The Portage la Prairie Fire Department is once again holding its annual bike auction. Firefighter Curtis Rance says it takes place May 4.

"It's the first Saturday in May and will take place at 9:00 a.m. The auction itself starts at 10:00 a.m.. The event will take place in the back parking lot of the fire department. It's a live auction. We'll bring up the bikes up usually onto the tailgate of a truck, and the auctioneer will do his bidding. "

He notes it all goes toward the Manitoba Burn Fund.

"It's an organization that supplies training and funds to the burn ward in Winnipeg. It helps train nurses and doctors and it also helps supply equipment for the burn ward itself and any other education that's required."

burn fund

Rance says if anybody has bikes that they're looking to get rid of for spring cleanup, you can bring them down to the fire hall. 

"We'll mark it as a donated bike and we can put it into this year's auction. The guys are here all the time and we're more than willing to accept the bike."

He notes the bikes on hand for the auction are either lost or stolen. Rance says that people find them around town laying around, and they'll give us a call. We can go pick them up. The RCMP also acquire bicycles that have been stolen and whatnot. And if they haven't been claimed by the owner after a year, they end up in our auction. So if anybody has any questions about up a possible bike that they're missing, they can always call down to the fire hall at 204-239-8340. We would need a description of the bike and probably the best thing would be a serial number. We can look it up and see if we have are in possession of that bike. There's also a viewing time at 9:00 before the auction. Anybody is more than welcome to come down and take a look at what bikes are around." 

He adds the bikes are prepared ahead of time a couple days before they go through all of them. 

"We try to fix up the bikes as best as we can, if we have the available parts, to try and get them into a half-decent working condition. Then anything that's maybe not in altogether, they kind of gets put into a pile that gets auctioned off at the end of the auction."

He notes this year there are about 130 bikes for auction.

"It's a worthwhile cause. Come on down if you're in the market for a bike. You might be able to scoop yourself up a bike at half-decent price. We do get some very nice bikes that come through that are donated. We also get them that are lost or have been stolen, and they are in very nice shape. Last year we were able to raise about. $5000 for the Manitoba Burn Fund. So we're hoping to beat that again this year."