O.C. IN BANKRUPTCY : Officials Plan Career Placement Center : Services: With layoffs imminent, employment materials will be consolidated in County Archives room. Librarian expresses hope there will be little need for it.

SANTA ANA —  Orange County officials, anticipating post-New Year’s employee layoffs, plan to open a temporary career placement center Tuesday in the Old County Courthouse.

“Given so much is unknown about this process . . . we’re going to have to be real flexible,” said John Adams, the county librarian. “Hopefully there will be so little need for it that we can close it up real quick.”

Adams said the idea for an “outplacement” center was hatched by his department, which has not been informed if it will need to make cuts, and the county’s Human Resource Department last Friday, after the announcement that about $40 million--and a number of jobs--would be sliced from the county’s budget in the first round of budget cuts.

Career placement materials from the county’s branch libraries--as well as the librarians who are familiar with them--will be consolidated in the County Archives, in Room 108 in the basement of the red-brick former courthouse at 211 W. Santa Ana Blvd., Adams said.

The center also will include local newspaper want ads, the National Employment Weekly distributed by the Wall Street Journal and career planning books. A computer will be available for the preparation of resumes.

County department heads have been asked to report by Jan. 10 to the Board of Supervisors on proposed cutbacks in their operations.

Adams said he hopes to have the center running Tuesday, although he does not know when decisions on layoffs will come.

The center will be open on weekdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

“We’ll probably be ready before we’re needed,” said Adams, who hopes to keep the center open as long as necessary.