Thanks to Belmont’s Campus Security, dozens of children in the Edgehill community will soon enjoy a free bike due to a partnership with the Edgehill Bike Club. Every year dozens of bicycles are abandoned on Belmont’s campus following spring commencement and summer classes. Announcements are posted for two weeks to allow students to claim bikes they may have unintentionally left behind, but any abandoned bikes left after that deadline passes are donated to a local charitable organization that specializes in mentoring disadvantaged youth.
This year Campus Security delivered 20 bikes to the Edgehill Bike Club (1277 12th Ave South), which “seeks to change lives one child at a time by combining the refurbishing of bikes with regular bike rallies and mentoring. The organization was founded by Terry Key in 2013 to create crime free communities by educating and inspiring children and parents to actively participate in creating a safe environment through biking programs, and more than 500 bicycles have been give to those in need since the program’s inception.
Campus Security First Shift Captain Lou Mills said, “Belmont came up with the idea of donating bicycles to the community because we wanted to share our love of cycling with others. Many of Campus Security’s officers were or are bike patrol officers, and we spoke with our local bike shop about what we were encountering with all the bikes leftover at the end of the year. The bike shop referred us to the Oasis Center of Nashville, who then referred us to the Edgehill Bike Club this year.”
