‘It's really a great thing’: In addition to turkey and fixin's, feast provides conversation, companionship, fun for kids
Organizers of Delta Junction’s annual community Thanksgiving dinner have been working for months to prepare for Thursday’s big get-together. The celebration comes with an additional challenge: they’re anticipating a bigger turnout this year.
Shayna Bialik has been organizing the dinner for three years now. She and her platoon of volunteers started working on this year’s community Thanksgiving dinner when they were cleaning up after last year’s big feed.
“ We pack everything up,” she said, “and I do an inventory and it's like, OK, this next year I have this list on this box. And this is what we need to buy. So we buy that stuff right away, so then it's not forgotten for the next year!”
Bialik heads up a team of dozens of community members who kick into high gear the month before the big feed.
“ It's a big community thing,” she said. “It's really a great thing. I have a list of people that I can count on, so I always contact them well in advance. And, like, ‘Can you like this one business? Can you still do the turkeys this year? And this other nonprofit, hey, can you do the hams this year again?’ ”
The volunteers hit up local businesses, organizations and community members for donations to support the event that’s been held for about 20 years now. That support also comes in the form of bringing side dishes or supplies or help with set up, serving and takedown. Bialik said Some of that work is done in exchange for a seat at the table and some conversation.
“ So, like, when you come and you volunteer, you give kitchen work for an hour and then you go eat with people and talk to people for an hour.”
She says many people come for companionship, including elderly folks whose kids have grown up and moved away. Or military servicemembers from Fort Greely.
“We do get a lot of families,” Bialik said, “like military families or families that are here, like teachers, families that don't have any others.”
That’s why Chris Tenpas and his family began coming to the dinner three years ago. He’s a junior high school math and science teacher.
“It's nice because we don't have family that's near here,” he said. “We're, you know, we're alone in Alaska. So, that’s one nice thing. But it’s also a really nice place for the community to gather.”
Tenpas thinks he’ll see more civilian employees from Greely this year, because they may still be trying to catch up after getting late paychecks due to the recent federal shutdown.
“ I wouldn't be shocked to find out that the shutdown put people who’d normally go out and buy a whole Turkey spread that the money wasn't in budget for it this year,” he said.
Bialik also is anticipating a bigger turnout. She says in recent years about 300 people have attended the dinner that’s usually held in the Community Center downtown. But the area’s population has grown, and so has the number of folks on a low or fixed income.
So she asked the Delta-Greely School District to allow them to use the junior high school gymnasium. She says not only can it accommodate more people – it’ll also give kids something to do after dinner.
“ We do have a lot of kids, so we do lots of crafts,” she said. “We have a kids crafting table. And because we're in the gym and we have a bigger space.”
District Superintendent Michael Lee says the annual dinner clearly needed a bigger venue.
“They said they have kind of been outgrowing the community center they've been using,” he said.
“It's been pretty crowded the last few years and honestly, because of the government shutdown and the impact on our community and some of the families, we are expecting a larger turnout this year, potentially.”
Lee said the district is waiving a fee usually charged for use of the gym as its way of giving thanks to the people who organize the event.
