Topeka ? Arguing that the state regulates veterinary clinics more strictly than it does abortion clinics, proponents of a bill to set minimum standards for those clinics said Monday that current conditions endanger women’s lives.

The bill is the same as one vetoed last year by Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, who said medical personnel are more qualified than legislators to set safety standards.

Sebelius said last week she will veto the measure again if it reaches her desk. Last year, an effort in the House to override her veto fell far short of the two-thirds majority required by law for an override.

“If exactly the same bill passes again, I’ll veto it again,” the governor said. “To repeat exactly the same exercise doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.”

Brendan Mitchell, a Johnson County obstetrician and gynecologist, told the House Federal and State Affairs Committee that 12,000 abortions are conducted each year in Kansas, often in facilities that are ill-equipped to handle complications from surgery.

“The public perceives that legal abortion is safe abortion,” Mitchell said. “Indeed, many of the proponents of abortion rights cite safe abortion as the main justification against laws restricting abortion. The public believes that the same standards that apply to other surgical procedures apply to legal abortion. However, this is not the case.”

Because most abortions are performed in an office or clinic setting, abortion clinics are treated like doctors’ offices, governed by the state Board of Healing Arts. State law does not require the board to conduct inspections.

The bill orders the Kansas Department of Health and Environment to set minimum standards for clinics’ supplies, equipment, lighting and ventilation, as well as minimum sizes of interview rooms, bathrooms and dressing rooms.

The bill also requires that every clinic have a doctor as its medical director; have a female staffer present during any procedure done by a male doctor; and have ultrasound equipment if it offers abortions after the 12th week of pregnancy.

“Women are very vulnerable when they go in for an abortion,” Rep. Peggy Long-Mast, R-Emporia, the bill’s leading sponsor, told the committee. “We need these regulations because the industry itself has admitted to not measuring up to these minimum standards.”

She said despite Sebelius’ promise to veto the measure, she does not think there will be major changes to the legislation in an attempt to gain the governor’s support.

“I don’t see how we can compromise on an issue as important to women as this,” Long-Mast said.