There’s a map of America in the window at Civic Center Pool that shows it all.

It contains a red line stretching from Davis to Ocean City, Md., which represents about 3,000 miles and $25,000.

The distance and amount reflect Davis Aquatic Masters’ goal as part of the Swim Across America, the latest in a string of club fundraisers that have helped the less fortunate and reshaped the community.

The distance is the total miles DAM members will attempt to swim this month, while soliciting pledges of charitable donations. The amount is how much it hopes to raise for children’s cancer research, prevention and treatment.

“We are swimming through Reno now,” coach Stu Kahn announced last week, pointing to a map with paper cutout of a swimmer following the line across the country.

Swim Across America is a program through which DAM swimmers solicit donations for yards or miles swum in March to benefit the cancer-related work at the UC San Francisco Children’s Hospital and Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute.

DAM’s participation is part of the 24-year-old national effort that has raised $30 million from open water and pool events.

According to DAM member Nicole David of Oakland, who is leading the effort, the most ever raised in monthlong pool swims is $23,000, which was done in New York.

“We’re raising the bar,” said Kahn, DAM’s head coach and chief bar raiser. “We are going to raise $25,000 for Swim Across America.”

So far, 73 DAM members have signed on to tally the yards in their daily workouts, the amount raised by pledges and by other charitable donations to Swim Across America. By the end of the month, many more of DAM’s 538 members are expected to join in the cause.

“It seems like almost everybody’s life has been touched by cancer somehow, and that is why we want to direct our practice effort in March to raise money to fight it,” David said. “We are sure to make an impact for someone who is fighting this disease.”

Donations can be made directly to Swim Across America through its web site at http://swimacrossamerica.org/DAMcancer.

This drive is just the latest in DAM’s history of community events that includes raising funds to serve the needy, promoting good health in senior citizens, paying for swim facilities and more.

Some of these efforts have been led by DAM as a club, while others have been carried out by its individual members.

One notable donation was the $1 million that DAM member Rand Schaal and his father Ted made in 1998 to UC Davis to build an Olympic-size pool.

That charitable gift led to others that together paid for the construction of the Ted & Rand Schaal Aquatics Center. As a condition of the gift, DAM has until now been able to use the pool for its summer workouts and long-course meet.

Over at Civic Pool, DAM raised money in a fundraising effort to build the Brady Family Aquatics Center. The popular multipurpose building at the pool includes offices for swim coaches, storage space for swim gear and an open room that is used for meetings, pre-swim stretching and watching training videos.

This center was built as the result of donations by DAM, Davis Aquadarts, the city of Davis and the Brady Family Foundation, which is led by former DAM swimmer Paul Brady and his family.

Although not a DAM project, the Aquadarts raised enough funds to build a similar building at the Davis Community Pool in Central Park. That building and pool is heavily used by Aquadarts, swimmers from other groups and schools and those from Davis High School.

Discussions about building an Olympic-size pool at Community Park has been going on for many years, including as part of the debate on the city’s long-term recreational facilities plan, which is inching its way toward the City Council. It is likely that such a pool could only be built following a large scale, public-private fundraising effort.

Many of the past fundraising efforts were led by the now-inactive Davis Sports Foundation, which was able to accept tax-deductible charitable donations. Because DAM is not a tax-exempt organization, the club has used the foundation as its fiscal agent for fundraising efforts.

DAM’s community service effort hasn’t all involved facilities. In recent years, the club has participated in these efforts as well:

* Soliciting donations of more than half a ton of donated food in January for the Food Bank of Yolo County and sponsoring other food drives at Thanksgiving and at the Lake Berryessa Open Water Swim.

* Promoting swimming as a way for seniors to stay healthy through discounted membership for those over 65 and charging no fees for swimmers 80 and over.

* Acknowledging achievements, motivation and dedication of senior swimmers with the annual Lillian M. Rowan Memorial Award.

* Promoting open water swim competition for young athletes by waiving fees for some of them at the annual Lake Berryessa race.

* Providing funds to support Davis sports clubs with money raised from the Lake Berryessa swim.

— Tom Martens is a Davis resident and a 15-year DAM member who serves on the nonprofit group’s board of directors. His column appears on the second Wednesday of the month. Reach him at [email protected] For information on DAM, call (530) 757-7946, send an e-mail to [email protected] or visit http://damfast.org

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