NASHVILLE — Three part-time consultants in a new state office that’s heavily focused on outsourcing some government services stand to be paid at a combined annual rate of $612,000 even as Republican Gov. Bill Haslam insists no decision has been made about whether to privatize anything.
The top paid contractor is Mike Ledyard, who gives his title as director of facilities management outsourcing. He receives $222 an hour for an average of four full days a week, which would come to about $369,000 over the course of a year.
Ledyard’s projected annual income surpasses by more than $100,000 the salary of the top earning state employee in Tennessee government, Chief Investment Officer George Brakebill in the Treasury Department. Haslam declines to take his own salary of about $185,000.
As for the two other consultants, outsourcing adviser Kate Vitasek is paid $191 an hour to work two days a month, and energy cost reduction specialist Bob Balzar earns $165 per hour for three days a week. The hours are described as averages and there are no guarantees the consultants will work a full year, as they can be dropped at any time by the state. The jobs don’t include health benefits.
The contractors work in the new offices for Strategies for Efficiency in Real Estate Management, or SEREM.