Aviary is evacuee's sanctuary

In August of 2005, when Caitlin DesRosier flew to Salt Lake City to get out of the way of a hurricane, she had no idea that three years later she would still be here, or that she'd find herself on the front lines of a crusade to save a bunch of longtime local residents from having to fly the coop themselves.

But here she is, manning the entrance booth at Tracy Aviary, encouraging everyone she meets to vote yes on Election Day for Proposition 1 and thereby save the aviary, and the winged residents who live here, from rack and ruin.

Prop. 1 would allocate $19.6 million in taxpayer money to the financially strapped and rapidly deteriorating bird zoo located in the southwest corner of Liberty Park.

The money would allow the aviary to upgrade its facilities to a point that it could conceivably regain the accreditation it lost in 2006 when the Association of Zoos and Aquariums inspected the premises and found that the facilities were not up to bird standards.

Caitlin knows what it's like to face housing problems. She was a resident of New Orleans in the summer of 2005, working for a sales company, when she turned on the radio one day to a report that said a hurricane was coming and anyone who could afford to should get out of town while the getting was good.

Caitlin took the news with a grain of salt. She grew up in Miami and was used to dire warnings when hurricanes were ripping across the Atlantic. Sometimes the calls for evacuation were well founded, often they were not.

But she had some time off coming at work, so she packed her bags and caught a flight to Salt Lake City to visit a friend.

A few days later, she watched on television as Hurricane Katrina busted through the levees and leveled New Orleans.

Included in the destruction was the house where she had been living, her car, a trusty old Saab, and her job. She would never see any of them again.

"I was left with two bags of clothing — the airlines lost the other one — and that was it," Caitlin says.

She took some time to overcome the shock and decide where she ought to live.

Then one day she woke up and realized the answer was right at her doorstep.

"I fell in love with this place," she says. "Salt Lake felt so safe, it's so beautiful here."

For work, she decided to see if Tracy Aviary had any job openings.

"I've always loved birds. I had a pet raven as a kid in Texas," she says. "I'm a bird nerd."

Not only did she find a job at the aviary, she found a sanctuary.

She calls Tracy Aviary "this wonderful little jewel" and sees it as one of Salt Lake's greatest assets. On top of that, it can be a great stress reducer.

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