ROTHBURY — New Winston Speedway owners Andrew and Crystal Heykoop have long wanted to host a Thanksgiving meal for the community as a charitable effort. In a way, they're finally getting to make that goal a reality through their The Track Gives Back initiatives, which kick off this month with a series of free community dinners.
The dinners are taking place from 5-7 p.m. each Tuesday and Wednesday in November at the Rothbury Community Center, with local businesses invited to donate food for the meals. Andrew said Papa's Pizza of Montague plans to provide the food for a meal later this month.
One of those meals, as the calendar falls, will take place the day before Thanksgiving, in effect fulfilling the Heykoops' hopes, but with the uncertainty surrounding the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program amid the federal government shutdown, the dinners are a chance to help those who might be affected by reduced benefits.
Just as much as the food, though, the Heykoops say they want to bring the community together for conversation amid a divisive political climate. Both of them are in local politics - Andrew, a U.S. Army veteran, is on the Oceana County Road Commission, and Crystal serves on the Shelby village council - and Andrew said while the national political climate involves "infighting" and inflexibility, he believes local people can come together to solve local issues. He said a local picnic he hosted last year served the same goal.
"Whether you're on the left or right, I think we need to go back to where we talk," Andrew said. "You don't just sit there and hold political lines and dig in. From the local level, we can solve our local issues, as a community, together and not follow the national standard...When we can get here with the community and engage, we can work on our local issues."
The meals, meanwhile, will have different themes. Wednesday's meal was a spaghetti dinner, and the aforementioned Papa's meal will be a themed evening.
"Hopefully from here it can trigger other local businesses to realize they can also help," Andrew said. "Even if we just become the shell that helps organize it or run it, then other businesses can pile in and help where they can. Hopefully we can take care of our community."
There's no goal in mind for how many come to the dinners - within the first hour of Tuesday's dinner, 30 or 40 had dined. Crystal said they were prepared for up to 200, but ultimately, the amount of people is less important, said Andrew, than the feeling of having helped local people.
"I don't care what the number is," Andrew said. "If it's one person, then you still touched one person."
The speedway, meanwhile, will hopefully reopen in 2026; it hasn't been open for two and a half years and plenty of work is to be done to make it race-ready. Andrew said he and his wife pursued buying the speedway due to a lack of family-oriented activities available in the area.
"You can see when that track closed that there's just nothing here (for families) to do," Andrew said. "Hopefully we can bring it back, make it fun and engage the community, and then have something for you to do that's good, clean, family fun."
