Kansas welfare officials were accused Thursday of threatening a party to a lawsuit that had been filed against the state on behalf of the mentally retarded.

“This is outrageous,” said Topeka attorney Jim Kaup.

Kaup, representing various community groups that help the developmentally disabled, filed suit last year, accusing the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services of violating the state’s 1996 Developmental Disabilities Reform Act. The lawsuit asserts SRS broke the law by failing to adequately fund programs aimed at keeping the mentally retarded out of state institutions and in community settings.

But Kaup said SRS officials threatened to pull all funding from one of the community programs he represents in the case.

“The message is pretty clear,” Kaup said of a letter SRS sent to Tri-Valley Developmental Services in Chanute: “Keep this up and we’ll put you out of business.”

‘That’s a threat’

The Sept. 3 letter ostensibly is about services needed for a 15-year-old autistic boy who is being kept at Parsons State Hospital. In it, SRS instructed Tri-Valley to make a place for the boy in its community program — despite the lack of state funding that is at issue in the lawsuit — or else SRS would pull its contract with Tri-Valley.

The letter coincided with the boy, identified in the lawsuit as R.S., being added to the list of plaintiffs in the lawsuit.

SRS is the main source of funding for Tri-Valley.

“I’d say that’s a threat,” Kaup said.

Kaup filed a motion Thursday in Shawnee County District Court, asking Judge Franklin Theis to add “retaliation” to counts already in the lawsuit against SRS.

SRS hasn’t yet pulled its contract with Tri-Valley, though the boy remains at Parsons State Hospital.

Maury Thompson, Tri-Valley’s executive director, says his agency doesn’t have the money it needs to create an opening for R.S., who is autistic, mentally retarded and disruptive.

“If the resources were there, we could and we would provide those services — it’s not a question of whether we’re willing or whether we’re able,” Thompson said. “The question is, ‘Are the resources there?’ And the answer is, ‘No, they’re not.'”

Notification, not a threat

John Badger, chief counsel for SRS disagreed that the letter was threatening.

“We don’t consider that a threat at all,” he said. “There are provisions in the contract that say that when things like this come up, the contractor will be notified. And that’s what this was — it certainly wasn’t meant to be retaliatory or a threat.”

Joining Tri-Valley Developmental Services in the lawsuit are Kansas Elks Training Center for the Handicapped, of Wichita; Training and Evaluation Center of Hutchinson; Topeka Association for Retarded Citizens; Sheltered Living, of Topeka; and InterHab, a Topeka-based association representing 45 community programs throughout the state.

Lawrence’s Cottonwood Inc., 2801 W. 31st St., is not a plaintiff in the lawsuit, but is a member of InterHab.

If successful, the lawsuit could force lawmakers to increase spending on community programs by as much as $100 million annually.

SRS’ counterarguments have yet to be heard.

Badger declined to predict SRS’ defense but said that like any other state agency, SRS is required by law to stay within its allotted budget.

State and federal spending on the developmentally disabled in Kansas, both in state hospitals and in community programs, has increased dramatically, from $156 million in 1993 to $227 million in 2003.

The increased spending for community programs, however, has not kept pace with the increase in the number of people served, advocates said.

“We’re serving a lot more people for the same money,” said InterHab executive director Tom Laing. “This is like the state telling a paving contractor, ‘We want you to build 100 more miles of highway but you have to do it for whatever we paid you in 1993.’

“We all know what that contractor’s going to do. He’s going to say ‘screw the state,’ and move on to his other customers. But DD (developmentally disabled) facilities don’t have any other customers — the state is their only customer. The only thing left for them to do is file a lawsuit.”