Earlier this week, GoBike Buffalo's Community Bicycle Shop on Colvin Avenue was robbed, with over $8,000 worth of resources stolen. GoBike is now looking to the community to help them recover after losing roughly 18-20 newly-repaired bicycles that were set to be donated, all of their power tools, and an assortment of replacement parts.
"We've been robbed before, and it's unfortunate, but it was very clear that maybe one person had found their way in and gotten one thing, and they were probably pretty desperate for it, so we wouldn't really dwell on it," said GoBike Deputy Director Kevin Heffernan said of previous thefts they had experienced.
However, Heffernan said this time was different. When their team came in on Tuesday for an open shop night, they realized the shop had likely been broken into the day before.
"This was such a job that clearly had some coordination and planning, and must have had multiple people, that that was what was the most disheartening about it, that somebody took their time to plan how to hit the Community Bike Shop that's serving people for, you know, little to no money to get them back on their wheels again," Heffernan added.
Heffernan says right now, what they need most are donations, because even the smallest things most people wouldn't think about were stollen and need to be replaced.
"So we are gratefully accepting cash because we do need to buy new supplies," Heffernan said. "We do need to buy the tools that we need to that we lost. They even took hot glue guns. They took our toilet paper and our paper towels. So we need to buy supplies."
The bikes GoBike had prepared over the course of the winter were going to go to adults in need of transportation. Heffernan points out that one in four Buffalo households do not have a car. He says this is what he hopes the people who committed this robbery think about and understand.
"I want them to know that the people they hurt the most were the people who desperately needed those bikes. You know, GoBike is gonna live on and rebuild and our community is standing up behind us, but those people who desperately needed those bikes are not gonna be able to just get them anyways, in a day or two, so that really hurts what they did to those people," Heffernan said.
Buffalo Police say they are investigating the burglary.
To learn more about GoBike and how to support, visit gobikebuffalo.org.
