Toll Gate bike collection ‘wheeling’ social change

By Kelcy Dolan
Posted 5/5/16

“I’ve been to some of the places these bikes end up and this means so much there. They use these bike in some ingenious ways,” Dennis Dubee, a technology teacher at Toll Gate, said.

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Toll Gate bike collection ‘wheeling’ social change

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“I’ve been to some of the places these bikes end up and this means so much there. They use these bike in some ingenious ways,” Dennis Dubee, a technology teacher at Toll Gate, said.

For the past three years Dubee has hosted bike drives to benefit Bikes Not Bombs, which transports refurbished and donated bicycles globally to third world countries.

Bikes Not Bombs began in 1984, after the United States military backing the Contra attacks on Nicaragua. Initially, their name was quite literal, the organization brought bicycles to places the U.S. military brought bombs.

Now, Bikes Not Bombs collects around 6,000 bikes annually to be distributed globally to the group’s international economic development programs in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean.

Based in Boston, the group also hosts Youth Programs for inner-city youth where teens learn bike safety and basic mechanic skills to earn a bike for themselves. The hope is that through bicycles, which help foster not only transportation but also economic development, Bikes Not Bombs can be a vehicle for social change.

On Tuesday morning, May 3, Dubee and his student volunteers helped to pack more than 125 bicycles to be sent to Bikes Not Bombs.

Dubee said that the school has done ever type of fundraiser, from clothing, book and food drives and he wanted to bring something “different.”

“The bikes we get have a lot of life in them but were on their way to the junk yard,” he said.

In the areas the bikes are sent they aren’t used solely for transportation. Dubee explained that some turn the bikes into generators, grinders and some even start their own businesses with the help of the bikes.

Will Patenaude, Lilly Saytes and Dente DeCristofaro, president and co-vice presidents of the school’s Bikes Not Bombs program, said it was much easier to get students to donate than they had expected. The group also received donations from the police department and the dump. Students helped not only in the collections of donated bikes but also volunteered to fix the bikes for transport, inverting the pedals and handlebars.

“A lot of us aren’t using our childhood bikes anymore,” DeCristofaro said.

Patenaude said, “A bike sitting in my shed doesn’t make any difference, but in these areas it can really help people.”

“I like the idea of helping create social change,” Saytes said, “a path away from war and violence towards making a difference.”

Dubee said many of his students are very giving and will step up to the occasion every time he asks for help.

For more information on Bikes Not Bombs and how you could help visit www.bikesnotbombs.org.

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