Beach resident will swim at charity event
A member of the Fort Myers Beach Lions Club will be among the casual competitors at the fourth annual Gulf Coast Charity Swim Event at Florida Gulf Coast University Aquatics Center Saturday, May 9 from 9 to 11 a.m.
The swimming event -which also features two members of the FMB Fire Department- is part of the week-long Florida Lions Camp, a program that has been going strong since 1974.
Lion Bill Van Duzer, age 71, will don the goggles and swim gear for his first time to support his club’s summer camp for visually and multi-challenged children and adults.
“This will be my first time in the water,” said Van Duzer. “I have supported and pushed for this program for a number of years. It’s a great, great program.”
Van Duzer, who was president of the Florida Lions Camp in 1994, is hoping to raise $15,000 to $30,000. The FMB Lions Club is the sponsor of the event.
“When I became president of the camp, we were serving about 50 to 75 kids a year,” he said. “Now, we’re serving 350 to 400 kids with a budget of $650,000 to $700,000.”
Van Duzer stressed the event is not a race, but a casual swim for a good cause. Swimmers choose the distance (amount of laps) they wish to swim and will have two hours to complete their task.
“I’ll do my best to swim 50 laps,” he said. “There’s a little secret to that to. Swimmers can wear a mask, a snorkel and fins.”
To be eligible for prizes, swimmers must collect minimum pledges of $500 in donations which amounts to the week’s cost of a single camper. All swimmers are also required to collect donations with a minimum goal of $300 -the cost of three days at camp.
Prizes include most money raised; longest distance; most inspiring swimmer; oldest swimmer; and youngest swimmer.
The event hosts swimmers of all abilities. Special needs swimmers will be accommodated in every way possible.
Fort Myers resident Adam Dunlap is one such swimmer. He has been wheelchair bound his whole life after being born with spina bifida, cerebral palsy and hydrocephalus. Sponsored by the FMB Lions Club, Adam has been attending the Florida Lions Camp since he was 14 and holding fund-raisers since age 15, according to his mother Lisa.
“He has sent over 11 different children to camp by doing fund-raisers such as selling candy and beef jerky, doing garage and Tupperware sales or anything else we can do to help,” said Lisa Dunlap. “We go to speak at local chapters to educate them on how important the camp is. As my son says, this (camp) is the place for him.”
Adam’s younger brother and sister have also attended camp during sibling sessions in the past.
“When my daughter came back from camp the first time she attended, her words to me that I’ll never, ever forget was, ‘Mom, no one there treated him differently,” said Dunlap. “They treated him like he was normal.’ My younger son and she learned so much from being there and seeing what he could do instead of all the things he can’t do. The camp taught them to do so much more with him and other disabled children at school. It’s taught them a whole new way of life.”