Baltimore's Goodwill Thanksgiving Dinner and Resource Fair provides warm meal, resources

BALTIMORE -- More than 2,000 people received a warm meal on Wednesday at the Baltimore Convention Center for the 67th-annual Goodwill Thanksgiving Dinner and Resource Fair.

Those in need were fed, given a bag of healthy snacks to go, and provided resources to help better their lives.

"I'm grateful to be in the position that I am to help people," said Lisa Rusyniak, President/CEO of Goodwill Industries of the Chesapeake.

Rusyniak said the resources included signing people up for health insurance and connecting them to other services, including job training programs.

"So that when they come to Goodwill, which we hope they will, we can get them connected to our job training programs, we place them into jobs," Rusyniak said.

Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott attended the event.

"It's a place where all of Baltimore, who can come support people who may need it, everyone should have a great Thanksgiving meal," Scott said.

Volunteering with a smile

Dozens of volunteers made sure meals filled their stomachs and the resource fair inspired their hopes.

"I helped someone today and they immediately smiled and that made me smile and I'm so happy I made her day," said student volunteer Evelyn Kim.

"Knowing that I did help people makes me feel a hundred percent awesome," student volunteer Ameria Boxdale added.

Darryl Green, who attended the 67th-annual Goodwill Thanksgiving Dinner and Resource Fair, said events like these give him a whole new outlook on life.

"A lot of us don't have families, and when you get to socialize with people who are in the same predicament that you are in, it changes your whole outlook about how you feel about yourself and where you are in your life," Green said.