United Workers Say They Won’t Control Board : Airlines: Unions would get three board seats and reportedly want former Chrysler executive Gerald Greenwald as chairman.

United Airlines pilots and machinists on Tuesday said they will get representation on, but not control of, the company’s board of directors if they succeed in buying a majority stake in the carrier.

However, the unions reportedly plan to pick former Chrysler Corp. executive Gerald Greenwald to replace Stephen Wolf as chairman of a reorganized UAL Corp., the airline’s corporate parent.

Greenwald, 58, who had been widely expected to succeed Lee A. Iacocca at Chrysler’s helm, left the auto maker three years ago to head a previous union attempt to take over United, which ultimately failed.

The unions’ offer, which has been roughly valued at about $5 billion, is scheduled to be reviewed today by UAL’s board of directors. The UAL board last week asked its financial advisers to work out some unspecified issues with the employees and prepare a detailed financial plan to be presented to the directors.

The plan would require about 60,000 United employees to make wage and benefit concessions valued by the unions at $5.15 billion over six years in exchange for 53% ownership in UAL. Employee ownership could rise to 63% if the stock performed well.

As part of the deal, the unions would allow the company to form a low-cost subsidiary to compete effectively against low-fare carriers, such as Southwest Airlines. Roger Hall, head of United’s members of the Air Line Pilots Assn., said 15% to 20% of the airline’s pilots will be working for a proposed low-cost “airline within an airline.”

On Tuesday, union officials discussed their proposed buyout with Labor Secretary Robert Reich and Transportation Secretary Federico Pena. The Clinton Administration, while officially neutral, had encouraging words for the buyout, which would make United the nation’s largest company owned primarily by employees.

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“United Airlines and the unions . . . are to be commended for the spirit of cooperation they are exhibiting,” Reich and Pena said in a joint statement. “We applaud the initiative.”

But Wall Street has remained lukewarm to the proposal. On the New York Stock Exchange, UAL stock rose 87.5 cents on Tuesday to close at $144.25 a share. United’s unions and management have valued the buyout deal at $173 per share.

The buyout plan was negotiated by the Air Line Pilots Assn. and the International Assn. of Machinists. The two unions will choose three of the 12 members of the new board under the plan. Five directors will be selected by shareholders. The remaining four directors will be independent.

So far, the Assn. of Flight Attendants, which represents 18,000 United employees, has yet to decide whether to join the deal. A spokeswoman for the flight attendants union said the group is still studying the proposal.

The pilots and machinists said the deal could proceed without participation by United’s flight attendants. The flight attendants dropped out of talks with United on Sept. 30 to protest the opening of an attendants base in Taiwan, which could trim 60 flight attendant jobs.