Topeka ? Key Kansas legislators hope for a quick agreement between House and Senate negotiators on pension legislation, even though plans from the two chambers take dramatically different approaches to tackling the long-term funding problems faced by the retirement system for teachers and government workers.

The House plan, approved on a 68-54 vote Monday, creates a new 401(k)-style plan, requires teachers and government workers hired after June 30, 2013, to participate and cuts the future benefits of other public employees who don’t join.

The Senate’s legislation, approved 35-4 last week, is more cautious about overhauling the Kansas Public Employees Retirement System and sets up a study commission to consider big changes. It would require public employees to pay a higher percentage of their salaries into KPERS but give most a modest increase in their benefits.

Both bills boost the state’s annual contribution to KPERS, starting July 1, 2013. But the Senate’s bill calls for a $23 million increase, the most aggressive proposed so far, while the House plan raises the contribution by $10 million annually, also starting in 2013.

Senate leaders are wary of moving too quickly toward a 401(k)-style plan for public employees that ties retirement benefits on investment earnings, unlike traditional KPERS plans that guarantee benefits up front, based on salary and years of experience. In turn, House Speaker Mike O’Neal, a Hutchinson Republican, has questioned the need for a study commission, suggesting it only delays needed changes.

The state pension system faces a projected $7.7 billion shortfall between its anticipated long-term revenues and the benefits it has promised public employees over the next few decades. A national report said last year that KPERS’ assets would cover only 59 percent of its long-term liabilities, giving Kansas the second-lowest percentage of any U.S. state, behind only Illinois.

Despite the two chambers’ differences, Gov. Sam Brownback said he’s pleased with legislators’ work. The Republican governor has identified the pension system’s long-term funding gap as one of the state’s most pressing financial problems.

“I’m encouraged that they are discussing and dealing with KPERS,” Brownback said during a news conference Monday. “Let’s see what comes out in a final bill, but this is a problem we need to get a solution to, and I’m delighted to see the progress being made.”

The Senate’s more cautious approach has bipartisan support, and public employee groups find it reasonable. It’s also in keeping with most officials’ long-standing belief that Kansas law and past court decisions limit how far the state can go in forcing concessions out of workers.

The House plan goes against that conventional wisdom. It has riled public employee groups, which are resisting attempts to cut future benefits and see 401(k)-style plans as attacks on the security of workers’ retirement benefits. None of the chamber’s Democrats supported it.

But Rep. Mitch Holmes, a St. John Republican and chairman of the House Pensions and Benefits Committee, is optimistic that negotiators can agree by the end of the week on the final version of a bill, so the two chambers can take up-or-down votes.

“I look forward to getting with the Senate and looking for a solution that works for everybody,” he said. “I don’t know why we couldn’t get something.”

Brownback said he favors a move toward a 401(k)-style plan or a hybrid system in which workers have a choice of such a plan or a traditional one. But he also told reporters that he’ll accept a study commission — if there’s a “trigger” to make sure that the changes it proposes are considered before the state increases its annual contribution to KPERS.

“These are both serious attempts to deal with a huge problem that we have,” he said of the two chambers’ bills. “And I think they’re both legitimate.”

And while Senate President Steve Morris, a Hugoton Republican who drafted his chamber’s plan, has misgivings about a move toward a 401(k)-style plan, he’s not ruling it out as something for his proposed study commission to review.

Morris stresses that the study commission would have private-sector experts among its members. It would make its recommendations by December, and legislators would have until June 2012 to vote on them.

“There are a lot of implications with what the House has done,” Morris said. “That’s not to say we may not to want to do something like that in the future, but we need the expertise from that study commission.”