It's Christmas in July!

for 50 area youngsters, thanks to a grant from the Fredericton Community Foundation and the hard work of a local bike shop.

After receiving a portion of a settlement stemming from a class-action lawsuit involving high-density rubber manufacturers, the Fredericton Community Foundation turned around and spent a percentage of it toward purchasing bicycles for 50 local children.

Cindy Sheppard, executive director of the foundation, said when the judge found the manufacturers guilty of price-fixing the product known as EPDM, he ordered the settlement to be disbursed among community foundations across Canada.

Sheppard said the foundation was allotted about $25,000.

There was one stipulation, however.

"The judge said that the money had to be used for transportation," Sheppard said. "You can interpret the word transportation in a number of ways, so we felt that children needed transportation to get to sporting events, part-time jobs and so on, so bicycles were a natural fit."

Sheppard collected the names of 50 local elementary and middle-school-aged children and approached Matt Savage of Savage's Bicycle Centre with nearly $10,000 for the bicycles.

Sheppard said schools were told to select children they felt were most deserving of new bicycles, based on their own criteria.

The kids will receive the bicycles tonight at Savage's King Street location.

Savage said he was happy to participate.

"Honestly, I felt a lot like Santa Claus putting all of those bikes together," said Savage.

"But, ultimately, the goal the whole time was just getting some bikes out to some kids who might not have had the opportunity to get one otherwise."

Savage said he was a little worried at first about how far the money would stretch.

"We had a budget of a little over $10,000 to work with, and if you do the math that's something like $160 per bike, plus helmets, which doesn't go very far in our world," he said.

But with a little help from California-based bike manufacturer Specialized Bicycle Components, he managed to get the bikes at cost.

"I started explaining the situation to the people at Specialized and, frankly, they told me to stop talking, the answer was 'Yes,' and they were going to do whatever they could to make it happen," Savage said.

"It was kind of a neat effect, because everybody came together and rallied around the cause."

Savage said the bikes he obtained from Specialized have a retail value of anywhere from $350 to $500.

"We've (Savage's) been in the community now for over 110 years, and when I took the business over from my dad, he was always pushing this type of community involvement," he

said.

"This just made good sense for us."

Sheppard said the remaining cash from the settlement will go towards organizations such as Meals on Wheels and Partners for Youth.