SANTA ANA : ‘Cheers’ Mailman Honors Workers

Actor John Ratzenberger, who played Cliff Clavin the mail carrier on “Cheers,” was in Orange County on Friday to honor a group of developmentally disabled workers at Ingram Micro Inc.

Noting that his father was a truck driver and his mother a factory worker, Ratzenberger presented achievement awards to 10 Ingram employees who were trained to operate a special packaging machine that uses recycled paper.

“I played Cliff, and Cliff’s a working guy just like you are,” he told the employees, who range in age from 20 to 40. “Sometimes the media makes light of the working person, the person who works with their hands, and it’s suicidal for this country.”

The employees were trained by Westview Vocational Services of Anaheim, a job placement and educational facility for people with special needs, such as adults with physical or developmental disabilities or mental illnesses.

The minimum-wage employees will operate machinery in Ingram’s warehouse, which has suffered from poor work habits and high employee turnover, company officials said.

“With this program and the performance of these people, we have been able to take a piece of our company that had traditionally been a problem and turn it into a real source of pride,” said David R. Dukes, Ingram’s co-chairman of the board. “This is not a charitable act. Ingram Micro is really the one benefiting.”

Ingram, a wholesale distributor of microcomputer products with annual sales of $2.7 billion, currently employs nearly 50 disabled employees in its 300-person Santa Ana distribution facility.

“We need to get a message to corporate America that there are a lot of people willing to work but no one asks them,” Ratzenberger said. “We have a lot of social problems in the country and people are looking to corporate America to solve them.”

Ratzenberger recently sold his Kent, Wash.-based packaging company, Eco-Pak Industries to Ranpak Corp. of Concord Township, Ohio, which makes the special recycling packaging machine operated by the Ingram workers.