12 33. Furthermore, they claim that the remedies that the State had argued they should seek are not effective since the Municipalities Act clearly states that municipal assets are not subject to seizure. Therefore, they say, until the mayoral decree is issued ordering payment, the persons adversely affected are unable to pursue other avenues to secure their payment in keeping with the judicial decisions. 34. With respect to the suit filed by the Municipality of Chañaral against the Chilean Treasury, which was brought in 2000 and, as of the date of the hearing before the Commission, was reportedly pending before the Supreme Court of Chile, the petitioners explained that it was a proceeding in which the municipality claimed that the Treasury should provide the funds with which to pay the sums ordered by the Court of Appeals. They added that it was not an effective domestic remedy inasmuch as the alleged victims were not parties in the suit; the parties in the suit were the Treasury and the Municipality of Chañaral. In a communication of December 29, 2008, the petitioners informed the Commission that on June 12, 2008, the Supreme Court had dismissed the suit, bringing the proceedings to an end. In that same connection, the Supreme Court rejected the claim of the Municipality of Cauquenes which sought to obtain financing from the Treasury to pay the obligations imposed by the court ruling. 35. The Commission notes that in a bid to secure payment of their welfare entitlements, the alleged victims, all of them teachers in the municipalities of Chañaral, Chanco, Pelluhue, Parral, Vallenar, and Cauquenes, filed suit against the municipalities with the appropriate labor tribunals and obtained a final decision in their favor. Furthermore, the information presented to the Commission shows that in all cases a proceeding for payment was initiated, that the specific amounts of the debts have already been approved by the relevant tribunals, and that, as of this writing, the alleged victims have signed different agreements with the municipalities. In spite of that, only in the case of two municipalities have they been paid certain amounts, which they class as very inferior and partial. 36. Accordingly, the Commission finds that the petitioners have taken their case to the competent judicial organs in the domestic jurisdiction, invoked the regular remedies envisaged under Chilean law designed to redress the abridged rights of the alleged victims and, therefore, that the State had full knowledge of the claims that gave rise to this petition and that the remedies mentioned by the latter are of a special nature, whose exhaustion the Commission does not require. 37. The Commission notes that, according to the competent judicial authorities, the final judgments in favor of the alleged victims were issued between 1993 and 1997 and that, as of this writing, they have not been carried. Therefore, the exception contained in Article 46(2)(c) is applicable. 2. Time limit for lodging the petition 38. Under Article 46(1) of the Convention, for a petition to be admitted it must be filed within the stipulated period, that is, six months from the date on which the party alleging violation of their rights was notified of the final judgment adopted at the national level. In the complaint under review the IACHR has determined that the exceptions to the rule of exhaustion of domestic remedies pursuant to Article 46(2)(c) of the American Convention are applicable. In this regard, Article 32 of the Commission’s Rules of Procedure states that when the exceptions to the rule requiring prior exhaustion of domestic remedies apply, the petition is to be presented within what the Commission deems to be a reasonable period. The Commission must therefore consider the date on which the alleged violation of rights occurred and the circumstances of each case.