Topeka ? Community groups fighting in court to increase state spending on services for the developmentally disabled celebrated Friday a judge’s order allowing their lawsuit to move forward.

But a spokesman for the Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services said the ruling did not address the merit of the groups’ claims.

The decision, released Thursday by Shawnee County District Judge Franklin Theis, will permit attorneys, representing five groups that provide services to the disabled, and InterHab Inc., an association that represents them, to gather evidence and take witnesses’ statements to support claims that services are underfinanced.

“It’s the difference between the life and death of this case,” said Tom Laing, InterHab’s executive director.

Theis’ decision focused on whether InterHab and the community groups could file their lawsuit under federal and state law and under the Kansas and U.S. constitutions. SRS sought to have the lawsuit dismissed even before attorneys began gathering evidence, arguing such lawsuits were not permitted.

“The judge has not drawn any conclusions about the merits of the claims,” said SRS spokesman Kyle Kessler.

Community groups contend the state must spend an additional $91 million a year to comply with a 1996 law reforming services for the developmentally disabled. That figure represents a 39 percent increase in the $231 million budgeted now.

Attorneys for InterHab and the groups have said the state owes at least $300 million total for its years of underfinancing.

“The state’s efforts over the past 11 months to bury this case have been turned back,” said Bill Craig, president of the Lakemary Center, a service provider in Paola. “We’re very excited about this because we know the facts are on our side.”

Theis dismissed portions of the InterHab lawsuit asserting that federal law entitles the community groups to recover funds they were due in the past. However, he refused to dismiss the rest of the lawsuit that asserts similar claims under state law and seeks future relief under federal law.

Kessler said he saw as positive the dismissal of portions of the lawsuit. However, Rodney Murrow, a Lenexa attorney representing InterHab and the service providers, said the dismissals were insignificant.

“Let’s assume there are five roads to get us from point A to point B, and two of them are closed,” he said.

Joining InterHab in the lawsuit against the state, SRS and Secretary Janet Schalansky are the 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 Tri-Valley Developmental Services, of Chanute.

Murrow and Laing said InterHab and the community groups were open to negotiating a settlement of the lawsuit.

But Kessler said SRS attorneys believed settlement talks would be premature, because the parties have not started gathering evidence yet, and, “we do not have enough information.”