The Union County Health Department (UCHD) makes sure to keep residents and business owners aware of food safety and the department’s health codes. Pictured is Marcia Dreiseidel, director of environmental health at the UCHD, demonstrating the proper way to store foods in a cooler during a food safety open house event at the department building Wednesday night. In addition, she covered what goes into a health inspection and how every restaurant typically receives one to two violations. She said the department’s role during health inspections is to educate people on the right decisions to make, rather than simply punish them for their infractions.
(Journal-Tribune photo by Jacob Runnels)
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Corner Carry Out is far from a restaurant or regular food-handling facility, and the only perishables it sells range from pre-packaged foods to milk.
Yet, it also receives health inspections just like any other restaurant or food-serving facility in town.
“The health department has actually been pretty good to us,” Corner Carry Out manager Julia Eickhoff said. “We’ve never had any major violations.”
Though the convenience store doesn’t sell many perishable food items, it has the potential to receive health code violations like any other food-handling facility. Eickhoff said the biggest violations the store would have to worry about would be if it was selling expired products or if the milk wasn’t being refrigerated.
The store did receive a critical violation in January, however, for having a dirty microwave.
Eickhoff took that reminder seriously, even though the microwave is only accessible to employees. She threw away the store’s microwave and bought a new one.
“When they come at us with a violation, it’s more of a reminder to us that this needs to be taken care of,” Eickhoff said. “They’re very nice and they are very educational.”
Though in its February inspection Corner Carry Out received non-critical violations, such as duct tape securing the carpet and having dust on the ceiling fan, its ownership still tries to make sure operations are handled safely, and it maintains a good, working relationship with the Union County Health Department (UCHD).
The Powell Chipotle incident
The UCHD wants to provide education rather than punish everyone who gets a violation. However, the department also takes its food inspections seriously.
In late July, nearly 700 people experienced food-related illnesses after visiting a Chipotle restaurant in Powell.
Marcia Dreiseidel, director of environmental health at the UCHD, said the department started looking at any calls about foodborne illnesses it had received recently. It was “all hands on deck,” she said. The department followed up with the Delaware General Health District and other near-by health departments to see if the problem was larger than Powell’s Chipotle.
A wave of relief followed after learning the issue was isolated to Powell and had not affected the Marysville Chipotle. It also gave a reminder of how the health department takes its inspections seriously.
“We have lots of good and experienced sanitarians out there looking at our restaurants and making sure people are doing the corrective actions they need,” Dreiseidel said. “There’s a lot of things that go into making sure that this stuff gets corrected.”
From citing issues like dirty can opener blades to not using a handwashing sink for its intended purpose, the UCHD’s sanitarians make sure to note each infraction during their surprise health inspections. They categorize violations as critical, which would pose an immediate threat to public health, and non-critical, which Dreiseidel said are “housekeeping issues” that “do not typically lead to someone getting sick.”
In her history at the UCHD, Dreiseidel said she’s never seen a restaurant close because of a health violation. Dreiseidel said though violations are given, the department wants to work as educators, and to see these businesses succeed.
“Our main goal is to protect public health, and if that means they have to close for a day or a couple of days, we will work with that operator to get them open as quickly as possible, without threatening public health” she said.
But what if it’s a case like Corner Carry Out, where the critical violation is just a dirty microwave customers can’t use?
“Just because they have a critical violation or two, there is no threshold of closing,” Dreiseidel said. “It depends on what that violation is, and if they can correct it while we’re there.”
She said a critical violation, like a dirty can opener or microwave, is addressed on the spot, and is solved relatively quickly. They’re less severe compared to other violations, but she said they must be addressed, as they can grow into bigger problems.
“Everybody has a bad day… and if we happen to show up when it’s a bad day for them… maybe that’s not necessarily the way they typically are,” she said. “I would encourage people to look at the total history, and not just one inspection report.”
Challenges of cleanliness
It may seem easy to make sure a business is maintaining health codes, but sometimes that’s not the case.
Eickhoff said though the Corner Carry Out doesn’t have many health codes to maintain, the difficult challenge comes with employees knowing what to clean and how often to do it, despite the store having a low turnover rate.
“I can imagine with turnover at other places, it’s more difficult with training (at corporate franchises),” Eickhoff said.
Dreiseidel said one of the biggest challenges to making sure facilities are clean is the turnover rate at a business. Employees changing out is one thing, but she said whenever managers or owners switch, they’re probably “not keeping staff informed” about cleaning standards.
She said the UCHD offers ways to educate businesses on how to keep their places clean, besides what they tell operators during inspections, by offering classes.
“It kind of depends on the operator or manager and how they are managing their staff and training,” Dreiseidel said. “You need to train your people to get them to stay. If they are well-trained and know what their job is and feel comfortable doing it, then they are more comfortable to stay.”
Dreiseidel said larger chain facilities may have their own corporate health inspectors and internal inspections.
With corporations being able to have their own inspectors hold inspections in addition to UCHD inspections, this puts a disadvantage on local facilities because they may not have access to those resources. However, Dreiseidel said she’s seen local facilities still try their best to maintain cleanliness.
She said local facilities can do just as well as corporate places can when it comes to following health codes, and are just as likely to call the UCHD for training or advice as the corporate places do.
And while Corner Carry Out enjoys a low turnover, Eickhoff said it also sees little challenge to keep up with health codes.