The special session, which is scheduled to start Oct. 5, will deal specifically with compensation, health insurance and retirement benefits for active and retired teachers and state employees, Fletcher said.

"It's important that we call on the legislators - and we call on particularly the House Democrats - to work in a bipartisan way, and a nonpartisan way, and to lay partisan politics aside to solve this problem," Fletcher said.

Fletcher recently announced plans to overhaul the state health insurance plan for next year, a move that affects thousands of state employees, teachers and public school workers.

Under the plan, most will pay more in deductibles and co-payments starting in 2005.

The Kentucky Education Association board of directors last weekend voted in favor of teachers and public school employees going on an indefinite strike starting Oct. 27 if their health-insurance demands aren't met.

Fletcher is calling on a General Assembly that was hopelessly deadlocked along party lines when it adjourned in April without passing a state budget. The Democratic-controlled House and Republican-controlled Senate could not agree on Fletcher's proposal to overhaul the state's tax code.

House Speaker Jody Richards said the House would be cooperative in dealing with the issue. He said House Democrats already have "some ideas for a course of action," but he declined to offer specifics. "We think we can do better than the governor's plan, and we're going to try to do that," Richards, D-Bowling Green, said in a phone interview.

Richards said an uptick in state revenue collections should help lawmakers in trying to improve the health care package. He noted that tax collections have exceeded projections in nine out of the last 10 months.

Indeed, lawmakers needed to work together when they return to Frankfort next month to solve the problem facing teachers and public employees, Fletcher said.

The governor has been running state government on a temporary spending plan since July 1. His ability to spend without a legislatively enacted state budget is part of an ongoing court challenge.

However, a Franklin County Circuit Court ruling limited the administration from spending any more money on government programs and services than was previously agreed on by the legislature.

Without a full state budget in place, the legislature itself could still authorize new spending that would have the "full force of law," Senate President David Williams said.

Still, it remained to be seen whether the General Assembly could pass a health insurance plan that would divert a strike, KEA President Frances Steenbergen said. But the organization's call for teachers and state employees across the state to engage in some form of protest this Monday was still in effect, Steenbergen said.

"It is a bipartisan issue," Steenbergen said outside the Capitol. "It crosses both party lines, and we are certainly hopeful that they will come together in a bipartisan fashion to help solve the issue."