Sign up for the battlefordsNOW newsletter

Local Kiwanis Club gears up for annual bike auction

Apr 21, 2017 | 5:00 PM

Battleford area residents will have an opportunity to pick up some new wheels next weekend when the Kiwanis Club of The Battlefords holds its annual bike auction.

The event will take place at 11 a.m. on Saturday, April 29 at the North Battleford Royal Canadian Legion branch parking lot at 1352-100 St.

All proceeds from the sale will benefit community activities and programs.

The annual bike auction, that has been running for about 30 years, should have around 30 bikes available this year. People are also invited to donate a bike for sale at the auction.

“We’ve had as many as 120, which is too many bikes because we don’t get that many bidders, but it’s usually around 60 or 70 bikes,” Kiwanis Club of The Battlefords president Dave Eckel said. He said this year the number is a little on the low side but he is hoping for a good turnout nonetheless.

Eckel said the auction is a good way for the club to help the community.

“The bikes have to be disposed of somewhere rather than the landfill, so this is what we do,” Eckel said. “They go back into circulation for a lot of families that can’t afford a new bike. Some bikes will go as little as five dollars or $10. Last year we have had one go for $450.”

The service club made a little more than $4,000 from the auction last year to return to the community.

The bikes for sale in the auction were collected by the City of North Battleford special constables. The bikes had been abandoned on local properties, after possibly being lost or stolen. The members keep the bikes for about six months. The bikes then will go up for auction if no one claims them.  

People interested in making a bid for a bike at the auction will have a chance to survey the bikes before the event to see if there is one that suits their fancy.

“We’ll have the bikes lined up for people to look at by 10 a.m.,” Eckel said. “There’s children’s, adults’ [bikes], anything they have found we will auction off. We’ve had a wheelchair there we just donated to someone who needed it.”

Funds raised from the auction will help the local Kiwanis help the community. The club supports a variety of groups, including offering student bursaries, donating to the Battlefords Kiwanis Music Festival and supporting the Battlefords Union Hospital Foundation.

Eckel wants to remind residents the local Kiwanis Club of the Battlefords is in dire need of members right now, with numbers down to only 10 members.

The president said the group would like to have about 25 members, so the club can continue to take on more community service projects, including the annual bike auction.

 

angela.brown@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @battlefordsNOW