By DON SHILLING

By DON SHILLING
VINDICATOR BUSINESS EDITOR
LORDSTOWN -- The Chevrolet Cobalt will have another little sister.
General Motors announced Monday that it will build a new model, the Pontiac G5, at its Lordstown complex.
"This is great news for Lordstown," said Frank Perretta, sales manager at Youngstown Buick Pontiac GMC in Boardman.
The plant is best known for producing the Cobalt, but it also makes other vehicles that are based on the Cobalt design. The Pontiac Pursuit is sold in Canada, and the Pontiac G4 is built for the Mexican market.
The new model will be similar to the Pursuit but will be sold only in the United States.
Pontiac isn't releasing design details on the Pursuit, other than saying only a two-door coupe will be sold in the United States and there will be differences between the Canadian and U.S. models.
Jim Graham, president of United Auto Workers Local 1112, said the new model will have a different interior from the Pursuit.
Production of the G5 is expected to begin in June or July, with the cars scheduled to appear in showrooms this fall, he said.
GM had been studying adding another car -- the Saturn Ion -- to Lordstown, but that appears unlikely now, Graham said. GM has indicated it will not build a redesigned Ion as it was considering, he said.
The G5, though, is expected to add 25,000 to 30,000 cars to the plant's production each year, he said. The Lordstown plant, which employs more than 5,000, produced 301,000 cars in 2005.
No new employees will be added for the G5, although workers may have some additional overtime this summer as production begins, Graham said.
Another factor
Plant and union officials had been trying to land another vehicle so that they could maintain production levels if Cobalt sales slow.
Last year, GM sold 212,700 Cobalts in the United States, 26,400 Cobalts in Canada and 16,300 Pursuits in Canada.
Before the Cobalt was introduced, the Lordstown plant produced the Chevrolet Cavalier and its twin, the Pontiac Sunfire.
Jim Hopson, a Pontiac spokesman, said GM didn't create a Pontiac version of the Cobalt when it was introduced in 2004 because Pontiac was in the midst of creating a sales strategy for its Pontiac-Buick-GMC dealers.
GM views these brands as a single "sales channel" and doesn't want them to have vehicles that overlap, he said.
Now that GM has had time to review the lineups of the three brands, it decided it needed an entry-level vehicle for Pontiac-Buick-GMC dealers, he said.
Perrotta, of Youngstown Buick Pontiac GMC, said Pontiac dealers have been asking for an entry-level car for some time.
Another recently introduced car, the Pontiac G6, has a sticker price starting at $16,900, but the G5 is supposed to be about $15,000, he said.
shilling@vindy.com