Once upon a time, I lived in Kansas. At the time the governor was Bob Dole. I was stationed at Fort Leavenworth and worked at the United States Disciplinary Barracks.

To the present:

The Brownback administration has decided that it will not be sufficient to require that transgender people be forced to use the restroom that accords with the sex listed on their birth certificate...since currently one could have the gender changed on a Kansas birth certificate by presenting medical documentation that displays that an anatomical or physiological change has occurred.

The governor’s administration has proposed changing the regulations so that the gender on a person’s birth certificate can only be changed if the person signs an affidavit saying the gender was incorrectly recorded on the original certificate and also provides medical records backing up that claim.

The change developed by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment seems to block transgender people from changing their birth certificates after transitioning.

They’re trying to change the rules in the middle of the game.

This has been standing in Kansas for a very long time that transgender people are able to get their birth certificates corrected. Now they’re changing the rules because there are transgender people who are still trying to get their birth certificates corrected … and Brownback’s people don’t want that to happen.

--Tom Witt, Equality Kansas

The KDHE explanation of the change says it is intended "to remove allowing corrections that are not considered minor.

Current regulatory language is not in compliance with Kansas law.

With these changes, the regulation will be brought into compliance

--Cassie Sparks, KDHE spokeswoman

I guess that is the law which declares it illegal for someone in Kansas to be born transgender.

Coincidentally(??) the proposed change comes as the state is being sued by Stephanie Mott for refusing to change Mott's birth certificate

It’s sadly unfortunate that the state of Kansas is in the business of trying to make it more difficult for people to be who they really are.

I couldn’t begin to understand their motivations.

My hope is to get my birth certificate corrected. I was born female. My birth certificate does not reflect accurately that I was born female and that I am female. And the state’s duty is to correct my birth certificate to reflect who I am.

Really, it’s an issue of fairness. “Most people have birth certificates that match who they are and I don’t.

--Mott, a graduate student at Washburn University

Of course, not having a birth certificate that matches her appearance can make her life much more difficult, like when she would want to do something like register to vote.

Ilona Turner, legal director for the Transgender Law Center, called Kansas’ policy “an extreme outlier,” saying that every other state except Tennessee and Idaho will give transgender people updated birth certificates.

The Student Physical Privacy Act (SB 523 and HB 2737) "declares in no uncertain terms that transgender students are going to harm other students just by using the same facility alongside them."

Allowing students to use restrooms, locker rooms and showers that are reserved for students of a different sex will create potential embarrassment, shame, and psychological injury to students.

Among other things, this law sets a bounty of $2500 (plus monetary damages for all psychological emotional and physical harm suffered as a result) per use on any transgender student using the bathroom of the gender they live as.

The Kansas Legislature is currently in adjournment until April 27.