Thursday, October 1, 2026
City officials have tabled a proposal for a public bicycle rental program that they said would generate as much as a half million dollars in revenue by making hundreds of new bikes available to residents and visitors, after three council members said that the program needed further review.
At its June 21 meeting, the council voted 3-2 to table the proposal to contract with Decobike — a Miami Beach-based company that runs a bike rental and sharing operation there — that would make hundreds of bikes available for use on the barrier island.
City Manager Charles Theofan, who proposed the resolution, said that the plan called for a six-year contract with the company, with an option to renew for an additional five years. The contract, Theofan said, would include corporate sponsorship and advertising as well as the rental program, and the city would receive 10 percent of the income it would generate.
But City Council President Thomas Sofield Jr., along with Democratic Councilmen Michael Fagen and Len Torres, voted to table the proposal, saying that more information about the proposal was needed.
Theofan floated the bike-rental proposal during the budget talks in May, as a way of generating additional revenue for Long Beach, after a plan to install parking meters throughout the city was shelved. He said that the program would ensure the city additional revenue, and could generate as much as $500,000 for the city and as much as $5 million annually for Decobike.
“What they were advocating to us is for us to adopt a bike-sharing or bike-rental system,” Theofan said. “We feel that this concept would be a good fit for our community.” Long Beach is composed of single-family homes and multiple-unit residences, he explained, and many of those complexes don’t have storage space for bicycles.
The program would provide 400 bikes, which would be stored in racks that hold 10 bikes each at 40 locations throughout the city. Theofan did not say how much they would cost to rent, but he said that the program would start next spring, or possibly this fall on a limited basis. He also said that Decobike would invest up to $1 million to start the program.
“We’re not going to spend one cent,” Theofan said. “They are going to do everything necessary to get the program up and running at no expense from the city.”
But the three councilman asked Theofan for more specifics, including how local bike shops would be involved. Theofan said that Decobike would utilize local shops for repairs, but that was not detailed in the contract.
“Will that language be built into the contract?” Sofield asked. “That they will use, exclusively, bike shops within the City of Long Beach for their repairs?”
Theofan said he would insist on that, and added that the form of payment for using bikes has yet to be decided, though it could be a prepaid card system. “You’ll pay a monthly charge to be a subscriber for this program,” he said.
Sofield requested a shorter contract, with an opt-out clause. “It might be more beneficial to the city to do a shorter contract to see how it works,” he said. “Right now we’re locking ourselves up for six years for something that may not work for our residents.”
Fagen asked Theofan about using the city’s existing bike stores. “Why would we have not gone to these businesses and tried to help their businesses by offering them some kind of incentive to rent bicycles in a similar fashion?” he asked.
Theofan said that the program would allow cyclists to ride a bike from a rack in one part of town and drop it off somewhere else, while bike shops usually rent bikes for a day and require that they be returned to the same location.
Councilwoman Mona Goodman, who voted not to table the proposal, along with Councilman John McLaughlin, described the program as a “phenomenal” idea. “This is a way of getting people out of their cars,” Goodman said. “And this is a wonderful thing for Long Beach.”
Torres said that although he believes that increased bike usage across Long Beach would be a good thing, he was concerned that the program might result in more bicyclists riding on sidewalks because of the lack of bike lanes. Torres submitted an application to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last July for a federal grant for as much as $75,000 to fund a study to determine the safest areas in the city to build bike lanes.
Theofan told Torres that if the program is successful, the city would look to use revenue from the program to create bike lanes.
Some residents, however, said that while the idea is a good one, not enough information was presented. Allison Blanchette told the council that “the city couldn’t handle 400 bikes,” and expressed concern over the lack of bike lanes. “Half the people in this town ride on the sidewalk,” Blanchette said, suggesting that the council carefully consider the proposal. “I think that by considering this … and not even having a conversation with any of the local bike shop owners is kind of a spit in the face to the business owners of Long Beach.”
Rick Hoffman, president of the West End Neighbors Civic Association, questioned where the racks would be placed, given that they are large units that would take up space he said the city doesn’t have. “It’s a great idea in theory,” Hoffman said. “[But] we need to do more research into this project before we commit to actually voting ‘yes’ on it.”
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