tuesday the 8th, proposal writing time!

two of bikes del pueblo's exceptionally gifted young volunteers just met with a representative from a certain local bike coalition to talk about possibilities, resources, and expanding our operation within san diego. to do this we need to put together a proposal by march 23rd detailing what our goals are and how we want to reach them. things like what materials we need, how we plan on operating, circumstances to take into consideration (volunteer coordinating, fundraising, etc), all of this needs to be in writing and presentable. if you would like to be part of this process to share ideas or lessons learned please stop by. here are the details:

tuesday, march 8th, 7pm
2754 snowdrop
san diego, 92105

if you cannot attend but would like to be involved send an email to our list serv (on the left of the blog) or leave us a comment on the blog with a time to meet or suggestion.

our official plan for the next few months, years, decades...

help share bikes with the rest of san diego

last saturday was a fairly slow day, so kelly, andres, brian, and myself all sat down and devised a plan of action. bikes del pueblo has been around for a few years and for most of that the various members have decided to keep it low key for various reasons. Among our concerns were being part of gentrification and compromising our work with more marginalized members of the community (city heights is a mostly immigrant, refugee, and non-english neighborhood). but we have decided that in order for bikes del pueblo to stay around and be accessible to the community and sustainable it needs to expand. so here are the main steps to what we would like to do:

1 bring in more people. we are going to begin outreach into san diego's growing and amazing bike community for volunteers, ideas, partnerships and solidarity, and hopefully new resources and energy needed to expand our collective. this is also where we need to look for anybody who can speak other languages such as burmese, kurini (sp?), swahili, vietnamese, etc.

2 general outreach. bdp needs to talk to all types of community orgs, businesses, community spaces and even rec centers, and maybe even schools. in the meantime we would like to form partnerships for collaborative events, maybe store materials/tools at a business or use their space when they are closed, set up mini workshops such as bike sheds, or even do assemblies at schools.

3 educate ourselves! this would include workshops to train new volunteers in basic bike maintenance, workshops on how to work with people who speak a different language, and awesome team building workshops like trips to tijuana and critical mass. we also want to network with other bike collectives and coops, steal their secrets and see how they do things. the first saturday of december is a field trip to la to see a few spaces out there and everybody is invited.


4 find a place of our own! eventually we would like to settle down, find a nice home, even if that means writing grants or selling plasma. but we know that step 4 of our master plan requires more volunteers, more connections, and more knowledge, thats why it is step 4.

if anybody wants to get involved or has anything to put in dont hesitate, get in touch and we'll make it happen.