BikeTexas Katrina BikeAid Needs Your Help

Texas Bicycle Coalition is coordinating an effort to collect and distribute used bicycles to thousands of Katrina evacuees. The Coalition needs your support and help to make this project a reality.

During the first phase of this project, the Coalition is seeking partnerships with other organizations, corporations and faith-based groups across the country that have the capacity to collect and store 50 or more working bicycles and handle some administrative responsibilities, possibly including fundraising for transportation costs. If your organization fits this description and is interested in helping, please contact Audrey Warren.

This project will be funded exclusively by donations made to the BikeTexas Katrina BikeAid Fund, and any excess funds raised will be donated to the American Red Cross. If you would like to support this effort, please visit the Katrina BikeAid donation page.

As the flood waters recede and Gulf Coast residents wake up in unfamiliar beds across Texas and the country, thousands of families who have been displaced by Hurricane Katrina are struggling with transportation issues in their new surroundings. Texas Bicycle Coalition is organizing a large-scale effort to get bicycles to these families and individuals so that they can more easily make appointments, go shopping, look for work and even just ride around for recreation.

“Bicycles can help provide mobility and independence. By collecting and distributing bikes for those impacted by Katrina, we’re all providing evacuees with an important tool to help them rebuild their lives,” says Robin Stallings, Texas Bicycle Coalition Executive Director.

Audrey Warren, New Orleans evacuee and the former director of New Orleans’ Safe Routes to School Program, has agreed to coordinate the BikeTexas Katrina BikeAid program to procure and distribute bikes for Katrina evacuees. “Bicycles can be a great way to significantly increase a family’s mobility in the immediate future,” says Warren, “and having a bicycle can ease the burden for individuals who are trying to find work and take care of business in a place that is totally foreign to them.”

When the Coalition moves into the next phase of BikeTexas Katrina BikeAid, more details will be posted on the BikeTexas website about other ways to get involved. Please stay tuned for updates.