Personal Injury Law

Oregon: Good restaurants reap benefits of making inspection results publicly available

By Dr. Doug Powell

Some restaurants in Estacada, Oregon have learned the benefits of disclosing restaurant inspection results to the public, reports Escadanew.com. In Escada inspection results for local diners are posted at the premise, in the form of a 'Complied' or 'Failed to Comply' card in the establishment window, and the full report plus numerical score is available online.

Additionally Dirty Dining highlights those establishments that have received a high inspection score, between 90-100, and one business owner is reaping the benefits.

Hitchin Post Pizza has been in business for five years, and has scored well on all of its inspections, earning at least a 95 in the last five.

Manager Valerie Ann Ballantyne said her good inspection results have improved business,

'I was on Dirty Dining for being one of the 10 restaurants in Oregon with a perfect score. Just for being on Dirty Dining we had several people come in.'

She continued,

'I take pride in keeping my establishment very, very clean. It's very, very important for people to come into a clean establishment and not have to worry about getting sick. I know I would never eat in a place that wasn't clean.'

It's not as easy as it may seem to receive a perfect score.

'You have to make sure the refrigerator is at the right temperature, the bleach buckets have the right consistency, the filters are clean...the list just goes on and on,' said Ballantyne.

Hitchin Post Pizza, and the other 23 dining establishments in the Estacada area, know what the standards are and expect a representative from the Clackamas County Health Department to visit at least twice a year.

In Escada establishments are inspected unannounced twice a year, with additional inspections when necessary. They are scored starting at 100 per cent and subtracting 1 or 2 points for non-critical items and 4 or 5 points for critical items, which are considered more serious and can cause food-borne illness.

Full post as published by BarfBlog on June 18, 2009 (boomark / email).