Christmas food, clothing and toys distributed at MOCO Fairgrounds

Rich Hughett has been helping run the Christmas Community Holiday Dinner in Monterey County for 25 years.

The event was originally to help the homeless, but Hughett wanted it to expand.
“For single people. Older people who don’t want to cook. Its for everybody,” Rich Hughett, Chair of the Community Holiday Dinner Committee, said.

Volunteers like Nancy Barnes have been coming here for 10 years, putting aside her personal Thanksgiving and Christmas. “I’m so much happier here serving the community,” she said.

John Houseman, the Outreach Pastor at Shoreline Community church spoke about how important events like this are during Christmas. “In the spirit of Christmas, its just a beautiful expression of God’s love to other people,” he said.

There were endless boxes of clothing, 160 turkeys and sides from the Food Bank for Monterey County, also Santa Claus.

And our Children can surprise us, knowing what events like this are really about.

“My daughter was five years old, handing out plates. The next time i saw her she was sitting and having dinner with a homeless man. Now if this was a another time, another day that would not have ever happened,” Hughett said.

Between the event at the fairgrounds and deliveries through meals on wheels, Hughett expects 2-thousand people will be served for Christmas.