Service Announcement

The merit selection panel for the Second Judicial District selected three of the nine nominees from which Governor Hickenlooper will select the next Denver Probate Judge on Tuesday.

One was a former Denver Probate Court magistrate who served for much of outgoing Judge Stewart's tenure. One is the current Denver Probate Court magistrate. One is a long time magistrate in Denver in its non-probate divisions. I am not that Denver lawyer and instead, will be continuing to have a private practice law. It is now up to Governor Hickenlooper to make a choice from these three candidates in the next two weeks, and as I probate lawyer who practices regularly in that court, I sincerely hope that he makes a wise choice between the three very different candidates. I appreciate all the support I received in the process, which was conducted in a fair and orderly manner. Colorado's method of selecting judges is a far superior way to obtain qualified judges than either ordinary judicial elections (we do have retention elections, but those are quite different), or the kind of exclusively political appointment process we have for the federal judiciary and some state courts.

For those of you who read this blog, that means that a brief hiatus from making posts that would be inappropriate for someone subject to the Canon of Judicial Ethics, most notably, partisan politics and certain kinds of posts on religious topics. In the next few day, I will be rebuilding the sidebar links (not necessarily exactly as I left them), and restoring archive functionality.

I anticipate having considerably less time available to blog for the indefinite near future, due to a major new source of legal work (hurray!), and also simply want to keep this space from getting stale. Towards that I end, I plan on rethinking and refocusing what I write about and how I do it.

I'm not sure exactly what I will come up with, but don't be surprised to see some changes. This post is two short of being post number 5400, and this July will be the sixth anniversary of this blog. I plan to make the change over on this anniversary, although there will be some beta testing of some of the concepts in the next nine weeks.

I definitely won't be converting to a group blog or taking guest posts - I don't have time for that kind of brain damage and coordination in a catch as I can personal hobby.

But, I'm looking at ways to give a bit more structure and direction to my posting and I am considering imitating Maju and splitting my currently eclectic blog into two or three more focused ones, although, unlike him, I will definitely make sure that "Wash Park Prophet" continues to exist as one of those blogs, mostly (with all due respect) because "Wash Park Prophet" is a bit catchier a name than the name of Maju's old omnibus blog, "Leherensuge."

The new Wash Park Prophet will include, at least, all matters related to Colorado in particular, from local politics, to infill and Denver neighborhoods, to praises of and rants about local businesses. One or more other blogs with still undetermined names will cover a significant chunk of the other stuff that I blog about here.

I am still playing with precisely which other topics to separate out, what banner(s) they will fly under, and what format changes, if any, I want to make at the same time. This blog covers an immense range of territory and it is perhaps a foreseeable curse that the son of a man whose academic career was profoundly interdisciplinary finds it tricky to fit his own musings into neat disciplinary boxes. The main criteria will be practical. Which topics overlap the least and what descriptions produce the clearest clusters (acknowledging that on rare occassions, a cross-post may be in order)? I am also considering a retooled set of post categories.

"Wash Park Prophet" will stay at this web address and continue to use the blogger system, because I want the address and format to have continuity, although it will have a visual face lift. The new blogs will not necessarily be blogger blogs and suggestions for the best alternative platforms are welcome.