NASHVILLE --Tennessee Gov.-elect Bill Haslam said Wednesday he is "really on a mission to find the very best people we can" to serve in his cabinet and administration.
"I learned in business, you see it everywhere, the team with the best players wins," Haslam, a Republican and Knoxville mayor, said during his first trip to the state Capitol since winning Tuesday's election. "It's just true, no matter what the endeavor is."
Haslam, a former president of his family's Pilot Corp. chain of travel centers, met privately for an hour with Gov. Phil Bredesen, a Democrat, to discuss what both men hope will be a smooth hand-off of power when Haslam is inaugurated in January.
At a news conference later, they were greeted by cheering Republican legislators whose strength in the General Assembly increased in part from Haslam's crushing 65 percent to 33 percent victory over Democrat Mike McWherter.
Haslam said he plans to name his transition team in the next several days but offered no clue who will lead it.
Bredesen supported McWherter in the race but warmly congratulated Haslam, adding, "I know you're going to be a great governor."
Haslam said he and Bredesen discussed transition issues and how best "you build that team" of top aides and commissioners who will advise and help run state government. The state's 21 departments carry out functions ranging from providing services for troubled children to building roads.
Haslam said one immediate concern is the state's budget shortfall, noting, "We will obviously dig into that right away."
He said he intends to ask department officials, "If we were starting over again, would we be spending money that way?"
State lawmakers at Bredesen's request already have approved some $1.5 billion in cuts in the last two years. Most will go into effect July 1 as federal stimulus funds run out.
Changing the cuts would require legislative action.
Bredesen said, "I've tried to leave things in as good a shape as I know how," but he acknowledged "there's lots of decisions to be made and lots of tough calls to be made."
Earlier Wednesday, House Democratic Caucus Chairman Mike Turner of Nashville said that while Haslam portrayed himself as a middle-of-the-road executive during the campaign, "Zach Wamp, I think, won the legislature."
Wamp, a Chattanooga congressman who lost in the GOP gubernatorial primary, sometimes displayed a fiery presence on the campaign trail in discussing hard-right stances.
"We've got some really extreme conservative people who just got elected. If they try to move to the extreme right, it will undo a lot of the things we've put in place in the past," Turner said. Pre-kindergarten, he said, "will be gone."
Haslam later said he was pleased with Republicans' "healthy majorities." But he said he doesn't see cutting pre-kindergarten programs.
He noted he was "real clear during the campaign, that while we don't have the funds to expand pre-K, we should leave pre-K where it is right now."
House Republican Caucus Chairman Glen Casada, of Franklin, bristled at Turner's comments, saying that "the people of Tennessee decided they wanted 64 Republicans making laws and running the budget."
As for cuts to pre-kindergarten, Casada said, "Everything is on the table, but I know of no movement at this point to delete pre-k."