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SCHENECTADY
Communities to share Thanksgiving
Big crowds expected for holiday dinners in area
BY JESSICA HARDING Gazette Reporter

    Thanksgiving isn’t about food at charitable turkey dinners throughout the Capital Region, but about the gathering and family-like community spirit.
    “People want to be around other caring people on the holidays,” Michael Saccocio, director of the Schenectady City Mission, said. “It’s an important day in all of our lives and it means more than a plate of food. It’s a gathering of loved ones and the mission is a place where people can do that, come here and we can be a family of our own.”
    The City Mission is expected to give away about 500 meals during its annual dinner at the Wallace M. Campbell Dining Center on Smith Street from 12:30 to 2 p.m. Thursday, Saccocio said.
    More people are expected this year than in years past because of the economy, Saccocio said.
    “We are seeing more people at all our meals and our numbers are up in the shelter so we’re preparing for that,” he said.
    Saccocio said the mission likes to make sure there are leftovers for people because he said that is a tradition of Thanksgiving as well.
    The mission is planning to have an accordion player this year and singing to add to the festive atmosphere.
    Similar Thanksgiving dinners are occurring throughout the Capital Region and Mohawk Valley, including one at in the Amsterdam Housing Authority’s Community Room on Division Street sponsored by the Calvary Assembly of God, which is expecting to feed about 500 people
    A lot of people have already signed up for the event in each of the authority’s three apartment complexes. Organizers said there is normally a full house.
    Meals will also be given away at the church.
    Perhaps the largest gathering of community spirit will be at the First Presbyterian Church in downtown Albany on Thursday for the 39th annual Equinox dinner where more than 8,000 meals are expected to be served, according to Patti Tullgren, director of development and marketing for Equinox. .................................


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