CAMPBELL COUNTY, KY — Judicial campaigns tend to come with promises.
Experience. Temperament. Fairness. Preparation.
In 2016, the Committee to Elect Abby Voelker told Campbell County voters that she had the experience and temperament to serve as District Court judge and would deliver “respectful and well-reasoned decisions.” She lost that race, receiving 8,920 votes to Cameron Blau’s 12,245. �
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Six years later, Voelker ran for Campbell County Family Court. This time, she told voters that she had been “intentional with my career path and preparing for this opportunity” for years. She said her experience would bring compassion, fairness and a trauma-informed approach to families in crisis.
She won
Now there is something voters did not have in either campaign:
an appellate record.
And some of that record raises difficult questions about exactly the qualities her campaigns emphasized.
First came a contempt order with no evidentiary hearing
In 2025, the Kentucky Court of Appeals reviewed Judge Voelker’s decision to hold CHFS social worker Stefani Hayes in contempt.
The appellate opinion describes a remarkable sequence.
Hayes was not present when the underlying order was entered.
The underlying order was directed to the Cabinet, not to Hayes personally.
The record did not establish that Hayes had even been served with it.
Then came the contempt proceeding.
There was no evidentiary hearing.
Nobody was sworn as a witness.
Hayes did not testify.
Yet she was held in contempt and ordered to write apology letters.
The Court of Appeals reversed. It held that Hayes had not received the due process required before contempt could be imposed and separately found an abuse of discretion in placing responsibility on Hayes under circumstances that included approved FMLA leave and other workers handling the case. �
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The opinion also records Judge Voelker referring to Hayes as “the infamous Ms. Hayes.” �
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A fair question practically writes itself:
If this is what a “well-reasoned” contempt decision looks like, what would an inadequately reasoned one look like?
Then came a published opinion saying binding law had not been followed
In June 2026, the Court of Appeals considered Yelton v. Yelton.
This one was designated TO BE PUBLISHED.
The appellate court held that the Family Court failed to apply Kentucky’s required tracing principles when dividing marital and nonmarital property. It said the court could not simply disregard binding Kentucky Supreme Court law because tracing was difficult. �
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Then there were the numbers.
The Family Court referred to one figure of $135,240.22.
Then another of $130,829.44.
Then ultimately awarded $139,000.
The Court of Appeals said the calculations could not be reconciled with the findings. �
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And two additional claims simply had not been decided.
One involved $7,665 allegedly used to pay a premarital tax debt.
Another involved a request for $3,000 in attorney fees.
Both had been raised.
Neither was resolved in the final order.
The appellate court sent both issues back. �
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That invites another basic question:
How does a final judgment divide people’s property using numbers the appellate court cannot reconcile while leaving claims sitting unanswered?
Then another financial order was vacated for missing findings
In Wood v. Bragg, the Court of Appeals reviewed an order requiring a mother to pay guardian-ad-litem fees.
Kentucky law requires a determination of reasonableness.
The appellate court found that the Family Court’s order lacked the necessary finding that either the amount of the GAL fees or assigning them to the mother was reasonable.
So that portion of the order was vacated and sent back for additional findings. �
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Other portions of the case were affirmed, which is important context.
But the fee ruling still leaves an obvious question:
Why was someone ordered to pay before the required finding supporting that obligation had been made?
Three different cases. Similar kinds of problems.
These cases involve different subjects.
A state social worker.
Marital property.
Guardian-ad-litem fees.
But the appellate corrections touch some remarkably basic judicial tasks:
Notice before punishment.
An actual hearing before contempt.
Following controlling law.
Using calculations that can be explained.
Deciding claims placed before the court.
Making required findings before ordering someone to pay money.
Those are not obscure technicalities.
They are part of the machinery that makes a court ruling lawful and reviewable.
The campaign record makes the contrast difficult to ignore
Back in 2016, Voelker’s campaign did not describe her as someone who still needed to learn how to produce careful judicial decisions.
It said she was already prepared.
Her campaign told voters she possessed the experience and temperament necessary for District Court and would make respectful, well-reasoned decisions. �
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She was not selected by the Judicial Nominating Commission for the 2016 appointment—the commission advanced Cameron Blau, John Hayden and Bob Monfort—and she later lost the special election. �
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Then in 2022, the message was not that she had suddenly discovered Family Court.
It was nearly the opposite.
She wrote that she had deliberately shaped her career toward this opportunity and considered herself uniquely qualified for the job. �
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Campbell County voters elected her to the open seat left by Judge Richard Woeste. �
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That history creates a question worth considering without inventing an answer:
When a judicial candidate repeatedly campaigns on preparation, experience and carefully reasoned decision-making, how should the public evaluate an early appellate record containing findings of denied due process, abuse of discretion, failure to follow binding precedent, unexplained calculations and missing required findings?
Maybe Kentucky should be asking a larger Family Court question
Family Court is not a small-stakes courtroom.
It can determine where children live.
Whether parents see them.
Whether parental rights end permanently.
Who pays support.
Who pays lawyers and GALs.
Who receives property.
And who can be jailed for contempt.
Most families do not have unlimited money to appeal.
Most parents do not have months or years to wait for an appellate court to tell them that the original order was legally deficient.
So how many mistakes never reach an appellate opinion?
How many litigants simply run out of money?
How many orders remain in place because no one can finance the challenge?
And does Kentucky actually have a mechanism for looking at repeated appellate corrections coming from an individual Family Court division and asking whether something needs attention?
An appeal may eventually fix an erroneous order.
It cannot return the months a parent lost.
It cannot erase a contempt sanction that should not have been imposed.
It cannot give back litigation costs already incurred.
That is why judicial performance should matter before another appeal becomes necessary.
The public now has something campaigns cannot provide
Campaign literature tells voters what a candidate promises to be.
Appellate opinions tell the public what happened after the candidate got the robe.
Those are very different kinds of evidence.
In 2016, Campbell County was asked to trust promises about experience, temperament and well-reasoned decisions. �
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In 2022, voters were told this Family Court opportunity was the culmination of years of deliberate preparation. �
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Now the public can compare those claims with actual appellate decisions.
That comparison deserves more attention—not because every reversal means a judge is unfit, and not because every losing judicial candidate should be barred from seeking another office, but because courts wield enormous power and campaign claims should be tested against the record once a judge has one.
The questions are simple:
Were these isolated mistakes?
Are the same kinds of procedural problems recurring?
How many similar orders were never appealed?
Does Kentucky track that?
And what happens when the promise of careful, well-reasoned Family Court decisions meets an appellate record saying otherwise?
Those are questions worth answering before another family has to pay for an appeal to ask them.
