The state’s looming $1 billion budgetary hole already is cutting into financial requests headed to the Kansas Legislature.

Representatives from more than a dozen agencies, associations and advocacy organizations made their annual pitches Wednesday to members of Douglas County’s legislative delegation, and their usual requests for more money often were replaced with pleas for financial maintenance, or even monetary mercy.

“We’re all pragmatists,” said Tom Eblen, a member of the Endacott Society, a group of 400 Kansas University retirees seeking stronger oversight and management of the Kansas Public Employees Retirement System, while also hoping to avoid reductions in benefits. “We hope we can be held harmless to whatever extent possible.”

Participating in the meetings were Reps. Barbara Ballard, D-Lawrence; Paul Davis, D-Lawrence; and Tom Sloan, R-Lawrence. Joining them were Sen. Marci Francisco, D-Lawrence; Sen.-elect Tom Holland, D-Baldwin City; and Rep.-elect Tony Brown, D-Baldwin City.

Among the requests: Don’t add to a pending $455,000 drop in state financing that hits July 1 at Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center.

“We feel like we’ve given at the office already,” said David Johnson, the mental health agency’s chief executive officer.

Tanya Dorf Brunner, executive director of Independence Inc., asked legislators to push for lifting the freeze on a waiting list for services that help people with physical disabilities remain safely in their homes.

At least nine of the agency’s clients have been squeezed by the freeze that took effect Dec. 1, and Brunner fears major problems as the cost-cutting measure takes hold. Inevitably, she said, some people left without assistance will opt to remain unassisted in their homes, rather than pay more than $3,000 a month to enter a nursing home.

“It sounds dramatic,” she said, “but people will die.”

Ballard, who organizes the annual meetings, said she and her fellow legislators would work to be fair during the upcoming session.

“We have to make the best of what we really have,” she said.