Bike Lady collects bikes for Foster Families
Dec 8th, 2009 | By Jeff Stephens | Category: Events & Activities
The Bike Lady is back! Last year Katherine Koch Gatch mobilized the donation of over 100 bikes to local foster children via the Franklin County Children Services Holiday Wish Santa’s Workshop. Katherine reported that a few days after Thanksgiving, the campaign was launched with the delivery of 60 bikes and matching helmets. Once again Walmart Easton is helping defray the costs of helmets and Abbruzzese Brothers sent me two big trucks and four strong men to help with the delivery.
Please spread the word and send your friends, family and colleagues to www.bikelady.org to donate. No donation is too small. Challenge your coworkers to bring in a bike if you do. Make it a holiday ministry within your church. Make it educational and take your own kids shopping for a bike and deliver it to Santa’s Workshop as a family. There’s lots of ways to be a friend of the Bike Lady and put more kids on bikes. Please help today!
Check out the website for more information, recent news coverage, and ways to donate
Contact information
Katherine Koch Gatch
Bike Lady, Inc.
PO Box 311
Blacklick, OH 43004
614.367.7739
www.bikelady.org
staff@bikelady.org
Hello Friends of the Bike Lady,
As of today, Monday, December 21, we have delivered 188 new bikes, helmets and locks to Franklin County Children Services Holiday Wish program. Yep, 188! It’s absolutely amazing.
I’m writing to see if you can reach out to your family, neighbors, colleagues and friends to see if possibly they could help get us to 200 bikes, helmets and locks. We only need another $1,500, give or take. I know it can be done. I’ll run bikes down to FCCS up until Christmas Eve. Please help me by spreading the word. Donating online is quick and easy. Let’s get 12 more bikes! I know there are enough real-life Santas out there to help me get this done.
Regarding the 188 delivered thus far, the bikes have been matched to children with Kinship Care as the first priority. These are caregivers that have taken on the responsibility of raising the children of a relative. These are often grandmas and aunts. They often live at or near the poverty level. They get little to no financial assistance to care for these children. The idea of a providing a bike to the new members of their family is so far beyond their grasp, that they wouldn’t even wish for it. Trust me, they cry with gratitude as they pick up the bikes from Children Services.
The second priority for child matching has been adoptions. These are children that are in permanent state custody, hoping to one day be adopted. They are often older children and a bike this holiday season will truly make them feel special.
Today, I met a woman caring for a 16 year old boy. When the grandma found out she would receive a bike for the child, she told him it was time to go find a part time job. He said he didn’t have transportation. She said she’d figure that out. He got a job at Olive Garden in his neighborhood and starts after Christmas. He’ll ride his bike to work. I met another woman caring for 4 children. She was getting a bike for each of them. She couldn’t stop crying long enough to say thank you. She didn’t need to.
These bikes are changing lives and I’m not being melodramatic. Let’s get 12 more so that we can all imagine 200 kids waking up Friday morning and seeing something they didn’t think was remotely possible: a new bike from Santa.
Sincerely,
Katherine Koch Gatch
Bike Lady, Inc.
PO Box 311
Blacklick, OH 43004
614.367.7739
http://www.bikelady.org
staff@bikelady.org