PORTLAND Ore. (KPTV) – A Portland tradition, Potluck in the Park has hosted their annual Christmas Dinner event for over 30 years.
For the last decade, the free holiday meal has been held at the Portland Art Museum.
With the help of over 100 volunteers on Christmas Eve, the space is decorated for the more than 1,000 guests that are expected on Christmas Day.
“It’s a wonderful experience! Very warm, Christmasy vibe,” volunteer Stephanie Chale said, as she placed a garland center piece on one of the long banquet tables set up in the PAM Ballroom.
For some volunteers, like Chale, getting the space all decorated is extra special, because they know how far a little Christmas cheer can go.
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“Last year I was at home for the holidays all alone,” Chale said. “My boyfriend was out-of-state, so we had to spend the holiday apart. So, I wanted to check this out and it was a really good experience.”
Since then, she’s been volunteering with Potluck in the Park by serving food on Sundays.
“Decorating a tree is a little bit different than how I usually help, but oh man it is so much fun,” Chalet said.
Recently, the grassroots organization celebrated 1,740 consecutive free Sunday meals.
“We haven’t missed a meal in 34 years,” coordinator David Utzinger said. “We’ve been doing this since the 90s.”
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Utzinger says the Christmas Dinner tradition started when Christmas landed on a Sunday, and he didn’t want folks to miss out on a meal. 30 years later, it’s still going strong.
“There are so many people who want to volunteer on Christmas, our meal service tomorrow will have over 100 volunteers that sign up through Hands-On Portland,” he said.
That’s a good thing, because it takes a lot of hard work to feed 1,000 people,
“It brings so many people so much joy in their faces, if you are here tomorrow you will see the joys on their faces and you will know how much that means to me,” Utzinger said.
Free meals will be available at the Portland Art Museum anytime between 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Christmas Day.
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