NASHVILLE (AP) - Three outsourcing consultants are being paid $612,000 annually by the state even as Republican Gov. Bill Haslam insists that no decision has been made about privatization efforts.

The top paid contractor is Mike Ledyard, who gives his title as director of facilities management outsourcing. He is paid $222 an hour for an average of four full days a week, or about $369,000 per year.

Ledyard's annual income is over $100,000 more than 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.

The other two consultants, Kate Vitasek and Bob Balzar, are paid $191 and $165 per hour.