On a balmy April day at the Tampa Museum of Art, the Children’s Board of Hillsborough County marked Child Abuse Prevention Awareness Month with an event celebrating the local nonprofits working on that serious community issue with funding from the Children’s Board.
Children’s Board Director of Programs Maria Negron tells the gathered audience of community leaders, service providers, and child advocates that these nonprofits are “protective factors’’ that reduce the chances of child abuse.
Negron, who likes to tell people she was born on a small island - “Upper West Side Manhattan’’ – says her protective factors growing up included a struggling but loving family, a neighborhood of merchants who knew her family, and, especially, her abuela, or grandmother.
“She taught me so much - how to make my bed, how to speak Spanish, how to hold a pencil, how to spell my name with an accent, how to tell the difference between the Cuban and Puerto Rican flag,’’ she says as the audience laughs, “how to dress, how to count things and draw. She took me on field trips to the park, to the library, and to the fire station, making me ready for first grade.’’
Negron realizes that not everybody has an abuela.
“So when they can’t have an abuela, I want them to have a Boys and Girls Club, a Layla’s House, a Path to Prevention, La Red de Padres Activos (Network of Active Parents), a free family day at this beautiful Tampa Museum of Art, or a Children’s Board Family Resource Center,” she says.
Supporting children and families
The Children’s Board, a special taxing district created in 1988 by the voters of Hillsborough County, is a lifeline of resources for more than 53 nonprofits and 90 programs. Its $91.6 million budget for fiscal year 2025 invests in partnerships and quality programs to “support the success of all children in Hillsborough County.’’
Speaking to an overflow crowd at the 100-seat event in April, Children’s Board Executive Director Rebecca Bacon says they are there to focus “on the strategies that bring prevention and early intervention to light in Hillsborough County and the wonderful people behind those efforts.’’
Those efforts address an important community issue. While Florida Department of Health stats show Hillsborough’s rate of abuse for children ages 5 to 11 has declined significantly over time, from 1,205 per 100,000 in 2004 to 586 per 100,000 in 2023. But it is above the statewide rate of 431.5 per 100,000.
Hillsborough Circuit Judge and Children’s Board Vice Chair Katherine Essrig, a longtime juvenile dependency judge, spoke at the event, along with representatives of two nonprofit agencies with a focus on preventing child abuse.
“We all understand the importance of child abuse prevention,’’ says Essrig. “What you might not know is how important it is for each of us to make those connections and to be aware and to report things that don’t seem right. It’s up to each of us to have that awareness and take that step.’’
The key is preventing the abuse from happening in the first place, says Ankita Patel with REACHUP, Inc., a community nonprofit that has a doula program among its services. She says doulas, or traditional birth coaches, are in a unique position to prevent abuse because they go beyond providing help with births to be trusted guides, educators, and advocates.
“They help the communities that they serve, often with lived experience as mothers, survivors of adversity, and caregivers,” Patel says. “They know what it’s like to face systemic barriers in health care, to lack support, to feel overwhelmed as a new parent. And because of that, doulas are in a unique position to help prevent child abuse before it happens by ensuring parents get the support they need from the very beginning.’’
Success 4 Kids & Families, a nonprofit organization that recently merged to become a program of the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay, impacts Hillsborough’s Hispanic community by recruiting “promotoras,” Senior Director Ruth Power says.
“Promotoras are traditionally Hispanic and Latino residents who are identified as leaders within the communities that they serve,” Power says. “Usually they’re women, not always. They’re seen as aunts, or the mothers, or the community leaders who are knowledgeable about resources and how to access them. They’re the advocates, the educators, the mentors, the role models, outreach workers, and interpreters. Traditionally, they serve as liaisons between social service organizations or medical organizations and the communities that they serve.’’
The program works with kids up to eighth grade. The older children, Power says, are at the age when parents “go from being their kids’ hero to being the most uncool human on the planet, almost overnight.”
“Add to that the difficulties that a family goes through when they’re experiencing poverty or housing insecurity, a language barrier, or a medical problem,” she says, “and that’s a recipe for lots of stress for both the parents and the kids. In some cases, it can lead to child abuse.’’
She tells how a promotora and therapist helped a child with the pseudonym “Marco” and his family.
Twelve-year-old Marco was skipping classes and getting into fights. Instead of homework, all he wanted to do was play soccer. There was trouble at home. His father had quit high school at 16 and made a career in construction until he was badly injured and couldn’t work. He was angry and ashamed because he couldn’t provide for the family, Power says. His wife, a nurse, was the sole breadwinner. The father frequently yelled at her and Marco.
When the promotora visited the home, she brought a therapist, a woman who liked to play soccer. Marco didn't want anything to do with the therapist at first. But the therapist brought her soccer ball.
“As they played, Marco began to talk about his dad’s accident, his new sister, the pressure on his mom, and getting into trouble at school,’’ Power says.
She says the therapist “helped Marco to talk about how angry he was at his dad and how scared he was when his dad yelled.”
Power says the therapist worked with Marco on the importance of thinking before acting and talked separately with his parents “so they could begin talking with each other again.”
“They could talk about their fears and their frustrations and their disappointments and also the fact that they were committed to getting through this hard time,” she says.
The father learned to work out his anger without yelling at his family and the mother stopped blaming Marco and the father for problems in the family, possibly averting a dynamic that could have led to child abuse.
Celebrating difference makers
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Children's Board of Hillsborough CountyFamily Support Champion Award honoree Stacey Francois, of the Early Learning Coalition of Hillsborough County, and Children's Board of Hillsborough County Executive Director Rebecca BaconDuring the event, the Children’s Board also named two community nonprofit workers recipients of its Family Support Champion Award in honor of their dedication to serving children and families. Bacon described recipient Sara Shockley, with the Healthy Start Coalition of Hillsborough County, as a “dedicated and compassionate family support therapist with a decade of experience helping families explore different parental approaches.’’ Honoree Stacey Francois, with the Early Learning Coalition of Hillsborough County, created programs like the Hillsborough Infant & Toddler Initiative and On My Way to Kindergarten.
Toward the end of the program, Liza Geist and her 9-year-old son, Donald “Donny” Geist III, sang “Don’t Give Up On Me’’ by Andy Grammer, a song with a message that suited the event. Geist and Donny praised the Children’s Board Family Resource Centers, which provide services to support children and families at seven locations around the county.
Donny tells the crowd he loves going to Tampa Bay Lightning camps as part of the Family Resource Center activities.
“It helps with my athleticism,” he says.
The benefits do not stop there.
“It provides me with nice snacks like Chick-fil-A,” Donny continues, drawing laughs from the crowd. “They have a basketball court, ice skating rinks, and I actually learned how to ice skate there.’’
Geist says she first went to a Family Resource Center while pregnant with Donny.
“We found some resources that they provided to us and ever since then they’ve been there for us,’’ she says.
Geist says they have utilized the center for car seat program, a mobile health clinic, dental clinics, and the ReDefiners language program.
“If they were open we were always there,” she says.
For information on programs to help families and children, go to Children’s Board of Hillsborough County
This story is part of an underwriting agreement between the Children's Board of Hillsborough County and 83 Degrees Media.