Special needs children fitted for adaptive bikes

Some special needs children in Carbon County will now have the opportunity to ride a bicycle on their own this summer.

Variety — The Children’s Charity located in Pittsburgh, gave 13 special needs children each a customized adaptive bicycle on Wednesday at the Palmerton Area Junior High School gymnasium. The organization provides adaptive bikes to children across the state.

The bicycles in red, blue and pink lined the gymnasium as the children anxiously waited to be fitted for the bikes.

“I am so excited for my bike. I’m going to ride it all summer long,” said 4-year-old Annabeth Grenier.

Variety and Carbon Lehigh Intermediate Unit #21 partnered together to get this program more involved in the local areas.

Dominic “Mickey” Sgro led the event, and believes this program will greatly benefit local children and their families.

“We will be back in this area, we won’t quit until every child with special needs has their own bike,” Sgro said.

The bikes are no cost to the families. Donations were given by the Carbon Lehigh Special Needs Children’s Foundation.

After an introduction of the charity, a brief safety tutorial was given to parents. Each bike comes with a safety break, a steer for parents to guide their child and a stationary stand for kids to ride their bikes in the house.

Parents were thrilled for their children to gain some form of exercise, and have the ability to join their siblings and friends on bike rides in the neighborhood.

“We were looking for something like this, and we’re so excited it’s finally happening,” Isabelle Wiley, Annabeth’s mother said.

Children participated in a bike parade led by Dr. Elaine Eib. Parents joined as well. They traveled all around the parking lot with smiles on their faces.

The day served as the best kickoff to summer for these special kids.