Ford Not Interested in VW’s Pennsylvania Plant

Ford Motor Co. told Pennsylvania officials today that it is not interested in buying Volkswagen’s assembly plant in Westmoreland County, the company said.

W.E. Scollard, Ford vice president of manufacturing, said Ford has “sufficient assembly plants to take care of forward-year requirements and that Ford will not purchase” the Volkswagen of America Inc. plant.

“With our approved current planning, we have determined that in view of the expected market conditions over the next few years, together with the world’s overcapacity situation, we will have adequate assembly plants to accommodate our future production requirements,” Scollard said in a letter to state Secretary of Commerce Raymond Christman.

Ford told Volkswagen and the state in late November that it would review its factory needs in light of the West German automaker’s plan to close its Pennsylvania plant this summer.

State officials had hoped that Ford’s strong sales would encourage it to take over the plant.

Meanwhile, a Toyota Motor Corp. spokeswoman said executives of the Japanese carmaker toured the plant late last week as a courtesy to Volkswagen, its partner in a joint venture in West Germany.

“As a result of that relationship, one of their senior executives asked us to take a look at the plant,” Linda Broadus, a spokeswoman for Toyota Motor Manufacturing in Georgetown, Ky., said Tuesday.

Toyota officials toured the plant “only as a courtesy,” she said.

Toyota does not need additional manufacturing capacity in the United States, Broadus said.

After 10 years of production, the Volkswagen plant is scheduled to close July 21 because of poor sales.

A United Auto Workers union official said the visiting Toyota executives were seeking managers for Toyota’s new plant in Kentucky.

“If there was anything else they were interested in while they were here it was not brought to our attention,” said Ken Prevenslik, president of UAW Local 2055.

The Toyota tour fueled speculation that the Japanese automaker might be interested in operating the Volkswagen plant.

Volkswagen is not negotiating with anyone about selling the plant, said plant spokesman Chet Bahn.

The state’s Labor Department, meanwhile, on Monday opened an office at the plant to provide leads on new jobs for those affected by the closing.

About 2,500 are now on the payroll. The center will also serve another 3,000 people who were laid off previously.