With each passing day, time is running out for Gov. Matt Bevin to call a special legislative session to reform the state’s pension system, which is short billions of dollars needed to fund payouts to state workers over the next 30 years.

Tom Shelton, executive director of the Kentucky Association of School Superintendents, raised doubts about the special session during a meeting Wednesday of the Green River Regional Educational Cooperative.

“We just don’t know whether or not it’s going to happen,” Shelton said over a conference call to a roomful of regional school district superintendents. Shelton added that, based on people he’s spoken to, “it’s less and less likely.”

Bevin has presented legislation that would ultimately close the state’s pension system in favor of 401(k)-style plans for state workers and public school teachers. Educator groups have also presented their alternative plan. Superintendent Rob Clayton of Warren County Public Schools supports the alternative fix and described it in a previous interview as “an opportunity to have a defined benefit within the current pension system.”

Shelton, a former superintendent of Fayette County Public Schools, called into the GRREC meeting during a Kentucky Board of Education meeting he was attending. Shelton said he’s still hearing rumors about the special session “happening late in the week of the 18th.” He added it’s “pretty clear” it won’t be called next week partly because Senate President Robert Stivers, R-Manchester, will be unavailable.

Students in both the Bowling Green Independent School District and Warren County Public Schools will begin their winter break on Dec. 18. Clayton and the county school district’s board of education have publicly supported letting teachers have time off work to attend a potential rally in Frankfort during the special session.

Shelton said Senate and House leadership met with Bevin on Monday to discuss the session and “asked him not to do that at this late date” and instead wait until the regular session begins on Jan. 2.

However, Shelton also went further and suggested a special session is unlikely to happen at all. Shelton said he’s been working with Legislative Research Commission staff who he said had originally been told to hold the entire month of December for the session.

“They no longer have to hold the rest of the month,” he said.

Regional lawmakers have also cast doubt on the possibility of a special session before the end of the year.

Among them was Rep. Wilson Stone, D-Glasgow.

“Every day, chances are going down” of having a special session, he said.

Rep. Jody Richards, D-Bowling Green, said he opposes addressing pension reform in a special session and that it should wait until the regular session.

“I’ve not seen a plan yet,” he said. “There needs to be a plan and let people vet it.”

Shelton added supporters of the Shared Responsibility Plan have continued meeting with lawmakers in both the House and Senate. He said the plan has been written into a bill but it does not yet have a sponsor and asked the superintendents for recommendations.

Supporters won’t endorse any measure that breaks the “inviolable contract” of pension benefits, such as freezing cost of living adjustments for teachers, Shelton said.

However, he said supporters are considering other cost-saving measures outside of that, such as raising the requirement beyond 55 years old for a retiree to use their three highest salary years to enhance their benefits.

“We wanted to make sure if we do that that there would be some level of grandfathering,” he said.

In addition to the educator groups’ plan, Shelton described another “compromise plan” by House lawmakers as “much better” than Bevin’s plan. That plan would potentially cut cost of living adjustments, which Shelton said he opposed. However, current teachers would not be required to move out of the current system, he said.

“Like our plan, sick days would be frozen as of the end of this current fiscal year for the calculation of retirement benefits,” he said.

For new employees, “they’re talking about going with a hybrid cash balance plan,” similar to a plan within the County Employees Retirement System.

Superintendent Jim Flynn of Simpson County Schools said in a follow-up interview that lawmakers he’s spoken with would rather wait until the regular session.

“There’s just not enough time between now and the end of the year to really have a bill proposal out there that’s an alternative to the governor’s that has been properly vetted, been scored actuarially and in time for people to really digest it and ask questions,” he said. “ … People need that time, deserve that time.”

– News director Wes Swietek contributed to this story.

– The Associated Press contributed to this story.