BATON ROUGE (AP) — Families of disabled children and advocacy groups, whose funding for services was a casualty of Gov. Bobby Jindal’s veto pen, are urging lawmakers to return to Baton Rouge to overturn the governor’s budget cuts.

Advocates have organized a Facebook page, a website and a petition drive called Override the Veto, and they’re bombarding lawmakers with emails and phone calls.

The groups hope that personal stories and the faces of those on waiting lists for services can generate support from lawmakers to revisit Jindal’s decision to remove $6 million the Legislature added to the budget for programs for the disabled.

“We are contacting every state senator and state representative and just asking them to stand by their budget and override the governor’s veto for these services for the people who are the most vulnerable in the state,” said Kay Marcel, of New Iberia, an advocate for the developmentally disabled whose son receives state services.

If the families and advocacy organizations are successful, they would be creating history. Lawmakers have not held a veto session since the current state constitution was enacted four decades ago.

“I think it’s a big hurdle to get over, but we are encouraged,” Marcel said.

A legislative veto session was automatically set for July 16 when the Republican governor jettisoned seven bills and issued line-item vetoes to the $25.4 billion budget for the fiscal year that begins Monday.

But a majority written vote of either the House or Senate by July 11 can scrap the session, and that has been done year after year, despite anger from lawmakers over vetoes and outrage in local communities about individual budget decisions.

Jindal said the state couldn’t afford new spending on the add-ons for disabled programs in the Department of Health and Hospitals because lawmakers hadn’t included enough money to continue the existing services in the Medicaid program and cover projected increases.

“We protected the most critical programs that our citizens with developmental disabilities use every day and focused on programs that haven’t yet been implemented, ensuring we maintain the services that people rely on,” the governor wrote in a letter to newspaper editors after facing criticism about the line-item vetoes.

That explanation hasn’t swayed everyone, particularly the families of the more than 10,000 people on a waiting list for services through the New Opportunity Waiver program, or NOW, that provides at-home services to the developmentally disabled.

Jindal struck out $4 million that would have paid for 200 new people to get services.

The chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, Rep. John Bel Edwards, is pushing for the veto session, saying Jindal’s vetoes harm “the least among us.” The leader of the Louisiana Democratic Party, Sen. Karen Carter Peterson, also wants lawmakers to return for an override discussion, calling the vetoes “cruel and heartless.”

But Rep. Lance Harris, chairman of the House Republican Delegation, opposes a veto session, calling it costly and unnecessary.

If Republicans vote as a bloc, they have enough votes on their own to kill the session.

“I don’t think we’ll have one,” said Rep. Simone Champagne, R-Jeanerette, who said she won’t support a veto session.

“We got a budget out. We did a compromise budget. Not everyone was satisfied with what we did. But I think we were independent and played our role. Now the governor has played his role, and that was what he was charged to do,” Champagne said.

Even lawmakers who support the idea of a veto session acknowledge that it’s unlikely to happen, though they say they are trying to change the legislative tradition of scrapping the return to the state Capitol.

“History shows how difficult it is. It certainly wouldn’t surprise me if history repeats itself, and we don’t come back for a veto session this year,” said Rep. Walt Leger, D-New Orleans, the number two ranking member of the House.

Leger had two of his bills vetoed and would like to revisit the governor’s decisions, but he said that based on conversations with his colleagues, it’s unlikely he’ll get that opportunity.

Marcel said she’s hopeful that the voices of the disabled community can sway people and rally support in the Legislature.

“It’s devastating to have had the Legislature say that this is a priority, identify the funding for it and then the governor take it away,” she said.

If lawmakers choose to hold a veto session, it also takes a hefty vote to override the governor: two-thirds backing in both the House and Senate to enact a law or budget item that has been rejected by Jindal.