Hundreds Gather to Meet With Clinton on Economy : Policy: Arkansas summit attracts CEOs and florists. President-elect is expected to hold off on Cabinet appointments during two-day meeting.

Corporate executives, labor leaders, small-business owners and community activists streamed into downtown hotels here Sunday for the two-day economic conference that President-elect Bill Clinton will convene today.

More than 300 representatives from all 50 states are expected for the conference, which has grown in the last month from a relatively small working discussion of economic trends to a mammoth media extravaganza complete with television network anchors and dozens of reporters. Clinton greeted the attendees with a reception Sunday night but otherwise kept a low public profile after making 11 high-ranking appointments in the last few days.

During the two-day conference, Clinton is unlikely to make any further appointments, aides said. But a senior transition official suggested Sunday that selections could resume in a flurry once the conference ends.

Appearing on the NBC news program “Meet the Press,” transition director Warren Christopher said that the new Administration intends to make virtually all of its remaining appointments to the Cabinet before Christmas.

“We hope, and I have a fairly strong conviction, that we will have all the Cabinet members, or virtually all of them, announced by Christmas,” Christopher said.

Sources said appointments could resume Wednesday or Thursday. Those considered most likely for the next round include former Arizona Gov. Bruce Babbitt as Interior secretary, former Colorado Sen. Timothy E. Wirth as energy secretary and former San Antonio Mayor Henry G. Cisneros as housing and urban development secretary. Rep. Mike Espy (D-Miss.) also remains a possibility as agriculture secretary, sources said.

Though Clinton has also promised to appoint a Cabinet “that looks like America” in its diversity, Christopher said: “There are no quotas for any minority or any other group.” In his first 11 selections, Clinton has named one black man, four white women and six white men.

“I would urge you to try to judge the quality of the Cabinet in terms of these diversity matters at the end of the process,” Christopher added.

For the economic conference opening today, Clinton aides have assembled an extraordinarily eclectic guest list, ranging from top executives at Apple Computer Inc., Ford Motor Co. and Xerox Corp. to community activists in Los Angeles and Texas and a florist from Yankton, S.D.

The conference, which will open at 7 a.m. PST with remarks from Clinton, will be broadcast live by C-SPAN and National Public Radio, with portions on CNN.

As media attention has intensified, Clinton aides have worked to downplay expectations about the conference. In particular, they have dampened any expectation that the President-elect would use the meeting to substantially revise the economic plan he laid out during his campaign. Instead they have indicated that he hopes to use the gathering to help hone details of his plan and build support for his overall agenda.

Appearing on the CBS news program “Face the Nation,” Vice President-elect Al Gore said Sunday that the Administration has “very clear ideas about what we want to do, and we’ve enunciated them to the American people.” But, he added, “we want to gather the thinking of men and women who have expertise in all aspects of our economy . . . as we begin to fine-tune the proposals that President-elect Clinton will be presenting after Jan. 20.”