GM to Lay Off 400 at Its Plant in Van Nuys

About 400 workers at General Motors’ Van Nuys assembly plant will be laid off indefinitely in August because GM plans to cut the plant’s daily production by 23%, a GM spokesman said Thursday.

GM builds the Chevrolet Camaro and Pontiac Firebird at the plant, which employs about 3,800 hourly workers overall.

Between June 30 and Aug. 7, the plant will be shut down for a normal retooling to prepare for production of the 1990 models. But when work resumes, the plant’s output will be cut to 48 cars an hour from 62 because of weakening sales of the models, said Darwin E. Allen, a GM spokesman in Warren, Mich.

“We’re adjusting the line rate to reflect sales in the marketplace,” he said.

At the end of March, GM had a 96-day supply of Camaros and an 84-day supply of Firebirds--both well above the 60-day supply that auto makers consider a comfortable inventory. Speculation surfaced two months ago that GM would lay off at least 400 workers because of the oversupply.

Rebates and other incentives in recent weeks have since pared the cars’ inventories to about 60 to 65 days, but GM still decided to cut production.