Restaurants: Flunk the Filthy

You may have noticed the Thursday Times’ exceptionally long list of Los Angeles County restaurants shut down for health code violations in December. That list should be a sign that the Health Department has cleaned up its own act and that the county supervisors have reacquainted themselves with their oversight responsibilities.

New procedures are based on letter grades, an A for superior health practices. That’s fine, but there is some important refining to do.

KCBS-TV took up the health cudgel in November, reporting that the county Health Services Department had allowed restaurants to remain open despite numerous health code violations. Some restaurants had not been inspected for as long as two years. That’s staggering. San Diego County requires four inspections per establishment per year, for instance. Los Angeles County Health Services Director Mark Finucane has acknowledged that his department last year failed to spend $6 million of the money it budgeted for inspections.

So now each Los Angeles County restaurant will have to post the letter grade it received in its last inspection, based on a rating scale that gives an A to restaurants falling in the 90-to-100 range, a B for 80 to 89 and a C for 70 to 79. Restaurants within the 60-to-69 range have to post their exact numbers, and if any restaurant is deemed unfit it can be closed immediately. Los Angeles County jumped the gun a bit and now is making “corrections” to give added numerical weight to serious infractions. That decision should have been implemented before the system was unveiled.

Nevertheless, the Los Angeles system is far more informative than those in San Diego and Riverside counties. A in those jurisdictions simply means minimum health code standards have been met. B means improvements must be made, and C means a health hazard that could close the restaurant.

Orange County officials use an “excellent to poor” rating system but don’t require that results be posted. Their thinking is similar to the federal Food and Drug Administration’s--that posting results gives customers a false sense of security. That’s worth noting: The rating represents only the day of the inspection.

Ventura County does not have letter grades. Officials there say they want to avoid tension with restaurants that might lead to less compliance. What is this, a U.N. weapons inspection? Not surprisingly, some Los Angeles restaurateurs aren’t happy with their county’s new grading system. The next thing you know, they’ll want to be graded on a curve.