Ford is offering a second round of buyouts to 54,000 UAW workers, including about 3,000 at its two local plants, to make room for flow-back workers.

The company announced details of the packages Friday.

Bill Russo, Ford's director of manufacturing, said the company and the UAW worked together to complete "these generous offerings" in an effort to help the business return to profitability by 2009.

Ford would like it the flow-back number to reach at least 5,200. The employees would come from its Automotive Components Holdings LLC subsidiary.

"If we exceed that, we can allow closure of the ACH by the end of the year," Russo said, adding that the ACH's 13,000 employees also are being offered the 10 buyout packages, and the 5,200 number entails ACH employees who are eligible for either flow-back or a buyout.

Once slots vacated by Ford workers are filled by ACH employees, Ford will be able to fill remaining positions with lower-tiered wage employees, Russo said.

Ford won't try to estimate how many of its workers will opt to leave the company, Russo said.

"We learned last time trying to do a forecast is very difficult," he said. "Reasons tend to be personal. ... We had a very ineffective crystal ball."

Bill Jackson, president of UAW Local 588 at the Ford Chicago Heights Stamping Plant, said Friday he had no specifics on how many of his members would accept one of the 10 packages, ranging from special retirement incentives to educational opportunity programs to two entrepreneurial special programs added to entice more buyouts

Those programs are being offered to active employees with between one and 25 years of seniority who can agree to voluntarily terminate in exchange for a lump sum payment, along with either five years of continuation of existing health care benefits, or seven years of catastrophic health care coverage.

"From my encounters on the plant floor, I'd say there are a small number interested," Jackson said.

Most of those who wanted to leave left last year through the initial buyout offered through Ford's 2006 Way Forward restructuring plan, Jackson said. About 500 of the plant's UAW workers accepted that buyout offer, reducing the number of the facility's hourly workers to about 875, Jackson said.

Ford Motor Co. is determining the ideal staffing level for each of its plants, Jackson said. Russo said staffing levels relate to product cycle plans and change with demand and work load.

"Each plant will have an operating number they'll work to," Jackson said. "Everyone who will want a buyout will be able to get it."

The company and international UAW officials are having meetings to discuss terms of the buyout packages with Local 588 members at 8 a.m., 1 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. Wednesday. Members can sign up for the packages between Tuesday and March 18. There is a 90-day exit period between April 1 and July.

Buyout decisions are irrevocable and Ford's goal is to "right size the business for today's needs," which will eliminating the need for any additional buyouts, Russo said,

"It's very important that employees very carefully consider their options," he said.