Gov. Sam Brownback said last week that he’s working to fill a vacancy on the Kansas Court of Appeals and plans to announce his choice well ahead of the February deadline set by state law.

Hopefully, the governor will choose to follow a process for that appointment that is far more transparent than the process he followed when appointing his former chief counsel, Caleb Stegall, to the court in 2013.

Stegall’s appointment was the first one made under a new law that eliminated the Kansas Judicial Nominating Commission’s role in selecting Court of Appeals judges. Those appointments now are made by the governor and confirmed by the Kansas Senate, without any input from the nominating group.

The new process was touted as more democratic because appointees must be approved by elected legislators, but, at least as it was conducted for Stegall, the process leading up to a court appointment is far less transparent than it was under the previous system.

The nominating commission advertised a deadline for nominations and subsequently released the names of everyone whose names were being considered for a vacant seat. When commission members selected the three nominees who would be forwarded to the governor, those names were made public so Kansas residents would know who was being considered. The commission still uses that process for Kansas Supreme Court nominees.

The “process” followed by Brownback in his only Court of Appeals appointment since the new law took effect was considerably less transparent. The governor took applications for the position but released no information about whom had applied or whom he was considering for the post. The first announcement from the governor’s office was the news that he had selected Stegall. The announcement declared Stegall as extremely qualified but offered no information about other nominees, meaning that Kansans had no opportunity to assess his qualifications against any other candidates for the job.

Brownback’s recent election campaign made a big issue of the governor’s responsibility for appointing judges to state courts, and it’s likely Brownback will push to also eliminate the Judicial Nominating Commission’s role in Supreme Court appointments.

For that reason, Kansans should be particularly interested in exactly how the governor goes about evaluating candidates and making these appointments. To that end, the governor should be willing to share the names of nominees and make his process as transparent as it possibly can be.