OAKLAND — Thirty-five bicycles are now the property of an East Oakland nonprofit that lost several dozen bikes to theft earlier this year, thanks to a timely donation from police with the East Bay Regional Park District.

On the morning of Jan. 7, staffers with Cycles of Change had been headed to Oakland’s Westlake Middle School for the latest of its ongoing Alameda County Safe Routes to Schools bike-education programs, which teach 8,000 students in 14 middle schools and four high schools throughout Alameda County.

Instead, they discovered a truck parked outside their offices full of bicycles and helmets ready for use was missing, so they called police and filed a report. The truck, which held 52 bikes and more than 350 helmets, was later found empty except for a sack holding a few leftover helmets in a residential Richmond neighborhood.

Cycles of Changes began with an after-school class offering in an East Oakland public school basement, and later grew to its current registration as a collectively run 501(c) 3 nonprofit. Its classes teach young people how to repair and, in some cases, build their own bicycles.

In a statement last week, parks police said their bicycles were former evidence from criminal cases or unclaimed property from lost-and-found sites, usually stored until auctioned, destroyed or in some cases, donated.

“Our job is to serve the community, and this is the least we can do,” East Bay Regional Park District Police Officer Ryland Macfadyen said. “This group was a victim of crime, and we really felt it was important to help them out any way we could, especially since they serve young people.”

The organization is seeking cash donations to cover costs for refurbished bicycles, safety classes, healthy snacks and helmets and is also accepting bicycles in good or reparable working order (meaning parts without rust, bent forks or more than minor dents), and all donations are tax-deductible. Full donation guidelines are available at http://www.cyclesofchange.org/support.

Contact George Kelly at 408-859-5180 or follow him at Twitter.com/allaboutgeorge.