At 84, retired officer still has much to offer
By Vicki Viotti
Advertiser Staff Writer
The world's a tougher place than when Ladislaus Roger Piwowarski began service as a police reservist more than a half-century ago. Most of that time he spent working with juveniles, and he says they're tougher, too.
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser
But he sees the mission for others like him, the 75 remaining reserve officers of the Honolulu Police Department, as unchanged: service to others.
Ladislaus Roger Piwowarski, 84, who retired from the police reserves in March, was congratulated by other officers during a ceremony yesterday at HPD headquarters. Piwowarski, a Pearl Harbor survivor, served with the force since 1950.
"It's a great blessing to know somebody loves you and that you love others," the 84-year-old retiree told a roomful of police officers who gathered yesterday to honor him as the longest-serving reserve officer.
Piwowarski, who retired from the police reserves in March, is a Pearl Harbor survivor. He remembers with youthful clarity the terror of returning to his ship, the USS Oglala, to find it already listing and his officers ordering him to safety. He settled down in Hawai'i after the war and enlisted in the reserves in November 1950.
In those days, officers of the voluntary reserve corps wore khaki uniforms complete with neckties and a seven-point star as a badge, said Officer Eddie Croom, curator of the Honolulu Police Department museum.
And they were expected to pay for those uniforms and weapons, and install sirens in their own cars, said Maj. Bart Huber of the police juvenile services division where Piwowarski served for more than 28 years.
Times — and police uniforms — have changed a lot since Piwowarski joined the reserve force.
A father of two, Piwowarski helped found what is now called the Evening Counseling Program for first-time juvenile offenders in 1981.
"He's still helping out as many evenings as possible," Huber said.
Piwowarski was born in New Jersey, the son of a farmer who, he said, made very little money. After enlisting in the Navy, he said, he sent almost half his $20 weekly salary to his parents.
"Today, you give a kid $20, and they say, 'That's all?' " he said.
Although satisfied with his civilian career as a claims adjuster for Matson Navigation, Piwowarski still views working with youths as rewarding public service, "because I have something to offer."
That's all the reason he needed for his volunteer work, which has extended to his church as well as the police force.
"This is what we come in this world for — not to take up space, I can tell you that," he said.
