Topeka ? A board’s ruling that five state employees were unfairly demoted when the Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services was reorganized could affect hundreds of employees, an attorney for the workers says.

The state’s civil service board, which resolves such disputes, sided with five SRS employees who had to take new jobs with different pay scales when the agency reorganized. The department last week appealed the board’s ruling in Shawnee County District Court, but a court date has not yet been set.

The job changes were part of a restructuring that included closing 62 of the agency’s 105 offices and consolidating 11 management areas to six.

“As far as we’re concerned, we believe there are hundreds of others who were demoted and not afforded their proper rights,” said Wesley Weathers, an attorney representing the five employees who protested their demotions.

The five employees claimed they were demoted without being given formal notice and a chance for a hearing, as required by state law. The agency claimed the employees were relocated and it didn’t need to provide them notice.

“That may be a game of semantics for some,” said Janie Coates, an attorney for SRS.

The agency isn’t sure whether it could be forced to undo some changes, and Coates noted that several hundred workers’ jobs changed with the reorganization.

“It’s not a matter of moving people back,” Coates said. “We’re struggling with the implications of it and how far-reaching it could be.”

The restructuring shifted much of the agency’s work force to urban areas. In smaller communities, “access points” for SRS services were put in public buildings, such as libraries. Customers in less populous areas also can do more over the Internet or on the telephone, which the agency says studies have shown the clients prefer.

The Legislature, meanwhile, has asked its auditing division to study the changes, including the affects on staff and services and whether the state has saved money.

Betsy Thompson, a special assistant in the agency’s integrated services delivery division, said the state the restructuring has saved the state almost $1 million over the past two years and is expected to save $2.3 million per year in the future.

However, employees weren’t the only ones who were unhappy with the changes. Critics contended the restructuring has forced social workers to meet with clients in public places, such as coffee shops, rather than offices, where privacy can be protected.