Fall puts the brakes on business at High Gear Cyclery in Longmont, but for owner Buzz Feldman and his four employees, the season’s workload is only beginning to surge.
People drop off old, busted, unwanted bicycles at the downtown shop. Feldman and a crew of devoted mechanics turn the broken bikes into working wheels.
And every year for the past two decades, a few weeks before Christmas, needy families in Longmont have had something to celebrate: A free bicycle.
This year Feldman gave away about 300 bikes one Friday night at the Boulder County Fairgrounds.
“Anybody who doesn’t believe in Santa Claus should go to the fairgrounds,” says Feldman, 62, a mustached, fireplug of a guy. “Santa Claus is there. The whole meaning of the season, the whole spirit of Santa, is there. If you want something that will bring tears to your eyes, be there. The power of gifts. It’s amazing.”
Feldman got into Johnny-Appleseeding bikes shortly after he opened his shop. One of his employees was stuck in an abusive relationship. When she fled her boyfriend she ended up at a shelter for battered women. When she returned to work, she told Feldman about the families — moms and kids — who lived in the shelter.
If the kids got bikes, she said, they would go nuts. The moms could use them too, to go grocery shopping and to get around town.
“I said, ‘Let me see what I can do,’ ” Feldman says.
And thus began his annual dance with philanthropy.
Feldman figures he commits between 500 and 600 hours a year to the project. He budgets about $2,000 a year for parts.
“It kind of takes over,” beginning in September, he says.
As the bikes stack up — it often takes three bikes to make one, he says — they are stored in three semi-tractor trailers donated by Sun Construction in Longmont. Between bikes ready for delivery, and bikes waiting for a mechanic’s wrench, things grow chaotic.
But then one evening in December families line up, and volunteers escort them through the smorgasbord of bikes.
Eventually, the last child picks the last one.
And just like that, Feldman’s months of labor comes to an end.
His work attracts volunteers who take home bikes, fix them, and return them to Feldman. This year, one 12-year-old Westview Middle school girl became extremely involved in the project.
“Out of the blue, she just showed up one day with this,” says Feldman, waving an orange flyer Gabriella Fallon printed and distributed around town, urging people to donate their bikes for poor families. “She came in here and worked on the bikes. For being 12, she did pretty darn well with it.”
Why does Feldman invest so much time and money to the bikes?
“Because I can,” he says. “There’s a need, and I can address it. There are a lot of needs I can do nothing about, but this is something I can do.”
Douglas Brown: 303-954-1395 or djbrown@denverpost.com
