Dim Hope for Bankruptcy Brainstorming : Roundtable: About 100 county residents are gathering today to consider any and all ideas for recovery, but officials expect to hear few realistic solutions.

It’s been billed as a chance for reconciliation. An opportunity for Orange County residents to move past last month’s bitter campaign over the failed sales tax increase and come together to plot a new course for the county’s bankruptcy recovery effort.

But whether a group of 100 concerned citizens meeting today for five short hours will be able to find answers that have eluded the county’s high-priced attorneys and financial consultants for seven months remains doubtful.

It’s downright unlikely, said soon-to-be retired county Chief Executive Officer William J. Popejoy.

“I don’t want to be cynical,” he said, but his experience is that “not a lot is accomplished” during such gatherings.

Orange County Supervisor William G. Steiner, who will join three of his colleagues at the meeting, agreed.

“The bottom line is that we’re going to hear from people that will be approaching a complex problem on simplistic level,” he said bluntly.

Carole Walters, a member of the vocal anti-tax group Committees of Correspondence, was also dubious that any real progress will be made at the meeting.

“I’m afraid it might be a waste of time,” Walters said. “I hope it’s not.”

Still, county officials said the public meeting at Chapman University, dubbed the “Financial Recovery Roundtable” is needed.

“I hope that it will cast some perspective on the problem,” said Board Chairman Gaddi H. Vasquez.

“This is an opportunity for anybody and everybody to put their ideas out on the table,” said county spokeswoman Lynne Fishel. “It’s an opportunity to focus on the financial solutions to the bankruptcy.”

County officials, in fact, are so concerned that the discussion stick to solutions and not erupt into a nasty rag session directed at the Board of Supervisors that they have asked professional mediators to moderate the forum.

The meeting, which will start at 1:30 p.m. at Chapman University’s Argyros Forum, will begin with a presentation from the county’s financial and legal consultants on a new Plan B that was unveiled before supervisors Tuesday.

Following the presentation, the participants will break up into discussion groups and “brainstorm” for solutions, Fishel said.

Supervisor Roger R. Stanton, who called for the open meeting, dismissed criticism that the recovery issue was too complex for people to make meaningful contributions.

“It’s an attempt. What else can we do?” he said. “This is a public meeting that is devoted to one issue, and that’s coming up with some ideas we might be able to explore once the meeting is over. We’re just going to listen.”

Even if no grand ideas come forth from the session--which some top staffers have referred to as the “We Are the World” meeting--Stanton and others said they hope the divisive feelings left over from the unsuccessful Measure R sales tax hike campaign will be buried.

“We hope this begins a reconciliation,” said Walters.

But she said she and other members of the Committees of Correspondence are worried that the county stacked the meeting in favor of tax supporters. As a result, about 10 members of the group plan to attend.

County officials deny that the meeting was stacked in favor of any group and said the meeting is open to anyone who wants to attend.

Stanton said he was encouraged that more than 100 people from many different backgrounds in the community are planning to attend.

“That’s the whole reason for calling this, to see if cooler heads can prevail now that the hype of the campaign is over with,” he said.

Times staff writer Jodi Wilgoren contributed to this report.