Recent changes in the leadership of Utah’s 2034 Winter Games that saw the departure of the only high-ranking Olympian at the organizing committee aren’t a worry for U.S. Olympic and Paralympic officials.
“We don’t have any concerns with the evolution of what’s happening in Utah,” U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee CEO Sarah Hirshland told reporters Wednesday about the changes announced in mid-June.
Four-time Olympic speedskater Catherine Raney Norman, chair of the bid that brought a second Winter Games to Utah, told the Deseret News she left after organizers ended her role as vice president of development and athlete relations to move in “a different direction.”
Raney Norman has since been named chief development officer of The USA Hockey Foundation.
The Organizing Committee for the 2034 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games created a new position, vice president of impact, engagement and enterprise operations, and hired Abby Osborne, the chief of staff to Utah House Speaker Mike Schultz, R-Hooper.
Osborne, who is giving up her membership on the organizing committee board, is set to start her new job Aug. 1. Organizers also put Olympic speedskater Julie Letai, in a new post, athlete experience coordinator.
Confidence that Utah’s Olympic organizers to stay engaged with athletes
Changes in the Utah 2034 leadership should be expected, Hirshland said.
“I think every organizing committee will go through significant evolutions in their respective teams, their leadership structure and all of this is very natural evolution,” the CEO said at a news conference following Tuesday’s USOPC board meeting.
She added she is “looking forward to the continued development and frankly expansion of the Utah organizing committee team.”
Asked about organizers no longer having an Olympian as a vice president, Hirshland said she is “quite confident that they continue to be and will continue to be very, very engaged with the Olympic and Paralympic athletes directly and the community they’re in.”
So, she said, “we have no concerns.”
The USOPC is “super excited that Cat Raney Norman is going to be leading fundraising for USA Hockey. Cat is a stalwart in the movement and is someone who always raises her hand and says, ‘Put me in, coach, I’m ready to go run through walls for the movement,’” Hirshland said.
“She’s going to be an incredible addition to the USA Hockey team and I know they’re very excited to have her and we’re thrilled to see her in that role,” she said. Raney Norman led the “Podium34″ effort that raised more than $250 million from Utah donors for the 2034 Games.