COUNTYWIDE : Postal Service Aids Olympians’ Families

For 14 years, Jerris Wendland has been watching her son, Scott, train as a figure-skater. She has been there at every championship, for every victory.

Now, Scott Wendland, 26, has a chance at an Olympic gold medal. And, with the help of the U.S. Postal Service, his mother has a chance to witness it.

The Postal Service will provide relatives of three local Olympians with hotel accommodations, event tickets and land transportation for the 16th Winter Olympics in Albertville, France, this month.

Hector G. Godinez, division general manager at the Postal Service’s Santa Ana office, said a promotion package called “Celebrate the Dream” allows two family members from each of 80 families nationwide--the number that signed up--to travel overseas.

“We can’t say how much we appreciate what they’re doing for us,” said Wendland, of Laguna Hills, who works for the Ice Capades Chalet in Costa Mesa. “It has made it so much easier for us.”

The Postal Service, a principal sponsor of the Olympic games, will defray costs for the program with Olympic stamp sales, Godinez said.

In exchange for free room and board, athletes will help promote the commemorative stamps and grant the Postal Service the right to use the team’s names and official logos in its advertising.

Santa Ana postal workers gave family members a send-off at a ceremony Monday. A large card with the signatures of local workers was also displayed.

Among the relatives present were Wendland of Costa Mesa and Diane Hall of Lake Forest, aunt of speed skater Nicole Ziegelmeyer. Diane Warner, mother of Bonny Warner, a member of the national luge team, was unable to attend.

Hall, a Western Dental employee, said she was thrilled when the Postal Service decided to launch the program.

‘We would never have been able to go,” said Hall, who will accompany Ziegelmeyer’s mother. “It is the most exciting thing that has happened to this family.”

Hall and her sister will leave for Albertville on Feb. 15. Wendland and her daughter Kristi leave on Wednesday.

The ceremony’s most emotional moment came when former Olympic Gold Medalist Shirley Babashoff told the crowd how her family pulled her through her 11-year career even when she was at her lowest points.

A winner of eight Olympic medals who set several world records during her 11-year swimming career, Babashoff is now a letter carrier for the Postal Service in Huntington Beach and one of the promoters of “Celebrate the Dream.”

Although she has lived out of the limelight for more than a decade, Babashoff vividly remembers the spirit of the competition and the key support of her parents.

“I wanted to help, to share my experiences, what I’ve gone through,” Babashoff said.

If the Winter Games stamps are a sales success, postal administrators say they may have a “Celebrate the Dream” package for the Summer Games.