The Kansas Constitution, in Article 7, Section 4, provides relief for individuals needing public assistance. Until 1936, providing assistance was the responsibility of county governments. The Constitution was amended in 1935 to allow the state to participate in relief programs. In 1937, the State Welfare Department was created. The department, supervised by the Board of Social Welfare, was empowered to participate in programs offered by the federal Social Security Act and establish welfare programs for the care of the needy.
In 1939, the Division of Institutional Management was created within the department to supervise the operation of the state hospitals. In 1953, the Department of Social Welfare was reorganized into two divisions: Social Welfare and Institutional Management. In 1968, the Legislature transferred the Division of Vocational Rehabilitation into the department, from the Board of Vocational Education.
The 1973 Kansas Legislature created a state agency, the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services (SRS), to replace the Board of Social Welfare. The 1973 Legislature directed SRS to administer assistance programs instead of counties.
SRS was expanded in 1979 to include programs for alcohol and drug abuse, income maintenance, and medical services. In 1996, legislation was enacted to allow the SRS Secretary to organize the department as needed to provide services in an efficient manner. Services for juvenile offenders were moved out of SRS and assumed by the Juvenile Justice Authority, which was a created by the Kansas Legislature in 1997. Responsibility for oversight of nursing homes and Medicaid-funded community programs for the aging were shifted from SRS to the Kansas Department on Aging in 1997.
Kansas health care reform was accomplished in 2005 by the successful transfer of all Medicaid and medical policy staff to the new Division of Health Policy and Finance of the Department of Administration. This transfer was prompted by an unprecedented growth in Medicaid that required much of the agency focus to be directed to management of the health care system. This transfer allowed SRS to refocus our efforts on the consumers we serve, the support we deliver, and the choices Kansans prefer as Kansas' human services agency.