The lawyer who successfully sued to overturn Kansas’ ban on same-sex marriage in federal court now plans to amend the lawsuit in order to force state agencies to grant marriage benefits to same-sex couples.

Same-sex couples in Kansas can get marriage licenses from Sedgwick and other counties and use those licenses to marry anywhere in the state after a federal district court ruled the ban was unconstitutional earlier this month.

However, state agencies have refused to grant newly married same-sex couples the same rights as other legally married couples while Attorney General Derek Schmidt appeals the case.

Doug Bonney, who represented the couples suing the state, said the plaintiffs would amend their complaint to force state agencies to recognize the marriages and grant full legal rights to the newly married couples.

This includes the right to change the last name on your driver’s license to your spouse’s. For the spouses of state employees, it also includes receiving state health care benefits.

Bonney said they would sue Gov. Sam Brownback if necessary. He added the governor has the authority to direct agencies on how to respond to the ruling but said the administration’s combative response was disappointing. He also said it would cost taxpayers a lot of money in the long run.

“They’ve (the state) now made it absolutely clear … they’re going to fight for every inch of ground, they’re going to make us fight for every inch of ground on this,” Bonney said. “And there’s no chance they’re going to concede defeat on this.”

The same-sex spouses of people who work for the state’s public universities are being denied the health care benefits that a married heterosexual employee’s spouse would receive, said Bonney, who is chief counsel for the ACLU of Kansas.

Breeze Richardson, spokeswoman for the Board of Regents, which oversees the state’s public universities, said in an e-mail that universities cannot extend the benefits to same-sex employees’ spouses without action from the state’s Health Care Commission, which determines eligibility for state employee health care.

KDHE updated marriage forms to accommodate same-sex couples in the wake of the federal ruling, but it has not changed other policies. KDHE was the only state agency specifically named in the federal lawsuit, which dealt specifically with the issuance of marriage licenses.

The governor’s office confirmed Wednesday that state agencies would not change policies while the state continues to fight the overturning of its constitutional ban on same-sex marriage in a federal appeals court. It did not immediately respond to requests for additional comments on Thursday.

Jennifer Rapp, public information officer for the attorney general’s office, could not offer comment on whether the state agencies had a legal basis to not recognize same-sex marriages, explaining that with the exception of KDHE’s secretary, the individual state agencies and agency heads “are not our clients in this litigation and we cannot speak for them.”

Schmidt told the Associated Press on Wednesday that the same-sex marriages already performed were legal for the moment, but that could change if the state prevails in its appeal.

Tom Witt, the executive direct of Eqality Kansas, a gay-rights organization, said if Schmidt admits the marriages are currently legal, state agencies need to treat them as such.

“They don’t get to make this stuff up as they go just because they don’t like gay and lesbian people,” Witt said.

“Could this be any more Jim Crow?” he added, comparing the policies to the treatment of African Americans during segregation. “When do we get our rights? How much longer are Sam Brownback and Derek Schmidt going to draw this out where gay and lesbian couples are denied the same rights as every other legally married couple in this state?”

The governor’s office did not immediately answer when asked whether the policy stemmed from a directive by the governor or whether individual agency heads were acting independently.

Terry Fox, a Wichita pastor who opposes same-sex marriage, commended the governor and attorney general for fighting same-sex marriage and called the court battle a good use of taxpayers’ money.

“I think it’s absolutely a good thing to use taxpayers’ money for because the majority of the people in Kansas are not for this,” said Fox, who spoke at a rally opposing same-sex marriage with Brownback last month. “People across Kansas are not for this and they’re very much behind the governor’s administration holding up and fighting this every way that they can.”

Fox said that the state should wait for a definitive ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court and that he did not want his tax money to go toward paying for health-care benefits for public employees’ same-sex spouses.

“I know that there’s dancing in the streets from the homosexual community that this is over, but until it gets settled I don’t think government agencies should amend their policies,” he said.

Bonney said the ACLU would amend the lawsuit against the state to include more agencies because of the state’s reluctance to grant legally married same-sex couples the same rights that newly married heterosexual couples would receive.

“We’re trying to figure out who we sue, including possibly the governor,” Bonney said Thursday. “We’re very concerned about the state’s refusal to recognize marriages both performed in state and out of state, so we definitely will seek to amend our complaint to add these claims, because this can’t go on.”