How safe is that restaurant in Georgia? New system spells it out
A green 'A' on the front door will be far better than a red 'U' under the state code
Knowing how clean a restaurant is will soon be as easy as reading your ABC's - and U's.
Customers won't even have to walk inside a restaurant to know how it scored. New state rules require posting the grades on drive-through windows and front doors, with a few exceptions.
The changes are part of an overhaul of Georgia's 10-year-old food service code that will take effect later this year. Many of the changes are intended to reduce the risk of foodborne illness, from requiring restaurants to have someone certified in food safety on staff, to barring buffet servers from pouring a half-empty canister of broccoli salad into one fresh from the kitchen.
The letter grade system should give a more accurate picture of a restaurant's operations, said Mike Mullet, a spokesman for the Georgia Division of Public Health.
"We know when a restaurant is above par or below par, but the scoring system we had didn't really reflect what the inspector saw in the restaurant," said Vernon Goins, a spokesman for the Gwinnett County Health Department. "Now ... it will be immediately clear to anyone who's checking out a restaurant if they want to eat there or not, based on the grade they got. This is getting Georgia in line with the rest of the country."
The state's current system allows restaurants with one critical violation - such as holding foods at an improper temperature, which could cause foodborne illness - to earn a score in the 90s. The new grading system awards an "A" only if none of those categories is violated.
The grading rules are tougher in other ways, too. Restaurants that fail in at least three critical categories must display a red "U" on their doors and can only raise their grade to a "C" on initial re-inspection. They'll have to keep the yellow "C" on their door for 60 days, until the next routine inspection.
"The health department will be taken more seriously by the restaurants with this approach," said Michael Doyle, director of the University of Georgia Center for Food Safety in Griffin.
External Source - For the complete article click here
Source - Journal and Constitution
Customers won't even have to walk inside a restaurant to know how it scored. New state rules require posting the grades on drive-through windows and front doors, with a few exceptions.
The changes are part of an overhaul of Georgia's 10-year-old food service code that will take effect later this year. Many of the changes are intended to reduce the risk of foodborne illness, from requiring restaurants to have someone certified in food safety on staff, to barring buffet servers from pouring a half-empty canister of broccoli salad into one fresh from the kitchen.
The letter grade system should give a more accurate picture of a restaurant's operations, said Mike Mullet, a spokesman for the Georgia Division of Public Health.
"We know when a restaurant is above par or below par, but the scoring system we had didn't really reflect what the inspector saw in the restaurant," said Vernon Goins, a spokesman for the Gwinnett County Health Department. "Now ... it will be immediately clear to anyone who's checking out a restaurant if they want to eat there or not, based on the grade they got. This is getting Georgia in line with the rest of the country."
The state's current system allows restaurants with one critical violation - such as holding foods at an improper temperature, which could cause foodborne illness - to earn a score in the 90s. The new grading system awards an "A" only if none of those categories is violated.
The grading rules are tougher in other ways, too. Restaurants that fail in at least three critical categories must display a red "U" on their doors and can only raise their grade to a "C" on initial re-inspection. They'll have to keep the yellow "C" on their door for 60 days, until the next routine inspection.
"The health department will be taken more seriously by the restaurants with this approach," said Michael Doyle, director of the University of Georgia Center for Food Safety in Griffin.
External Source - For the complete article click here
Source - Journal and Constitution
