Full disclosure department

When I embarked on this project of covering the judicial primary in Cook County I made it a point to state expressly that I would not be filing for the primary -- and, of course, I didn't.

However, a number of vacancies were recently posted for the office of Cook County Associate Judge. I have applied for Associate Judge on several prior occasions and I applied this time as well.

Associate judges are elected by the full circuit judges (the judges elected by the people). In Cook County, a screening committee composed of judges will sort through all the applications (last time out there were 242 applicants for what turned out to be 31 vacancies). Two finalists will be chosen by this screening committee for each vacancy and the circuit judges will select their new colleagues from those finalists. It may be a year or more before the next class of associate judges is chosen.