5K Run Fund-Raiser to Aid Child’s Family

Ventura County firefighters will hold a 5K run in Newbury Park on Sunday morning to raise money for a colleague whose 6-year-old daughter underwent surgery for a brain tumor last week.

The fun run will begin at 9 a.m. at Banyon Elementary School at 1120 Knollwood Drive.

Hayley Burdick, a first-grader at Banyon, remained semiconscious in the Intensive Care Unit at Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles after her operation Monday.

The survival rate for such an operation is 78%, and Hayley is healing at a normal rate, said Capt. Jack Nosco, who is organizing the fund-raiser.

Nosco said he hopes to raise enough money to buy the Burdicks a van to help the family commute to Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles.

The family’s car broke down last week.

“They have been keeping the thing alive over the last few years,” Nosco said. “They just spent a bunch of money on it a month ago. Then, a week before this all happened, it broke down again.”

Randy and Lynne Burdick found out Sunday that their daughter had a brain tumor. Hayley, who turns 7 this Monday, had been sick with stomach problems. On Sunday she began vomiting and her legs buckled. Lynne Burdick, an administrator in a local emergency room, pulled out a medical book and started searching.

“She really diagnosed it,” Nosco said. “She said, ‘This sounds like a tumor.’ ”

By 4 o’clock that afternoon the tumor was confirmed. The next day Hayley underwent surgery, which removed 99.9% of the tumor, Nosco said.

Nosco works with Hayley’s father, Randy Burdick, a captain with the Ventura County Fire Department. The two men have known each other for 10 years and live around the corner from one another. Their daughters are best friends.

Nosco is trying to set up a trust fund for the family and to get a local dealer to offer a van to the family at a reduced price.

Runners in the 5K will gather and sing “Happy Birthday” to Hayley. Nosco will video-tape the song and the runners, all of whom will receive T-shirts with a drawing made by Hayley of a teddy bear and a bunch of hearts.

On Monday, Nosco will play the video for Hayley at the hospital.