Gm Plant

A HUGE "millennium clock" that measured each passing day of the 20th century was moved from Annapolis' historic State House months ago because it was considered too garish. But Gov. Parris N. Glendening and the state of Maryland can't so easily avoid another ominous countdown that began last July.That is the one set by John F. Smith Jr., chief executive officer of General Motors Corp., when he told the governor and others that the automaker's plant on Broening Highway in east Baltimore would remain open for at least two more years.

State and city officials face an "uphill walk" if they are to keep the General Motors assembly plant in Baltimore operating beyond 2000, according to one participant in a meeting with officials from the automaker yesterday.Top executives of GM's Truck Group met for 90 minutes with city, state and federal officials -- including Gov. Parris N. Glendening, Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke, U.S. Sens. Barbara A. Mikulski and Paul S. Sarbanes, and U.S. Reps. Benjamin L. Cardin and Elijah E. Cummings -- to discuss the future of the automaker's 63-year-old plant, the city's largest manufacturing employer with 3,200 workers.

RECENT layoffs at the General Motors Corp. plant on Broening Highway have again raised questions about the future of the region's economy, particularly its manufacturing base. Because of the United Auto Workers union strikes at GM parts plants in Flint, Mich., the Baltimore plant doesn't have enough parts to continue production. Some 3,000 GM employees here have been forced to sign up for unemployment benefits.The strike is causing massive pain as workers lose between $500 and $1,000 a week in income -- roughly $2 million per week in lost earnings.

General Motors Corp. closed its van assembly plant in Baltimore yesterday and said it will remain shut until Tuesday because of slow vehicle sales.The shutdown, the second this year and the third in eight months, idled 3,100 workers at the city's largest manufacturing employer and forced layoffs or other production adjustments at area companies producing parts for the GM vans.Kerry Christopher, a spokesman for GM's Truck Group in Pontiac, Mich., which has jurisdiction over the Baltimore plant, said the closing was done to "adjust inventory," an industry term that refers to declining sales.

General Motors Corp., which has been cutting back on production at its Baltimore van plant this year, has shifted gears and scheduled employees to work overtime, a company spokesman said yesterday.The plant will operate two full shifts today and a half-hour overtime on each daily shift next week until the plant closes on Wednesday for the holiday season."The increased work is to make up for some lost production during the work stoppage earlier this year," said Joseph Jacuzzi, a spokesman for GM's Truck Group in Pontiac, Mich.

The assembly line at General Motor Corp.'s sprawling assembly plant in Southeast Baltimore will spring to life tomorrow as workers begin cranking out the first of the 1998 models of the Chevrolet Astro and GMC Safari vans.It will mark the plant's 14th year of van production and the 62nd year of operation for the aging factory that opened in 1935 as a builder of Chevrolet Deluxe sedans.It's unclear how much longer GM's relationship with Baltimore will last. But there are new signs that the city's largest manufacturing employer, with 3,200 workers, could be a part of the GM family for a long time.

General Motors Corp. has increased production by as much as 45 percent at its van plant in Southeast Baltimore to meet continuing strong demand for the 11-year-old vehicle.Workers at the sprawling plant are working overtime -- sometimes up to 18 extra hours a week -- to produce up to 5,800 Chevrolet Astros and GMC Safari vans a week, up from about 4,000.The production increase kicked in when the workers returned to their jobs on March 25, after an 18-day strike by United Auto Workers in Dayton, Ohio, halted all of GM's vehicle production in the United States and Canada.

The United Auto Workers strike against two General Motors Corp. brake plants in Dayton, Ohio, entered its 12th day today with a slight hint that a breakthrough could be in the works."

Eleven days after settling a strike at two brakes plants that had halted all its vehicle production in the United States and Canada, General Motors Corp. has been notified that workers at two suspension parts plants in Kettering, Ohio, may walk off the job next week.The International Union of Electronics Workers, which represents 2,700 employees at the two GM Delphi Chassis plants, has delivered a letter to GM authorizing a strike to begin at 12: 01 a.m. April 11.The issues are reported to be similar to those that led to the 18-day strike at the Delphi Chassis brakes plants in Dayton, Ohio, last month -- GM's purchase of parts from outside suppliers, health and safety.

The Chevrolet Astro and GMC Safari vans made here roll into their 12th model year today amid signs that the vehicles are beginning to lose some of their consumer appeal.Production at the Southeast Baltimore plant is off 15 percent this year, prompting some industry representatives to wonder if the Astro and Safari are beginning to suffer from the lack of a major overhaul since they were introduced in 1984.The vans' old design is also being blamed for the Baltimore plant's low productivity rating -- 27th among the 36 truck plants in the United States, Canada and Mexico.

The General Motors transmission plant in White Marsh was one of several plants chosen by the federal government Wednesday to receive part of $2.4 billion in stimulus grants to be used to develop batteries and other parts for electric cars. The plant, along with a GM plant in Wixom, Mich., will share in $105 million to develop a rear-wheel-drive electric system. The grants, which will fund 48 projects, come from the $800 billion economic stimulus bill Congress passed earlier this year to help create jobs and move the country out of the recession.

They were still buying General Motors shares on Thursday, as if the company deserved its space in the Dow Jones Industrial Average. GM stock dipped 3 cents to $1.12 on Thursday after rising more than a dime earlier. If this column were owned by the financial wires, it would assign glib and dubious causes to GM's blip. Europe eyes new GM bailouts! A few creditors agreed to a revised restructuring plan! There are no reasons to buy GM stock, however, except nostalgia and the cool picture of cars and smokestacks on the certificate.

General Motors Corp. said yesterday that it will temporarily close 20 factories across North America and sharply reduce its vehicle production as it tries to adjust to weaker automobile demand. GM said it will cut 250,000 vehicles from its production schedule for the first quarter of 2009, including the cut of 60,000 vehicles announced last week. Normal production would be about 750,000 cars and trucks for the quarter, spokesman Tony Sapienza said. Many plants will be shut down for the whole month of January, he said, and all told, the factories will be closed for 30 percent of the quarter.

More than half of the hourly workers at GM Powertrain's Baltimore Transmission plant will be temporarily furloughed due to a strike at a separate parts supplier that has forced General Motors Corp. to cut production at 19 of its plants, the company said yesterday. The walkout at Detroit-based American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings Inc. means GM doesn't have axles for certain pickup trucks and SUVs. GM spun off American Axle in 1994 and makes up 80 percent of its business. About 27,000 GM workers nationwide are affected by the temporary production cuts.

Herman Trafton is napping in the van's back seat. Wanda Hopkins is wolfing down a quick McDonald's lunch one row up. Adam Falkowski is complaining about the union, again. And near the front, Delaney Bert is watching Little Man on the drop-down TV screen. They are members of a vanishing tribe, the well-paid manufacturing worker. They joined the factory right out of high school, some of them, and over the decades have accrued a good salary and benefits. And they are doing whatever it takes - even if it means commuting 120 miles round trip to Delaware - to hold on to jobs that will soon be gone.

Calling it the "old GM plant" is a reminder of bad times, so the developer building a huge industrial park on Broening Highway wants residents and groups in East Baltimore and Dundalk to supply a name befitting the site's brighter future. John H. Macsherry Jr., vice president of development and leasing at Duke Realty Corp., which bought the property a year ago, hopes the park's name will become as well-known as Camden Yards - even without baseball. "This site has a lot of history in this community," Macsherry said.

For the past two months, Chip Long pondered what it would be like to have a $70,000 check in his pocket. That is what his employer, General Motors Corp., is willing to pay him to leave the company. The trade-off: give up health insurance and other benefits - and any chance for ever again working for the automaker. It might seem an easy choice for a skilled millwright who likely would soon find another job. But for Long, 43, the chance of snagging a coveted spot at GM's Allison Transmission plant in White Marsh is a powerful magnet.

NATIONAL Medicare denies supplies The new Medicare drug program is denying supplies that seriously ill patients need to administer intravenous antibiotics and other medications at home. Some patients are being referred to nursing homes and others have had to go into the hospital. Although no national estimates are available, the number of patients affected -- including some with life-threatening diseases such as cancer and multiple sclerosis -- could run into the thousands. pg 3a WORLD Hamas gains control The overwhelming victory in Palestinian elections by the radical Islamic group Hamas ushered in an era of uncertainty and anxiety yesterday, as Palestinians and Israelis wondered what kind of government to expect from an organization best known for suicide attacks, not politics.

General Motors, which closed its 70-year-old Baltimore manufacturing plant in May, expects to fast-track the sale of the 185-acre industrial property on the city's eastern fringe. Dozens of developers have expressed interest or toured the Broening Highway plant, and real estate sources expect at least a dozen groups to submit proposals to GM by Monday, a deadline set by the auto manufacturer. "This piece of property has gotten one of the highest levels of interest, from a developer standpoint, of any property we've put on the market recently," said John McDonald, a GM spokesman.

General Motors' Broening Highway assembly plant, one of the city's last remaining symbols of an industrial lifestyle that dominated the Baltimore economy for generations, will make its final van May 13, company and union officials said yesterday. The plant's 1,100 workers learned of the official closing date yesterday when the assembly line shut down briefly at 7:30 a.m. and a recorded message from plant manager Timothy E. Stansbury was broadcast over television screens throughout the factory.