For Robin Bernal-Ealy, it’s always about serving the community.

The long-time volunteer coordinator for State Representative Vernon Smith’s annual Christmas Dinner sat and watched the last community members stream in and out of the Calumet Township Multipurpose Center in Gary as her volunteer crew broke down the serving stations Saturday afternoon. Coming off not having the annual holiday classic after two years of the pandemic, she was happy to be back doing what she loves best.

“As long as we’re serving the community, nothing matters but the mission,” the California transplant said.

Smith, however, was concerned. He of course was happy to be back helping Gary’s and the greater community-at-large’s needier folks, and nothing was going to stop him from doing something. But Christmas Eve is one thing, and for the people who relied on his Christmas celebration the 33 years he hosted it prior to COVID — well, those are the people about whom he’s worried, because he was one of them so many years ago after he got into it with his mom Christmas Day and decided to boycott dinner out of pride.

“People enjoyed coming for dinner and celebrating with us. They weren’t in need, necessarily, but they needed to feel like part of a family,” Smith said. “Now, there are people who are going to be lonely and hungry (on Christmas). This was easier to put together, but we’re not looking to do less for our community, either.”

It wasn’t for lack of trying and trying on his part, he said: Now that the Genesis Center, which is where he held most of the dinners, isn’t readily available, finding a new place that would accommodate the more than 700 people who come to celebrate with him just didn’t materialize, even when he wanted to open it up to more than just Gary residents. The several venues he talked to would require employees to be on-hand, and many just didn’t want to ask the employees to work on the holiday, he said.

When he and his team decided to take a different tack, Calumet Township Trustee Kim Robinson volunteered the Multipurpose Center for them to offer light refreshments and give away the toys and other gifts they normally would give away during the dinner. But for a small kitchen with only one oven, they’d have gladly hosted the dinner there on Christmas.

“We have 25 turkeys, seven hams and all the sides to do, and we wouldn’t be able to do it here with a small kitchen,” Smith said. “But when you have a vision, you accept what comes your way. And we still had enough gifts to give 1,000 people.

“But we will go back to what we had: A dinner on Jesus’s birthday.”

The volunteers didn’t seem to mind the change in venue. Scotty Johnson, of Chesterton by way of Gary’s Aetna section, has volunteered for the dinner for several years and knows what a giant undertaking it is.

“This was easier for sure, but I can see both ways,” Johnson said before running back to the gift room to give some very happy children the noisiest toys he could find. “I know (Bernal-Ealy and Smith) would’ve rather done the dinner.”

For Craig Williams Sr., and his family, the scaled-back version suited them just fine for their inaugural volunteer effort.

“I saw an article that they needed more people, so I drug — and I mean drug — my girlfriend and daughter here his morning,” Williams, of Gary’s Miller section, said laughing. “What better way to spend Christmas Eve? And my daughter already has a friend over there. She’s fine.”

Williams’s daughter, GeraLynne Williams, 13, rolled her eyes at him and mom Tammy Palma when he insisted she take a pair of house shoes. Still, she enjoyed her first volunteering gig.

“I thought it was going to be a dinner, but I helped get the kids and the elderly refreshments,” she said. “I had a great time.”

Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.