Prior to assuming executive responsibilities for the Foundation, Clabes was editor of Scripps’ The Kentucky Post for 13 years, editor of The Sunday Courier and Press in Evansville, Ind., for five years and a trustee of the Foundation. Her 32 year career with Scripps began at The Evansville Press. She was a syndicated columnist for Scripps Howard News Service and has published numerous articles in professional and general circulation publications.

Professional affiliations have included membership in the American Society of Newspaper Editors, which she served as a two-term board member; a member of the founding board for Forward Quest of Northern Kentucky; a member of the founding Board of Governors for the Metropolitan Club; a trustee of New York City-based Seedco Foundation; a member of the National Advisory Council of the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center; and a member of the boards of the Northern Kentucky Convention Center, Huntington Bank, the Northern Kentucky Fund of the Greater Cincinnati Foundation, the NAA Foundation, and the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression. She serves on the Boards of Visitors for Schools of Journalism at the University of Kentucky, Iowa State University, the Middle Tennessee State University and Ohio University.

She was elected to both the University of Kentucky Hall of Distinguished Alumni and the University of Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame and was named Outstanding Alumnus of the College of Communications in 2005. Among her numerous honors are the Bridges Distinquised Community Service Award in 2007; Middle Tennessee State University, Friend of the College Award in 2007; Gerald Sass Distinquished Service Award from AEJMC in 2006; James Madison Distinquised Service to the First Amendment Award University of Kentucky School of Journalism in 2006; Outstanding Alumnus, University of Kentucky College of Communications in 2004; Outstanding Women of Northern Kentucky in 2003; Distinguished Service to the First Amendment Award from the Kentucky Council of Teachers of English in 2002; the Lewis B. Owens Award for Community Service from the Kentucky Press Association in 2000; the Lincoln Award from Northern Kentucky University in 1996; the Frontiersman Award from the Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce in 1993; the Kentucky Press Women Outstanding Communicator award in 1990; and a Cincinnati YWCA Career Woman of Achievement award in 1986. PROUD magazine recognized her as an "Ambassador of Diversity" in 2001.

Clabes holds a bachelor’s degree in English and journalism from the University of Kentucky and an M.P.A. from Indiana State University. She also received an honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of Southern Indiana and an Honorary Doctorate of Law from Thomas More College (KY).