West Sacramento residents were able to get their bicycles and clothing repaired for free Saturday morning during the monthly West Sac Repair Cafe, which provides free repairs and lessons on maintenance.
The 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. event was held at Arthur F. Turner Library, located at 1212 Merkley Ave., and was marketed as an "environmentally friendly event" featuring bike repairs and tips on how to fix worn-out clothing.
Admission for the event – held at the library on the last Saturday of every month – is free for all West Sacramento residents, according to the event's website.
Ani Durst created the repair cafe six months ago in an attempt to teach people how to be more sustainable and to address the growing issue of clothing waste.
"There's a lot of repair cafes all over the country and other countries and I found one going on in Illinois," she recounted. "When I saw it online, I said, 'We can do this in West Sac,' so I started talking with people I know and asked if they would like to do this in West Sac, and they said yes."
Durst said the local library offered a room where they could set up sewing machines and allowed Sacramento Area Bicycle Advocates to repair bikes outside.
"SABA was willing to do the bicycle repairs and we just started talking to seamstresses and a seamster, and they all volunteered," she said. "So we just wanted to start small on something we knew we could handle and get the word out."
As the event has grown, Durst said she's planning on providing more services starting with cell phone and computer advice in January.
"They can't really offer to repair them because they don't have all the parts, but they can consult with people," she explained regarding cell phone repairs. "And then we hope to go on small appliance repair and electrical repair" in the future.
Durst, who organizes the sewing component of the repair cafe, said her group typically helps between 15 to 20 residents with clothing repair for blankets, dog beds, jeans and more.
Pierson Rohr, Durst's neighbor and director of outreach and partnership for Sacramento Area Bicycle Advocates, said the organizers of the cafe reached out to him earlier this year to see if his organization would be interested in providing repair services for the cafe.
"The repair cafe is something that… makes sure that West Sacramento has resources to make a repair culture and get away from the throw-away and replace sort of thing that kind of ties all of us down," he emphasized.
His organization has averaged 30 bike repairs during each of the repair cafes, although Rohr said he's noticed higher attendance at each session.
"We put up paper flyers and try to get local businesses to help amplify (the event)..., but we definitely need more awareness," Rohr argued.
Furthermore, Rohr noted that the cafe is currently working on finding a more permanent location not in the library.
"We're trying to see if we can reach out to the city to get some funding from them or any sort of benefactors in the area," he explained. "Ideally, in the future, we'd like to get set up permanently in one of the rooms in the community center."
Additionally, Rohr is a commissioner on the Transportation, Mobility and Infrastructure Commission for West Sacramento, which has highlighted the need for transit hubs in the city.
"Part of transit is keeping transit running and that's a major function of SABA," he said regarding his organization. "SABA's mission statement is to get people out of their cars and on their bikes to help with congestion, health and everything like that, so there's a lot of different programs that we do. Free bike repairs is really only one of them."
To learn more about the Sacramento Area Bicycle Advocates, visit sacbike.org.
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