ERNC Grants Funds to Offer Free Adult Bicycle Learn-to-Ride Classes

The Eagle Rock Neighborhood Council approved a grant of $1,215 to the organization CICLE (Cyclists Inciting Change thru Live Exchange) at its meeting on Sept. 3. The funds are so CICLE, which is located at 4610 Eagle Rock Blvd., can grant fee waivers to people who want to take adult learn-to-ride biking classes but cannot afford them. 

The classes are given monthly at Eagle Rock Plaza.

“We promote the bicycle as viable, healthy, sustainable transportation,” CICLE Program and Marketing Coordinator Julia Lippe-Klein told the council, and also added that the organization had lost some sources of funding lately.

“We want to maintain it as an accessible and affordable class. It’s not self-sustaining, so the only way we can pay for it is the fee,” Lippe-Klein said. “The fee waivers would allow us to continue giving the class.”

The classes cost $38. The group had asked for a grant of $4,860, which would cover the entire cost of the class, but the Budget and Finance Committee recommended granting $1,215, which would cover 32 fee waivers over a year.

Several council members inquired about how many people from Eagle Rock take the class.

“I think a lot of people are local because they want to learn to ride in the neighborhood they will be riding in,” Lippe-Klein said.

The class offers 12 slots per month, and Council President Michael Nogueira stated that he would prefer if priority could be given for fee waivers for Eagle Rock residents.

"We're Eagle Rock Neighborhood Council. Now, if somebody comes in from Long Beach, Glendale, Pasadena, I personally, this is me saying that I would feel that I would rather see an ID, 90041, to fund somebody from Eagle Rock and not somebody from Long Beach, Rancho Cucamonga or Santa Clarita," Nogueira said.

Council Vice President David Greene asked if priority could be given to Eagle Rock residents for the fee waiver, and Lippe Klein said it could.

For more information about the classes, go to http://www.cicle.org/.

Editor's note: An earlier version of this story said Nogueira asked if preference could be given to Eagle Rock residents for fee waivers, when he only made a statement that it would be his preference.