Bike Gallery owner receives prestigious advocacy award from BTA

Photo by Jonathan Maus

Each year the Bicycle Transportation Alliance (BTA) presents the Alice Awards to individuals, businesses, and organizations in Oregon and SW Washington who have shown exceptional dedication to improving their community for bicyclists. It's not every year that they present the Bud Clark Award for Lifetime Achievement, but this was one of those years and Jay Graves, owner and CEO of Bike Gallery received this prestigious honor Saturday March 22, 2008, at the Annual Alice Awards and Auction.

Jay has truly devoted his life to bicycles. Aside from running the Bike Gallery he has worked tirelessly to advocate for bicycling. He spent 12 years on the Bicycle Transportation Alliance board, was a founding board member of the Community Cycling Center (14 years) and a founding and current board member of Cycle Oregon. He has served on the board of the National Bicycle Dealers Association, including a term as President. As a result of Jay's belief in the importance of parks and recreation as critical components of livable communities, he recently joined the Oregon State Parks Commission Board. Jay also travels to Washington, D.C. each year for the National Bicycle Summit, and works to educate and influence state and local policy makers to support bicycle transportation laws, funding and facilities.

Many of Jay's family, friends, and employees were part of the sold out crowd of over 750 bicycle advocates who watched him receive the award. While accepting the award Jay said, "I hope to see the BTA continue to grow; I'd like to see the 5,000 members grow to 25,000 so we have the advocates we need in order to influence politics, policy, and politicians and get more safe places to ride." No doubt, Jay and many other Bike Gallery staff plan to continue working hard to make that a reality.