Michigan owners of black Dodge Caravans were at highest risk of having their minivans stolen on a Monday in July 2009, according to an annual report released Thursday the Detroit Free Press reported.

The Michigan Auto Theft Prevention Authority said the 2000 Dodge Caravan minivan was the most stolen vehicle among nearly 30,000 stolen statewide in 2009. In fact, five of the 10 most-stolen vehicles statewide last year were Caravans, and nine of the 10 most-stolen vehicles in the state were Chrysler products.

The only other automaker in the top 10 was Ford; the 1997 Taurus was in 10th place.

Given the state’s auto heritage, “the top stolen vehicles in Michigan are always domestic cars,” said Terri Miller, executive director of Livonia-based Help Eliminate Auto Theft, which provides rewards for tips that help bust car thieves and chop shops when people call 800-242-4328 or report online at www.1800242HEAT.com.

Chrysler models from the late 1990s and early 2000s are particularly targeted because they’re known as “easy to steal,” and weren’t built with security equipment such as engine immobilizers, Miller said.

Black was the most popular color of the vehicles stolen last year. Mondays were the busiest days for thefts and July was the busiest month, according to the report.

Nationwide, foreign automakers lead the most-stolen list, according to the National Insurance Crime Bureau, with the 1994 Honda Accord favored most by thieves.

Dan Vartanian, executive director of the prevention authority, said annual vehicle thefts in Michigan fell by 16% in 2009, part of a 59% decline that’s been going on since 1986.

Vehicles are taken most often for joyriding, for parts and for black-market export overseas, he said.

Vartanian said too many motorists make their vehicles easy prey by leaving vehicles parked with windows down or with keys still in the ignition. He said alarms, engine disablers, steering wheel locks and etching vehicle identification numbers, or VINs, onto vehicle windows are the best deterrents.

CHICAGO – Resource Automotive, Inc. has reached an agreement with the Mopar division of Chrysler Group LLC to provide dealers with wholesale mechanical parts training and support.

Resource Automotive will provide Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Ram dealerships with proprietary methodology, market strategy, process, training, outside sales implementation and support aimed at conquesting wholesale mechanical parts sales from the aftermarket parts manufacturers and distributors that currently dominate the segment. The program takes a holistic approach based on extensive market research and Resource Automotive’s subject matter expertise.

“Through this program, dealers will benefit from additional revenue and Mopar will increase its market share,” said John England, president of Resource Automotive Solutions.

“Mopar recognizes the size and scope of this market segment and the great opportunity it represents for Chrysler and our franchised dealers,” said Jim Sassorossi, director of Mopar Sales & Marketing. “Customers prefer original Mopar parts, and now they will be even easier to obtain.”

DETROIT – The Detroit Institute of Arts will serve as the backdrop for Chrysler Group’s “The Fiat Experience” for dealers on Aug. 30.

Chrysler has invited roughly 600 dealers to Detroit to hear the company’s plans for relaunching the Fiat brand in North America – and registration for the event opened today.

The Detroit Institute of Arts makes a dramatic setting for the introduction of a European brand to North America. The museum’s cavernous Rivera Court features a series of murals by Mexican artist Diego Rivera depicting the history of the automobile industry.

Jerry Golinvaux, owner of Roseville Chrysler Jeep Dodge in Roseville, Minn., wasted no time signing up for the Detroit meeting, confirming his attendance via email this morning. He and his son David, the general manager, will attend.

“We very much would like to have it. We think it’s going to be a great vehicle that will augment some of the Chrysler products,” Golinvaux said. “We do understand that eventually, as the sales volumes increase to the levels we would move it into a separate facility. We see the small car industry in the United States increasing in the next few years.”

Golinvaux believes Chrysler will only choose two Fiat dealerships in the Twin Cities and he believes he’s qualified to be one of them.

“We have recently remodeled a facility that meets all of Chrysler’s facility requirements. We have met the Gold Standards level under their new program in the first two quarters. Our dealership is well capitalized. We’re profitable. We exceed all the capital requirements. We exceed the minimum sales responsibilities. We’re pretty excited about it. We think we’re an outstanding candidate for the franchise.”

Chrysler spokesman Ralph Kisiel said the company doesn’t know how many dealers have accepted the invitation to come to Detroit. Visiting dealers will stay in Detroit’s MGM Grand Hotel and Casino. The dealers will be responsible for paying their own expenses.

Only two representatives from each dealership will be allowed to attend: the dealer principal and/or the general manager as listed on the dealer agreement.

An invitation was sent to the dealers on Aug. 9 by Laura Soave, head of Fiat North America, and Peter Grady, Chrysler’s vice president of network development and fleet.

The company will ask interested dealers to present proposals by Sept. 22. The automaker will choose the Fiat franchisees in early October.

The first Fiat to go on sale will be the Fiat 500 minicar, which is scheduled to go into production in Toluca, Mexico during the fourth quarter. Three other 500-based models are scheduled to go on sale by 2013, including a convertible, a sporty Abarth and a four-door hatchback with a raised roof.

“The requirements for Fiat are straightforward: separate sales and display at launch, transitioning to a full dealership facility as the volume grows,” Grady said in a statement.

Dealers may also get the chance to sell Alfa Romeos. The brand is expected to return to the U.S. market in 2012.

Chrysler spokesman Ralph Kisiel declined to discuss future Alfa Romeo products or any Alfa Romeo network, but said the Fiat network “might be expanded as more new products are added to the lineup.”

Chrysler extended the invitations to dealers in 36 states and Puerto Rico, with plans to establish franchises in 119 markets. Chrysler plans to grant about 200 Fiat franchises across those markets.

The company said those markets have “strong small-car registrations and growth potential in the small-car segment over the next five years.”

Kisiel said some non-Chrysler dealers might get an opportunity for Fiat franchises if no Chrysler dealers come up with satisfactory proposals in a given market.

“In that kind of circumstances we might consider a non-Chrysler dealer,” Kisiel said. “We won’t know that until these dealers come to the meeting and learn what they need to know and submit their proposals.”

Chrysler said it will evaluate dealers on a number of criteria, including:

• Sales performance;
• Plans for a separate Fiat facility;
• Comprehensive marketing plans;
• Compliance with dealer standards; and
• Proper capitalization.

Fiat acquired management control of Chrysler last year as part of the U.S. government’s rescue of the automaker. Under the alliance, Fiat is using Chrysler’s sales network to reintroduce the Fiat brand in America. Fiat withdrew from the U.S. market in 1984 and Alfa Romeo left in 1995.

DETROIT – Chrysler Group got a boost this week when Ally Bank, the former GMAC, lowered its credit-score threshold for Chrysler customers to qualify for a vehicle lease from 660 to 620, reported Automotive News.

The move by Ally, Chrysler’s preferred finance provider, broadens the pool of lease customers. A 660 FICO score is on the lower end of prime, while a 620 score is on the upper end of subprime.

In a memo to dealers this week, Chrysler confirmed that Ally had revised its minimum score. Dealers confirmed the 620 figure.

A credit score helps determine what interest rate a bank will charge a customer for a loan. FICO scores range from 300 to 850.

Chrysler’s leasing business collapsed in July 2008 when its former captive finance company, Chrysler Financial, left the leasing business when the resale value of its pickups and SUVs plunged amid soaring gasoline prices.

In 2006, when Chrysler Financial was still its captive finance company, leases accounted for about 22 percent of all Chrysler new-vehicle transactions. After Chrysler Financial left the leasing business, along with most of Chrysler’s lenders, that percentage plummeted to under 1 percent by mid-2009, according to Ralph Kisiel, a Chrysler spokesman.

“Since then, as lenders have resumed leasing, our corporate average has gradually been increasing to where we’re at today, 4 percent to 6 percent,” said Kisiel. “We are now taking a disciplined approach to leasing. We still want to remain competitive by offering a wide variety of financing options.”

Leasing will account for less than 22percent of sales, he said, and Chrysler is “comfortable” with leasing levels at their current level.

David Kelleher, owner of David Doge Chrysler Jeep in Glen Mills, Pa., and a member of Chrysler’s National Dealer Council, said the shift would be a big help to dealers in extending lease offerings to more customers.

Ally declined to comment on the change in Chrysler credit scores.

WASHINGTON – Dealer advocates are questioning whether a federal audit that challenged dealership cuts by General Motors and Chrysler was delayed until after arbitration hearings were completed, Automotive News reported.

The report by the inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program was released Sunday, after the last of more than 100 dealer arbitration hearings was completed Wednesday, July 14. The federal audit began a year ago.

Two dealer advocates said they had had extensive contacts with audit staff, which suggested that the report was on the verge of being released at least six months ago. A third advocate said an auditor told him in May that a draft was being circulated within the administration.

The U.S. Treasury Department’s brief response to the draft was sent Friday, July 16.

“This seems like too much of a coincidence to be a coincidence,” said Tammy Darvish, a co-leader of the Committee to Restore Dealer Rights, a rejected-dealer group.

Dealer lawyers said the 33-page report would have provided ammunition for them to use in seeking reinstatement for rejected dealerships.

The inspector general’s office said today that the timing of its report was a coincidence and that no decision was made to withhold the report until after arbitrations were completed.

“It’s impossible for a deadline to have been breached on this because we didn’t set a deadline for it,” Kris Belisle, a spokeswoman for the inspector general, said in an e-mail. “We will sometimes predict a rough time frame, but always with the understanding that nothing is firm. We did not release this report earlier for the simple reason that it was not yet ready.”

Belisle declined to comment on dealer contacts with audit staff.

The Treasury Department neglected to consider the potential job losses and economic impact when it pushed General Motors and Chrysler LLC to step up plans to close dealerships as part of their government-funded restructurings, a federal watchdog said.

A report by the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program that handled the federal bailouts said the Obama administration’s auto industry task force wasn’t focusing on the savings for the automakers either when it pushed them to shut dealerships faster, reported The Detroit News.

“The fact that Treasury was acting in part as an investor in GM and Chrysler does not insulate Treasury from its responsibility to the broader economy,” said the audit by Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, the $787 billion stimulus program known as TARP.

“Job losses at terminated dealerships were apparently not a substantial factor in the Auto Team’s consideration of the dealership termination issue,” it said.

The Auto Team is part of the Treasury Department, which objected strongly to the report and denied pushing GM and Chrysler to single out dealerships in March of 2009 when it asked them to revise their restructuring plans.

In a letter attached to the inspector’s report, a senior Treasury official said the restructurings required “deep and painful sacrifices” from all stakeholders.

“The Administration’s actions not only avoided a potential catastrophic collapse and brought needed stability to the entire auto industry, but they also saved hundreds of thousands of American jobs, and gave GM and Chrysler a chance to re-emerge as viable, competitive American businesses,” said Herbert Allison, assistant secretary for financial stability at the Treasury Department.

Administration officials said it was easy in hindsight to question whether things could have been done differently. The report “takes the situation dramatically out of context,” one administration official said.

Two of Detroit’s three automakers were on the verge of extinction, the official said. “Over a million jobs were saved by virtue of saving GM and Chrysler.”

While the report focused on job losses at dealerships, more were lost in other parts of the industry, another administration official said. Since June 2007, the number of jobs in auto manufacturing has fallen 30 percent, compared with an 18 percent drop in auto retailing jobs.

In March of 2009, after the Auto Team rejected the restructuring plans submitted by GM and Chrysler along with requests for aid, the companies revised their plans. Chrysler said it would terminate 789 dealerships by June 10, 2009, and GM announced plans to close 1,454 dealerships by October 2010.

The terminations remain an issue, with some dealers still appealing the decisions while automakers find they need some of the stores.

The report also stoked political differences over the government’s role. “This sobering report should serve as a wake-up call as to the implications of politically orchestrated bailouts and how putting decisions about private enterprise in the hands of political appointees and bureaucrats can lead to costly and unintended consequences,” said Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

GM said that it was showing “substantial progress” a year later. “The events depicted in the report have since been overtaken by a new GM and a stronger dealer network to match,” it said.