Bringing Forth Diplomacy and Unity. Member Spotlight: Michelle Hubbs

As a young girl, Michelle Hubbs was closest to her father, Honorary Colonel Petty Officer First Class Gene Shearer. She loved spending time with him so much she would tag along to work with him whenever he would let her at the Charlotte Regional Medical Center. “As the Director of Patient Business, he was always going above and beyond finding ways to get more for those he worked for and those he worked with. He used faith based non-profit management to do what he thought God wanted,” explained Michelle. After five years of having his hands tied and limitations put on his ability to help people, Shearer walked away from his position with grace. Michelle remembers that time and as she watched her father struggle, she made God a promise — “I told God in my heart that if He would give me a non-profit, I would make it a place where everyone is treated like He wants them to be.” Although her straight and narrow would involve many swerves along the way, Michelle started on a journey that resulted in the founding of The Advocacy Center. She had one goal in mind – create a nonprofit that honored her father’s efforts, a place where everyone’s needs are met and everyone feels valued just as they are.

Finding the Law

“I was in eighth grade when I took Mr. Pop’s U.S. Government class at Punat Gorda Junior High . . I loved how the government reflected judeo-christian principles without emphasizing one religion over the other. I loved how our Declaration of Independence acknowledges the existence of a Universal Creator, how it emphasizes that all mankind has certain unalienable rights, the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness… I decided I wanted to work in this area of law as a paralegal, maybe going into policy, and my mother was like ‘you mean an attorney, paralegals don’t make enough money.’ I said,”No, a paralegal, Mom.”

Michelle started her career as a paralegal in the Eighth Judicial District of Tennessee, navigating various legal positions before earning her bachelor’s degree in business administration. That degree opened a door for her in the accounting department for the Eleventh Judicial District’s Clerk and Master’s Office under the Chancery Court.

“The Clerk and Master at that time thought I was too ambitious to stay in the accounting department; so, he moved me up to probate, where a newly appointed chancellor had just taken the bench,” Michelle explained. “I was going to pursue a masters but on whim decided to go to law school. I wanted to see if I could do it. I took the LSAT and did well enough to earn a full-ride scholarship to Duncan School of Law in Knoxville.”

Although she enjoyed her time at Duncan, Michelle quickly realized after her first year that she did not enjoy litigating before the bar. She could do it, she just wasn’t made for it. She transferred to Regent University School of Law, where she earned a Master’s Degree in Law, specializing in Nonprofit law and International Human Rights. It was here that she clerked for the Center for Global Justice, working on memoranda relative to international terrorism and the international rights of a child. The policy-heavy courses of her master’s program only added to the passion that had shaped the direction of her youth.

After graduating from Regent University in 2015, Michelle worked for Mustard Tree a“small but mighty” faith-based non-profit settled in the heart of Chattanooga created to help address the homeless crisis and inner-city gang issues in downtown Chattanooga, Tennessee. Alongside their local initiatives, Mustard Tree also fought for equal access to healthcare and standing before the law for Roma women and children in Romania before the European Union. After a final merger with the Methodist Church, Michelle would go on to work for On Point, Inc., a nonprofit focused on helping at-risk youth in Chattanooga thrive.

Founding The Advocacy Center

Once she returned to Florida, Michelle resumed her work as a paralegal, gaining experience at some of the most prestigious regional and international law firms. However, she quickly recognized a troubling pattern—support staff were undervalued, and an air of elitism permeated the culture. It was then that she realized the environment her father had endured at Charlotte Regional was not an anomaly but the norm. In many firms, the hierarchy was rigid, and respect was reserved for those at the top.

Determined to create a different kind of culture, Michelle envisioned a workplace where collaboration, respect, and value were extended to all, regardless of title—one where the prestige of a name on the door didn’t dictate a person’s worth and positions were created for people, instead of people being hired for positions.

Michelle also saw the severity of issues caused by Florida’s over-populated communities, the intensity of immigration as an issue, and the disparity between the needs of the people and the services being rendered by the courts. The bar was over-whelmed and the bench over-extended.

In 1946, Congress enacted the Administrative Procedures Act, which created non-attorney agents, individuals federally certified and accredited to assist with complex form production in the areas of immigration, social security administration, veterans administration and tax relief. Michelle knew putting non-attorney advocates was the answer to could help alleviate the strain on the judiciary and communities as a whole “I thought that there was a way we can come alongside the bar and the bench and assist the people who are stuck in the gap, to serve the people in the community who desperately need it.” That thought resulted in the founding of The Advocacy Center (TAC) 

Although she didn’t intend for TAC to be all-women managed and led, Michelle explained, “when it did work out that way, I loved it. I met an attorney who founded an all-women law firm, and I remembered that the department clerks who had worked in Dad’s department had all been women – I used to help them with files, etc. I thought to myself ‘What are you showing me here, God?’ For I have learned that God will put a reflection in front of you for which you can either say yes or no to. I said yes.” What Michelle did intend was to create a space “where God was free to be God and mankind was free to mankind – all of mankind. I learned from what I saw in my Dad’s experiences and took some additional inspiration from one of my heroes, Dolly Parton, in her movie 9 to 5 in creating an environment where we have people, not positions.” Emphasizing wisdom, integrity, tact, and honor, her passion for the work resulted in a workplace where 3o hours is considered full time. Everyone has three day weekends every weekend, and flexible schedules are a staple, supporting those who serve with and for them.

In many ways, The Advocacy Center’s founding ideals and structures mirror that of the American Government. Michelle explains, “I took the cue given from our Founding Fathers. The United States, while built on Judeo-Christian principles, is not a Christian Nation, yet we are one nation under God with our founding documents acknowledging a universal creator and universal rights. These are just some of the reasons why TAC is a faith-based nonprofit, not a Christian one.” Although guided by faith — Michelle says she finds her heart of inspiration within the heart of God — Michelle tries to mirror those universal rights within her organization — To quote Barbara Brown Taylor, ‘Leave my religion between me and my God. If my religion has caused me to be more dutiful to society than it cannot be a bad one.’ How you worship, what you believe, that is between you and your Maker. I’ll take it a step further and quote Jefferson, “ Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions.”

Focusing on the Work

Her time at Law School and the projects she took on apart from TAC gave Michelle a wide breadth of legal experience across multiple fields. “I was working on a project writing a memorandum of law advocating for the international rights of a child,” Michelle explained, “when I followed the paper trail under the current administration through the UNRWA, I found monies tied to educational literature instructing children to honor God by ‘bathing their feet in the blood of martyrs;’ and the nation receiving the funds cited the The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) as the applicable law permitting the instruction. It was a clear abuse of the policy. It was never the Councils’ intent for the UNCRC to serve as a loophole so that governments can teach children how to go kill in the name of religious jihad. I thought to myself, ‘God has to hate religion as much as we do – using His name as an excuse to kill and to train killers.” Michelle’ next project was for an Israeli organization advocating for the rights of the Palestinian people to the Gaza Strip. Michelle loved this. “I went from advocating for the rights of a child to advocating for an enemy. ‘This is Christ, this is true religion,’ I thought.” The questions and lessons taken from these experiences manifested in mediation being a tenant of The Advocacy Center. “It doesn’t matter what side of an argument you are on, you can find a common ground, some point that you can agree on, and move forward in a spirit of diplomacy with one goal in mind: equity for all. My goal for TAC is to do just that – with wisdom, integrity, tact, and honor.

Right now, Michelle and TAC are focusing on violence against women and the international rights of children. My goal is for us to come alongside the entire Eleventh Federal District, which would include Tennessee, Georgia, and Florida,” Michelle said. The non-attorney agency advocates are available to assist everyone with immigration and mediation, and they hope to add secondarily Social Security and Veterans services as they grow.

Michelle was recently appointed to the National Association for Community Mediation (NAFCM) Impact and Values Committee. Her hope is to use these positions to create a spirit of unity and diplomacy, emphasizing the value non-attorney advocates have in bridging the gap.

Throughout her legal career, Michelle has seen abuse at every level of society: familial, professional, interpersonal. With the communities and services overwhelmed, Michelle and her team are trying to usher in a new age of equal standing and fair justice before the law. “I would honestly like to use non-attorney agency services such as mediation to address socio-economic barriers and forge new pathways that ensure equal access for all” reiterates Michelle.

The Advocacy Center, Inc. has been a long time in the making. At the crossroads between her family, her faith, and the law, Michelle leads with diplomacy, bi-partisanship, and kindness. Michelle states, “We are seventy years from the 1950s and we still do not have equal access— men do not have equal rights in family courts, women still do not enjoy equal standing before the law, and the rights of a child are constantly overlooked or just outright ignored. The immigrant has no way of egress or ingress and the orphan has no way of repose. Propaganda is promoted in the place of truth and justice is polluted by greed. Armed with a pen as her sword, Michelle plans on approaching this work with the same unwavering eloquence, determination and grit and grace like that of Eleanor Roosevelt and Annie O. As Eleanore said, “It’s up to women.”