Child custody; Modification of a custody arrangement; MCL 722.27(1)(c); Proper cause or a change of circumstances; Vodvarka v Grasmeyer; Whether joint legal custody is in a child’s best interests; The statutory best-interest factors; MCL 722.23; Whether the parties can cooperate & agree on co-parenting matters; MCL 722.26a(1); Bofysil v Bofysil; A referee’s duties; MCR 3.215(E)(1); Live evidence; MCR 3.215(F)(2); Due process

The court held that the trial court did not err by denying in part plaintiff-mother’s motion for reconsideration of its order maintaining joint legal custody and modifying defendant-father’s parenting time. The trial court adopted most of the referee’s recommendations and modified defendant’s parenting time, finding the evidence demonstrated that the child “struggled with transitions between parenting time due to the parties’ behavior, and the extended weekends during the summer would allow” the child “‘to relax and settle into the environment of [defendant]’s home before facing another parenting time exchange.’” It denied plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration, finding her objections to select provisions of the recommendations did not obviate its duty to issue a parenting-time schedule in accordance with the child’s best interests. On appeal, the court rejected her challenge to the trial court’s denial of her request for sole legal custody, noting she conceded “that there was no change of circumstances that would support revisiting the parties’ custody arrangement, but” argued there was proper cause to do so, and that the trial erred by finding otherwise. “The record, however, clearly reflects that both the referee and the trial court found that there was proper cause and/or a change of circumstances to revisit the parties’ custody arrangement. And [it] did, in fact, revisit the parties’ custody arrangement—it simply concluded, after its analysis of the best-interest[] factors, that it was not in [the child’s] best interests to modify the arrangement from joint legal custody to plaintiff’s sole legal custody.” In addition, it was “readily apparent that the parties generally dislike each other and struggle to communicate effectively and appropriately, with defendant having directed some particularly inappropriate communications toward plaintiff in the past. But the record as a whole does not clearly indicate that, contrary to the [trial] court’s assessment, the parties are completely unable to cooperate and generally agree on major decisions regarding” the child’s welfare. Finally, the court rejected plaintiff’s argument that the trial court erred in its award of parenting time to defendant. “To start, the trial court did not err simply by opting not to follow the referee’s recommendation regarding parenting time.” Further, plaintiff never indicated any need or desire to present additional evidence. “And even in the time since the [trial] court issued its final decision, [she] has never substantiated or explained in any detail . . . what additional evidence she would have provided regarding parenting time that was not already presented at the evidentiary hearing before the referee.” The court also disagreed that she was denied her right to due process, noting she was “given full opportunity to object to the referee’s recommendation,” and she failed to explain how this right was violated. Affirmed.