As many as 150 people will be laid off at Chrysler’s Kenosha Engine Plant next month as the company slows production.

A spokesman for the struggling automaker said the company is adjusting production in the face of continued declining sales.

“We are looking to adjust the production schedule. Beginning March 23, both (production) lines will begin operating at reduced rates indefinitely as we continue to monitor the market,” spokesman Max Gates said. “Up to 150 employees will be put on indefinite layoff.”

The Kenosha plant employs about 800 people, about 630 of them represented by the United Auto Workers.

American automakers have been in crisis as plummeting demand has brought auto sales to a 10-year low. Both Chrysler and General Motors have sought government help to stay afloat, borrowing $17.4 billion from the federal government.

On Wednesday, Chrysler Chairman and CEO Bob Nardelli, Vice Chairman Tom LaSorda and Chief Financial Officer Ron Kolka met with Obama administration officials to lobby for more federal help. They huddled behind closed doors with members of the administration’s auto task force, said a Chrysler official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the private nature of the talks.

Auburn Hills, Mich.-based Chrysler has received $4 billion in loans and wants another $5 billion in federal aid and the approval of an alliance with Italian automaker Fiat SpA. The company, believed to be in the weakest financial position of the Detroit Three, said in a Feb. 17 progress report that it needed the loans to stave off a liquidation of the company.

Along with the loans, automakers have shut down plants and eliminated thousands of jobs.

Until now, production at the Kenosha Engine Plant has remained fairly steady. The plant even brought on 120 new temporary workers last year after nearly 280 plant workers took incentive packages to retire. About 70 of those temporary workers were still at work earlier this month. They would likely be the first to lose their jobs in a cutback.

Representatives of the United Auto Workers Local 72 could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

The plant builds six-cylinder engines — running a line producing a 3.5-liter engine and a separate line building a 2.7 liter. The engines are used in cars like the Chrysler 300 and the Dodge Charger.

According to a plant worker, the company plans to shut down the second shift building the 3.5 next month.

Kenosha had been slated for a new engine line, the Phoenix, a next-generation six-cylinder designed to replace those currently produced by the engine plant. But that plan has stalled.

Earlier this month, LaSorda said Phoenix developments are moving forward at plants in Trenton, Mich., and Saltillo, Mexico. Kenosha was to have been the third site.

“We’ve made no decision on the third module yet,” LaSorda said. “Those decisions will be made probably in the next few months, as we look at what’s going on in the marketplace.”

Worker James Earl was angry and frustrated over the changes in the Phoenix program and the ongoing uncertainty at the plant. Earl said he was one of about 40 Chrysler workers from Detroit who relocated to Kenosha because of the promise of the Phoenix.

“They told us it was guaranteed. Now, every time they talk to the company it’s ‘we’ll get back to you in six or eight months.’”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.