have a in-home, home visiting program for child abuse prevention as well yeah, so is that all of the programs?

Chris Baker:

are we missing one?

Chris Baker:

no, it's all of them, and I kind of combined everything that they did into one sentence my brain was like wait, I, I think I only heard like three or four, I thought there was six. But no, you did. You did just kind of like combine them together. It's summarized so what is the future of Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies? Look like right now, strategically, Like have you have any plans that you're trying to like put into the universe? Like this is what we want to do. You know, where does that look like right now?

Dawn Liberta:

So, yes, we have lots of plans. So right now, currently, our goal is to strengthen and grow the programs that we currently have, so, for instance, our mahogany program. One of their goals is that every child on the case that is born within that program makes it to their first birthday, and over the last four to five years we've had zero infant deaths in that program. And it's amazing. And we just received an amazing grant, an amazing grant from an organization that is actually worldwide, and they reached out to us and, of course, we put the proposal together and they offered funding and so now we're able to expand that program, so now we're going to be able to take more cases on and I'm able to put a therapist in place as well.

Chris Baker:

Oh, that's so.

Dawn Liberta:

So, being that's one of the most needed services for our pregnant and postpartum women. Now I'll be able to provide that in two programs, so excited about that.

Chris Baker:

So really our goal right now is being able to expand what we do have to be able to meet the needs of the community and there's so much need right now yeah like there's a yeah, I, I can definitely see, because there's still a lot of you know mothers out there that are not getting the nutrition, they're not getting the exercise that they need, they're not getting the education they need so that they can help prevent.

Dawn Liberta:

Right, and we're there also to be able to support them as part of those programs and be able to be with them if they need us to. So if they need our staff to be at a doctor's appointment so they could help advocate for them, then we will do that, because that is an important factor. You know, we do know, that the majority of baby maternal deaths and infant deaths are from black and brown women and children, and that just shouldn't be the case, and so if we need to advocate, we will be there to advocate. However, they need us to do that, right, right. So, and then looking to the future, one of my biggest goals is to be able to bring in, like a fatherhood dad program into Healthy Mothers, healthy Babies.

Chris Baker:

So that's our goal within the next three years to be able to do that. I think that's amazing because you know you have all the support for the mothers and don't get me wrong, they're the ones that are carrying the child and they're the ones that lost. But you know there is the fathers that are also grieving, and so I'm loving the fact that you're trying to also look at ways to support them.

Dawn Liberta:

Yes, and you know our Forget Me Not support group, dads can come. That's not just for that's for grandparents, dads, moms, aunts, uncles, godparents, best friends, Because I think it's a the whole family feels that loss when we have a loss of a baby. But yes, I mean we need to support our dads in our community too and we want to make sure that they're seen and they're heard and they're able to connect to their children, and so it's important, that important to us, that we're able to support that.

Chris Baker:

No, I'm glad to hear that. So the final question. Actually, before I get to the final question, let's ask one more. How can people get a hold of you at Healthy Mothers, healthy Babies?

Dawn Liberta:

So we can, we take calls. We're open nine to five, monday through Friday, and actually we have our phone that is accidentally forwarded to one of my staff, so she answers it almost 24, 7 um, and even in. She even stepped out of a funeral to take the call on a saturday. I'm like I I need you to not do that because you need, we need to take care of ourselves also, right?

Chris Baker:

so very important self-care is important.

Dawn Liberta:

So you could contact healthy mothers healthyies at 954-765-0550. And you can email me directly at dliberta L-I-B-E-R-T-A at hmhborg. And the website is also wwwhmhbbrowardorg, and the website is also wwwhmhbbrowardorg.

Chris Baker:

So it is a Broward there.

Dawn Liberta:

Okay.

Chris Baker:

Yeah, good, I'm glad that I brought that up.

Dawn Liberta:

Can I tell you a little bit about our Mother's Day event?

Chris Baker:

Yes, oh, yes, definitely.

Dawn Liberta:

So our Mother's Day event it's our 32nd annual Mother's Day luncheon, which is on April 29th 2025. And it begins at 11 am, where we have amazing honorees from our community that we're honoring for being such amazing not only parents, but humans in the community and making such a difference for the community that we live in, and so I would love for anybody to join us, and you can get that information on our website, and that again is wwwhmhbbrowardorg.

Chris Baker:

The last question that I love to ask everybody that's on the show what is the legacy you personally want to leave for future generations?

Dawn Liberta:

is one being a good support to my staff, because I think it's important that if I'm there for them then they enjoy the work and they do a better job at the work that they're doing.

Dawn Liberta:

Um, having that support and hoping that I've been able to coach them and mentor them in the best way possible in meeting their needs. As for a community, I hope to be able to make some sort of difference in the maternal and infant mortality rate, really make a difference in being able to educate our community on unsafe sleep, make a difference and being able to educate our community on unsafe sleep and really being able to have family understand that it can happen to any of any of us. So if we're co-sleeping with the baby, it doesn't matter who you are. This does not discriminate, this can happen to anybody and it is so important that the baby has their own place to sleep and so there's no risk right of unsafe sleep deaths. So, you know, I hope to be able to make some sort of difference in the community and the community being able to walk away a little bit better, because I did whatever the job was that I was doing.

Chris Baker:

Awesome Dawn. Thank you so much for being on the show today. We really appreciate you coming on, so thank you you.