The Janowicz family of Shell Beach wants city officials to remember it was their father, Frank Janowicz, a former Pismo Beach city councilman and mayor, who created the first walkway linking Shell Beach and Pismo Beach.

“I think it’s neat the city is doing the sidewalk, but I just don’t want them to forget it was my dad’s idea,” Joe Janowicz said about a sidewalk project Pismo Beach recently undertook at Dinosaur Caves Park.

The new concrete sidewalk will meander along Price Street from Cliff Avenue through the park to the existing sidewalk near Shelter Cove Lodge, providing an improved pathway for pedestrians, according to city staff.

Currently, people must use an unimproved path to walk, run, jog or bicycle past the blufftop park along Price Street.

“This was here in 1971, and over the years, it has just gradually disappeared,” Joe said about the 1.3-mile walkway that his father constructed linking Shell Beach from Cliff Avenue to Pismo Beach. “It is and always should be the Janowicz Walkway.”

Janowicz, who sat on the city council in the late 1960s and early 1970s, saw the need to join Shell Beach to Pismo Beach and embarked on constructing the decomposed granite walkway, which was dedicated by the city on Sept. 11, 1971.

n n n

Advertisement

Prior to the walkway’s construction, there was no safe way to walk or ride a bicycle between the two communities, and trying to get from Pismo to Shell Beach, or vice versa, on foot was a dangerous feat at best.

“There was no sidewalk there, and Frank decided he would do it,” said Joe Crescione, former Pismo councilman and mayor, who sat with Janowicz on the City Council. “In those days, the city didn’t have any money ... city council people took on projects themselves.”

“Ninety percent (of the project) was done by Frank’s sweat and blood,” he added.

Janowicz’s daughter, June Janowicz Torre, said the walkway was definitely a community project that employed lots of volunteer time and energy and helped bring Pismo Beach and Shell Beach together.

“It was a big deal,” Joe said. “People really got behind the idea.”

Since its construction more than 30 years ago, the walkway has been paved over to make way for bicycle lanes, and many people who now live in Shell Beach and Pismo Beach don’t even know the path once existed, extending all the way to Grand Avenue in Grover Beach.

But, with the help of the city, the Janowicz family hopes to bring their father’s vision and hard work to make his community a little safer back into the limelight.

n n n

In 1981, three years after Janowicz died at 56 from a heart attack, the city dedicated a concrete memorial, complete with a plaque and wood bench at Dinosaur Caves Park to Janowicz’s memory and foresight.

And over the years, 87-year-old Esther Janowicz, Frank’s widow, has visited the memorial almost daily, bringing potted flowers and water to the site and hanging ribbons from the monument on holidays.

Esther made the trek to the memorial, carrying water up the hill by hand, so she could be close to her husband and remember what he did for their family and the city, she said.

But now that the city has moved the memorial and taken out the bench to make way for the new sidewalk project, she and her five children are keeping their fingers crossed that everything will be put back the way it’s been since July 3, 1981.

“It’s not just the history of our family; it’s a part of the history of the whole community,” Joy Janowicz Parker said. “We don’t even know where it’s going to be.”

Pismo Beach Mayor Mary Ann Reiss met with the Janowicz family recently and said she’s reassured them the monument will be re-erected somewhere in the park.

“Everything will be replaced,” Reiss said. “It’s really important that the family feels good about how it goes back. We will continue to consult with them so they feel comfortable with what we do.”

Reiss didn’t know where the Janowicz memorial would be placed after the sidewalk project is finished later this month, but said the city plans to place it on a concrete pad to make it more visible.

“I think it will be nice for the family and the city,” Reiss added. “It’s important that it stays visible.”

The mayor said she also plans to speak with city staff about possibly rededicating the memorial and walkway in the future.

“It was emotional just to move it at all,” Joe said. “And it should go back the way it was. That’s the least the city can do.”

Esther, who wasn’t contacted by the city when the memorial was removed, will be happy once the city puts the monument back in its rightful home, showing her husband the respect she believes he deserves for undertaking the walkway so long ago, she said.

“I don’t want them to take credit for my husband’s idea,” Esther said. “It doesn’t show respect to who did it, and I want them to respect him.”

The Janowicz monument, including the wooden bench, was erected near the corner of Cliff Avenue and Price Street, where a ribbon-cutting ceremony was held in July 1971 to dedicate the walkway.

April Charlton can be reached at 489-4206, Ext. 5016, or acharlton@santamariatimes.com.

September 4, 2008