Legal custody; Proper cause or change in circumstances; MCL 722.27(1)(c); Vodvarka v Grasmeyer; Parenting time; Routine decisions; MCL 722.27a(11); Shulick v Richards; Modification; Established custodial environment; Shade v Wright; Appellate jurisdiction; Civil contempt sanction; MCL 600.1721; Alpena Cnty Bd of Cnty Rd Comm’rs v Tadajewski

The court held that it lacked jurisdiction over defendant-father’s appeals from the civil contempt proceedings and that the trial court did not err by denying his motion to reinstate joint legal custody or by making modest parenting-time adjustments. The parties shared equal parenting time, but plaintiff-mother had sole legal custody after earlier disputes involving father’s “aggressive approach to the children’s medical” care. Father sought joint legal custody after renewed conflict over HW’s school absences and medical issues, while mother sought contempt based in part on father’s at-home blood test of the children. The court first held that the contempt appeals had to be dismissed because, despite the trial court’s criminal-contempt label, the attorney-fee sanction was compensatory civil contempt, and the court lacks jurisdiction over an appeal of right from such orders. On legal custody, the court held that father failed to establish proper cause or a change in circumstances because the facts continued to show “a pattern by father of aggressively pursuing medical treatment for the children and imposing his medical beliefs on HW,” while mother did not ignore any serious medical condition. The court also held that no evidentiary hearing was required because the asserted facts were legally insufficient. As to parenting time, the court held that requiring father to take a sick child to mother so she may decide if they should go to school and to administer only approved medications involved important medical and educational decisions, not routine matters. The court further held that these “modest adjustments” did not alter the established custodial environment and were supported by the children’s best interests. Contempt appeals dismissed, custody and parenting-time orders affirmed.