Selfless warrior: Mike Shaw

Mike Shaw, a career military man, is retired, but he’s still on a mission.

For the past five years, that mission has been to help veterans struggling with homelessness. Shaw is the executive director and founder of the Guardians Foundation, a Post Falls-based nonprofit that provides immediate housing, and other types of assistance, to veterans in need.

Last month, Shaw traveled to Boise to accept Idaho’s Brightest Star Award. Presented annually by Serve Idaho, the Governor’s Commission on Service and Volunteerism, the award recognizes volunteers who show exceptional commitment to helping Idaho communities. Shaw was selected from 24 nominees from across the state to receive this honor.

Shaw spoke to The Press about the Guardians Foundation and how it works.

His home is in the shelters the foundation creates to house veterans.

“I’ll stay in them for months with the homeless until the shelters are running and operating smoothly,” Shaw said. “I’ve been doing that since I got back from Baghdad.”

Shaw’s military career began right after he graduated from high school, when he joined the U.S. Army. He served in Germany as a reconnaissance scout during the Cold War, “before the walls came down.”

Then he returned to the states and joined the U.S. Army Reserve. He went to drill sergeant school and was a drill instructor for nine years in Spokane with the 104th Infantry Division.

Then he joined the Idaho National Guard. He didn’t plan to join the Guard, but ended up doing so after taking his 18-year-old daughter to check it out for herself.

“They discovered my military background and history and they aggressively asked me to come back, so instead of my daughter going, I ended up going,” Shaw said. He was assigned to recruitment and sustainment as a drill instructor and staff sergeant.

In 2010, Shaw volunteered to deploy with the line units to Iraq. He was accepted as a volunteer was assigned to Bravo Company.

Shaw was in the same platoon as Sgt. Nathan Beyers and Spc. Nicholas Newby, two young soldiers from Coeur d’Alene who died in Baghdad in 2011 when their vehicle company was attacked by insurgent forces.

“It was a rough time,” Shaw said.

He was injured in Baghdad himself, and Army officials were considering sending him home. It prompted him to start thinking about what he would do at home in the Inland Empire. That’s when he came up with the idea for the Guardians Foundation.

“But I was able to get back on mission, so in between my missions, I would work on filling out the paperwork for creating a foundation, a business plan and model and whatnot,” Shaw said. “And when I got off the plane after my deployment (in 2011), I had a 501(c)(3) waiting for me, so I actually formed it in Baghdad.”

He was medically discharged and retired from the Army last year.

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What was it that prompted you to start forming the Guardians Foundation while in Baghdad?

I left in a recession. I knew going back to my profession was going to be a difficult because I was a home builder. I knew that things I wanted to explore might also possibly help other veterans — outdoor sportsmanship, fishing and hunting. I did that for about six months, when I first got back. But then I realized the real way to be the most impactful would be to help these homeless guys. Because you can take a guy fishing. That’s great, but when you drive by a guy flying a sign that says he’s a vet on your way to the fishing hole, there’s some hypocrisy there that didn’t make sense to me. And how do you go back to donors and say you want to go fishing again?

The big thing is, I’d see all these people flying these signs. I had no idea what the situation was with the veterans, how many people need assistance. When I started seeing these people in the wintertime...I’d go to these shelters and many of them were veterans. When we opened up our first shelter we had 70 veterans staying there within a month. It was completely illegal housing for them, but at least it was a bunch of veterans homeless together. Then we started worrying about how we could somehow grow to where we could supply these individuals with their own bedrooms everywhere.

The main thing was, I didn’t know how to find veterans to serve until I opened my eyes and I noticed how many of them were standing there, begging for help with their cardboard signs. So that’s what I do mostly, I drive around and roll up to guys with a cardboard sign and say, ‘You need help? Where you headed? What’s going on?” I do a lot of that.

Do you believe your experience in the Army makes it a little easier for these veterans to trust and relate to you?

It’s more about cutting through the crap. When a homeless veteran comes to me and tells me why he’s in the situation he’s in and asking for help, I’m able to identify what the barriers are and determine if we’re in a position to help.

We offer housing first, and if that homeless veteran wants to be housed with us, he needs to decide how he’s going to help that house, because it’s a housing first model. We’re in the position to offer a safe, stable environment so that individual can reach out to the agencies and programs and affiliations, his past family and his future family, where he can do it unmolested. In other words, where he knows he’s in a safe place to do those things.

The individuals that bring some of that baggage into the house that didn’t work for them in the past, we’re able to identify it. We’ll say, ‘Look this isn’t appropriate behavior.’ We receive no government money, no grants. Every dollar we get is from an individual donor. And I’ve got to say, ‘Would my donor base appreciate your conduct today? And are we just enabling or are we facilitating you with a transitional situation so you can move forward?’ The sad commentary is that many of these adults, men and women, make poor decisions, and they even make poor decisions when they’re faced with an opportunity for possible success...as if they were afraid of success. Then they revert back to some issues that cause chaos and turmoil in their lives, their friends’ lives, the community’s lives, my life, my staff’s lives, so it’s tough. Some people really appreciate the stuff we’ve offered and there are some that just don’t get it. The reality of helping the homeless population is that it’s a difficult one, a frustrating one. It can be rewarding, but you have to take the time to find out where these rewards are, because it will get to you pretty quick.

Have you seen some success stories?

Oh, absolutely. Hundreds of success stories. I’ll just refer you to the website (www.theguardiansfoundation.org). On the testimonial side, there are lots of success stories. But the biggest success story is that we’re in our fifth year, and we’re still in a position - if the phone rings right now from the VA, or anyone else, and says, ‘Hey, I’ve got this guy,’ - we’re in a position to respond. That’s our No. 1 success, because if we just took phone calls and made referrals, that’s not our culture. We want to do immediate assistance, and that’s what separates us. The VA can’t even do immediate assistance. We fill gaps.

If you were to become homeless today, you’d get a pile of paperwork to fill out and an appointment in two weeks. Well, you’re still homeless. You’re under a bridge for two weeks somewhere or in your car. Our organization has been able to put people under a roof in under an hour.

Once a person is under that roof, how do you help them? You’ve already given them a much-needed address to use to apply for assistance, right?

Yep, they have a certification they can show, a mailing address. They can navigate the long-term opportunities that are afforded to them, and get assistance filling out forms. The main thing that we’ve learned over the last five years, is housing first. I’ve got to reiterate. Without a stable roof over a person’s head, his ability to get through his barriers and be successful and get back to being a member of society he feels good about, is a stable environment. All the money and all the programs in the world don’t do anything if you don’t have that roof to navigate from, because of the chaos that’s out there.

And when they lay their hat on their bed, they know that at the end of the day, that’s their bed, as opposed to the typical shelter, where that’s not the case.

What’s your main role in all of this?

The war is based on volunteerism. I give the money I receive from my pension, 90 percent of that is given back to the organization to help us make it to the sixth and seventh year. We’ve made it five years and we’re really proud of that, but it hasn’t been the easiest five years. Financially, we’re able to do this, with our volunteerism. I started it with an employment check.

I know you have the thrift store. How else do you raise money?

Our typical fundraising is in-kind donations of clothing and furniture that we distribute to veterans in need or we are able to sell at retail thrift store prices to the general public. We’re proud of the thrift store. When someone gives us something they want to go to a veteran, we have to be good stewards of the donations, and we think this is one of the best ways. I used to just have everything in warehouses, but we got so much stuff, I thought we have to open a thrift store. It’s more about ownership and stewardship of the donations. We don’t ask for any of this, it just comes. The community is pretty generous with their stuff.

We do a lot of awareness tables in front of Wal-Marts. Technically, our No. 1 fundraising is the individual donor at the $3 to $5 range. That’s our No. 1 source of income. That’s where 99.999 percent of our funding comes from. It’s labor-intensive and it’s not sustainable. I believe we need more corporate sponsorships, someone to hang their hat on us, someone to count on.

Are there any other things you like to see change regarding the plight of the people you’re serving?

Well, it is changing. The numbers are being reduced. I have seen in the last four years that the homeless veterans numbers are decreasing. My goal is that we become one of the only regions in the nation where the homeless veterans population can be ended. I’ve always wanted to meet that goal. The problem with that goal is every veteran out there is still one paycheck away from homelessness. Until that ends, it can’t end. Until these veterans, or anyone in society, decides to save up six, eight, 10 months of savings, and makes that a priority, the homeless veteran population will never go away until people start saving. If society doesn’t start saving, it will never end. The problem with the veterans is, for some reason, they’re on the higher end of unemployability, the higher end of divorce, of alcoholism. I’m not saying, if you’re a vet, you’re a drunk, just on the higher end of those percentages.Which is bizarre to me, too, because to get into the Army these days, the standards are so high, you would think that wouldn’t be the case. And then we instill all this stuff when you’re in there about how you conduct yourself, but for whatever reason, the second some guys get off the post, they let their hair down, and soon there’s credit card debt and other chaos.

Do you see all ages of veterans becoming homeless?

Yes, absolutely. The younger population is on the rise. I call them couch-surfers. They can get by with their friends and family for longer periods of time moving from this couch to that couch, from this house to that house. But that usually ends up with broken relationships, and they’re too proud to go down to the mission, to seek help. But the older ones, in their 40s, 50s, 60s, they’re tired. They’ll go to the mission. They’ll come to my organization. When you’re out there a long time, you don’t age well out there.

And women are on the rise across the board. It’s shocking.

What did it mean to you to receive the Brightest Star award from Lt. Gov. Little?

The nomination itself was an honor. You don’t go down thinking you’ll win. I went to Boise thinking it would be good for the organization. I was happy to represent North Idaho. That was No. 1. No. 2, I was in shock that I was picked out of all these other unbelievable nominees. To bring it back to North Idaho was the coolest part of it.

If people want to help the Guardians Foundation, what should they do?

If they’re a business, we’d like to talk to them about charity donations. If they’re an individual donor, we’d direct them to the website.

To donate, visit www.theguardiansfoundation.org or call 208-449-1210. Shaw also asks anyone who knows a homeless veteran in need of assistance to refer him or her to the foundaton, 2600 E. Seltice Way, Ste. F, Post Falls, Idaho, 83854.