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| TThursday, February 12, 2015
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Little Skyler Beats the Odds for a ‘Good Life’
Company admits errors in tree report But still says none are worth preserving in proposed Aldergrove subdivision By DAN FERGUSON Aldergrove Star
KURT LANGMANN PHOTO
Skyler Poirier with her mother Eleanor at home in Aldergrove. Now 15 months old, Skyler is healthy and happy after defying death when she was born a tiny and highly vulnerable “premie” after only 25 weeks gestation. The Variety Club has played an important role in supporting the family through the crises.
‘Premie’ baby helped by Variety Club By KURT LANGMANN Aldergrove Star
A family from Aldergrove has a personal interest in the upcoming 49th Annual Variety Show of Hearts Telethon, taking place on Global BC this weekend, Feb. 14-15. Skyler Poirier was born prematurely by emergency C-section 15 months ago, after only 25 weeks gestation. Skyler was tiny, so small that her arm could comfortably fit inside her father Dan’s wedding band. She was also under-
developed and weak, and required ventilation and oxygen support for the first six months of her life. In Royal Columbian Hospital she contracted pneumonia and her lungs collapsed. Doctors were not hopeful she would survive. You wouldn’t know any of this to see Skyler today, though. She’s healthy, happy and strong, with a smile that could steal your heart. She’s a bit small for her age, at only 17 pounds, but she’s fully capable of feeding herself solid foods, crawling and standing
up — even taking her first tentative steps. “She’s just a tough cookie,” says proud momma, Eleanor. “She’s our little happy girl.” Skyler was a twin but unfortunately her fraternal twin was miscarried ten weeks earlier and did not survive. “Instead of my body absorbing the fetus, my body forced out the tiny baby along with the placenta,” said Eleanor. “Skyler’s placenta tore because of the distress and bed rest was mandatory.”
The company responsible for a arborist’s report that confused the types of trees in a proposed Aldergrove subdivision has admitted the mistakes, but insists the errors aren’t enough to justify saving more than a single tree. Sanderson Planning, a Vancouver company, made a written presentation to the council priorities committee meeting on Monday (Feb. 2) that defended the previous report as a “fair and accurate assessment of the conditions” on property near 28 Avenue and 276 Street. The firm was hired by the Township to help design a 61-lot neighbourhood on the proposed Betrand Creek Trails Estate development. The 2012 assessment determined there were no trees worth preserving on the property. It called for cutting down the existing 165 trees and replacing them with 303 replacement trees, arranged to fit around the detached houses planned for the property. The report was condemned by opponents of the development who want the Township-owned site preserved as an urban forest. They argued the decision by council to approve the sale was based on an error-riddled assessment that confused the types of trees. The critics included another arborist, Celeste Paley, who said that among other things the report confused cedar trees with maple trees and alders. Paley said the “discrepancies” and “misidentifications” were “worrisome.” In December, council put the project on hold to sort out the issue. At the Monday committee meeting, Sanderson filed an updated arborist’s report that aimed to correct the errors of the first. The new report said only “one tree in the stand of trees is thought to be a suitable candidate to be retained” and went to say that “correctly identifying tree species is not typically an issue” when assessing how trees deserve preservation. “This has never before occurred on numerous projects that we have been associated with the Township of Langley over the past 25 years” the report said. It added the mistakes happened during “the transfer of data from field notes into the final report” and went on to say that “there was no intent to falsify information, there was simply a human error made during the drafting of our report.” SEE: Page 3
SEE: Page 3
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