With all of the publicity there were problems that started to happen. I had over 100 bicycles in my back yard. This proved to be a big temptation for the neighborhood youngsters who were needing things to sell for Drugs. This was very frustrating and got me started to look for a new place to keep the bikes.
I asked every private property owner in this area for help and the doors were all closed. Then I became aware of many unoccupied buildings in the Northwood Business District. One was a beautiful new building belonging to Northwood Business Development Corp., now called Northwood Renaissance Corp. They were trying to improve the economics in the area and also to improve our living standards. They offered this new building to me to get through the Christmas season.
With all of the publicity on the bike project and my other efforts in helping people in need, the program started to grow. Suddenly the 12 bikes the first year built up in 3 years to over 100 bikes for Santa Claus. I also was nominated for the Prestigious Jefferson Award and was a finalist for this honor.
A world famous Children’s Charity called Variety called me on the telephone. I was invited to a Variety Show in the Poinciana Playhouse in Palm Beach. They presented me to the audience on the Stage and gave me 10 brand new bikes to help with my Christmas Bicycle Gifts for the children of the Migrant Workers in my neighborhood. They became a major help for my project for several years.
After several Hurricanes I was forced to rent a building as all of the buildings that were originally available to me were damaged and torn down. It was a nice building where I could store, repair hundreds of bicycles. I was able to give away 400 at Christmas time in 2005. After that Christmas with other disasters and developments all over the world, donations slowed down significantly.
I then made the decision to lighten my obligations and closed the shop. It was costing me a lot of money each month and that was a problem as my income is from Social Security. I still get phone calls weekly with bikes to donate and I get requests for bikes more often.
I have been privileged to have been able to donate many bikes to very worthy causes. After the first big storm here and I had to get rid of a lot of bikes an angel appeared. A pastor from Haiti found me. There had been bad storms in his village there. He had bought a big truck here to ship to his country. It was empty and he felt that it was a waste to ship a big empty truck to his church. I gave him 120 very tall big people bikes needing repairs. We packed them on the back of the truck. Then he stuffed rice between the bikes in big bags before covering the whole thing with a tarp to ship to Haiti. On his return he showed me a video of the truck being unloaded. The happy faces were worth millions to me.
In a few months a man approached me form St Paul of the Cross Catholic Church. His group had a ministry in Nicaragua. On two separate occasions I was able to give him 40 bikes needing repairs. They were shipped to Nicaragua and repaired for the people there.
