Kentucky's chief justice is winning national praise.

Chief Justice Deborah Lambert just won the Judge Stephen F Goss Lifetime Achievement Award for 2025, for her work in improving court responses for people with behavioral health needs.

The award is from the Council of State Governments Justice Center, the American Psychiatric Association Foundation, and the National Center for State Courts.

Justice Lambert received the award yesterday.

She was praised for her leadership, compassion and enduring commitment with work through the Drug Court, Mental Health Court, and the Kentucky Judicial Commission on Mental Health.

Chief Justice Lambert stopped by our studios earlier today to discuss her work on mental and behavioral health and her history making role with the state's highest court, Chief Justice, Deborah Lambert.

It's a pleasure to have you.

It's a pleasure to be here.

First of all, big congratulations on winning the judge Stephen S Goss, a lifetime achievement award for 2025 for your work on improving behavioral health.

Thank you so very much.

It was quite the honor.

Yes.

Let's talk about your work in behavioral health and mental health.

We know this has really been a passion, not project, but a commitment of yours over very many years.

Talk to us about why this is so important to you.

Well, of course, my history is as a family court judge, and I saw lots of folks under stress as both as an attorney and in the courtroom, and, knew that mental health was was very important.

And we know that as individuals, too.

Don't wait.

But, a few years ago, in about 2015, I think, I had some friends who died by suicide and, I was encouraged to, be trained, through an organization called QPR Institute.

So I became a suicide prevention trainer.

And so that work predates my work on the court, but is somewhat related to that.

So when, Chief Justice Minton, former chief justice, met and asked me to lead the judicial, Commission on Mental Health in Kentucky, it seemed a perfect fit.

You mentioned QPR and, that question.

Persuade and refer.

Yes.

Very nice.

So that is like a mental health first aid kind of approach.

Is that right?

Is, you know, we think of, CPR for medical emergencies when our heart stops and, the acronyms QPR, you can actually save a life with being trained and it's not it's not as if the training is, exotic or difficult, curriculum to learn.

A lot of it is just about making people comfortable with following their instincts and pausing long enough to ask the question, are you thinking of taking your life and knowing kind of the steps that you can take after that, to persuade them to get treatment and to actually find the treatment offered to go with them?

So let's talk a little bit more about you.

When you became chief Justice and your investiture, which kind of got moved because of some circumstances you talked about during that investiture, which we carried on.

Kate, being a native of Bell County in eastern Kentucky with parents who didn't have ideal circumstances or maybe, perhaps opportunities that that you've been able to enjoy about how that has really rooted and grounded you and made you the person you are today.

Talk to us a little bit more about that.

Well, growing up modestly, but with hard working parents, who believed that education was just the key to everything.

And perhaps maybe they over idealized that.

And because they did not have that opportunity and, I just always knew that that was the direction I was going to go.

And, and when you're raised modestly, too, you require the, the idea or, or you have to have the idea that if the playing field is level, you can succeed.

And so I'm very much a rule follower.

So I guess becoming a judge was, was a natural for me.

But I had so many caring adults who surrounded me who did know a little bit more than my parents about, getting into college and what I needed to do, and they were so very helpful.

All it takes is just a an adult or two in your life who can who can really make a difference.

I'm sure everyone's had that.

Absolutely.

The power of mentorship and we can all be mentors, regardless of our station in life, in our age.

It's also historic.

And all of this is the fact that you being the first female, Supreme Court justice, but also there's a lot more women on the bench as well.

So talk to us about that dynamic.

And do you feel it even makes a difference.

And how a law is exercised or decisions are come to, to be made.

I really don't think it makes a difference.

You know, I've said it's not as if we, all show up to work with casseroles or cookies or anything.

We just, work the same as the men, and and gender really hasn't, had any effect, I don't think, on our any of our opinions.

I would like to perhaps come up with some way of explaining that that's a little bit more clear, but we just show up and go to work.

Just do the work.

Yeah.

We do.

It's the same list for all of us.

We don't.

We get the same assignments.

And, we all work very well together.

But we are excited to be part of the first majority of women.

It is of note, I think.

Right.

But, you know, it's I don't think that many people realized we hadn't had a female chief justice until I became chief.

So where is there a line between interpreting the Constitution as a justice and activism on such issues that may not seem to be controversial, such as mental or behavioral health?

Do you ever struggle with where your activism can lie?

Perhaps.

But one of the things that we focus on with the, Judicial Commission on Mental Health is where the public intersects and their behavioral health and mental health needs intersect with the court system.

And how we can put together better processes.

It's not about one case or one type of case.

It's how we can better serve the needs of, any party that comes before us or any victim who comes before us as well.

And, so it isn't that hard to lift to if you're just focusing on the processes and on the judicial criminal or judicial Commission for Mental Health, we have, all types of people.

We have state legislative folks.

We have people from the various cabinets.

We have professional organizations from social work.

All types of people are there.

We're trying to break down the silos of communications, of communication.

There are lots of good things going on in the state of Kentucky surrounding mental health.

But sometimes, those ideas could easily be used throughout the state, but they're only being used in a region or in a county or in a courtroom.

So the more we have these conversations together, the easier it will be to promote the good ideas.

The Kentucky Supreme Court is hearing oral arguments on a few cases next week that you can see exclusively online.

As it happens at KT dawg, and I'll have more my interview with Chief Justice Lambert in the coming days, as she talks about the budgetary needs of Kentucky courts, and more ways the courts are trying to help justice, involved offenders with substance use and mental health issues.

So look for that on our future edition of Kentucky Edition.