Ride rolls in donations for cancer patients
COEUR d’ALENE — Local bikers cruised for charity in a big way this week.
A record 525 people rode motorcycles to Cavanaugh Bay on Priest Lake on Saturday to support the Ninth Annual Ride for Life, raising more than $13,000 to help people who are fighting cancer and struggling to pay their bills.
A check for $12,630 and an envelope bearing another $625 in cash and checks were presented Thursday to Cancer Patient Care, a Spokane-based nonprofit that provides free social services to cancer patients with limited financial resources.
“It’s just grassroots bikers,” said volunteer Dave Cazel of Coeur d’Alene. “It’s the old school where you try to raise some cash to help somebody, and everybody empties their pockets and gives everything they can.”
Riders paid $20 each and received a T-shirt, a ride pin and lunch. Raffle tickets and door prizes brought in additional donations.
With more than 40 sponsors, nearly every facet of the region’s motorcycle community contributed to the event.
Cazel, a double cancer survivor himself, said Cancer Patient Care helps people fighting the disease by providing financial assistance to help them pay for prescriptions, groceries, bus passes and other expenses.
“A lot of times, you can’t work. You’re going through chemo and funds are a little hard to get,” Cazel said.
The local nonprofit is not affiliated with any larger organization and has been in existence for more than 40 years. The agency operates on donations, fundraising and some grant money.
Nikki Rabey, Cancer Patient Care’s event coordinator, said that with just seven employees, there is little overhead freeing up more of the funds for patients and their families.
“To show up at Priest Lake and see over 500 people there at this resort for the same reason on the same day was incredible. By the end of the day, we had tears in our eyes,” Rabey said. “That is an incredible amount of money. That’s going directly to client services. That’s a lot of assistance to a lot of local people. Checks like that are few and far between.”
The organization serves cancer patients in 10 counties in Eastern Washington and six North Idaho counties, provided they are receiving treatment in Spokane.
Dan Ertz, of Post Falls, got the Ride for Life wheels rolling in 2001 as an addition to the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life fundraiser.
“It isn’t terminal a lot of times, but it can be financially devastating and that can be terminal, in a sense,” Ertz said. “The need never ends. It’s not because they don’t have insurance that these people are driven into bankruptcy. It’s the out-of-pocket expenses they incur.”
This is the second year that Cancer Patient Care is the sole benefactor of the Ride For Life proceeds. Previously, some of the money went to the American Cancer Society.
“We do that because Cancer Patient Care donates directly to families,” Ertz said. “It’s not that we don’t believe in research. We just want to impact people in a direct, immediate way.”