Kansas City approves GM contract

UAW Local 31 will resume making the popular Chevy Malibu after voting for new deal.

Sharon Terlep / The Detroit News

General Motors Corp. will resume full production of its popular Chevrolet Malibu sedan today after workers in Kansas City, Kan., voted to return to the line after a 17-day strike that threatened one of the automaker’s most critical vehicles.

Members of United Auto Workers Local 31, representing GM’s Fairfax Assembly plant, on Wednesday ratified a new plant-level labor deal with the automaker, GM spokesman Dan Flores said.

The strike’s conclusion ends months of labor unrest for GM, which cut into supplies of the company’s top selling vehicles at a time when GM could least afford to lose sales.

Malibu sales are up more than 30 percent this year, even as the company’s overall U.S. sales dropped 12 percent.

GM had about four weeks’ supply of the Malibu at the end of April, just before the UAW went on strike, according to trade publication Automotive News. The factory also builds the Saturn Aura sedan.

"We’re certainly happy to be able to resume production of the Malibu and Aura," Flores said.

Even before the walkout, the automaker was struggling to keep dealers stocked with the new Chevy four-door sedan, despite adding Malibu production at its Orion factory.

GM last fall struck a landmark, money-saving national contract with the UAW, but had struggled this year to secure plant-level labor contracts with dozens of union locals across the country.

Where the national deal covers wages, benefits and other major issues, plant contracts govern matters such as job descriptions, working conditions and employee complaints.

The Fairfax strike was GM’s second this year. A Lansing-area plant that builds GM’s popular crossover SUVs — the Buick Enclave, GMC Acadia and Saturn Outlook — was on strike for a month before reaching a labor agreement last week.

The deal at Fairfax gives workers $1,250 bonuses and calls for improvements in workplace conditions, according to a summary of the contract posted on Local 31’s Web site.

Workers at the Lansing-area plant got cash awards up to $2,500 as part of their deal.

Cash bonuses, which have been included in past national contracts between the UAW and Detroit’s Big Three, are unusual as part of local labor deals.

The deal was ratified by 88 percent of skilled trades workers and 85 percent of production workers, according to Local 31’s Web site.