Restaurant Health Ratings Advised

The Ventura County Grand Jury weighed in on restaurant ratings Wednesday, recommending that the county adopt a system allowing customers to learn how clean local eateries are before stopping in for a bite.

In its year-end report, the panel, whose role is chiefly advisory, suggested that the county’s Environmental Health Division devise an easily read rating system that would tell consumers how the restaurant fared in recent health inspections.

Los Angeles, Riverside and San Diego counties all post A, B and C ratings in restaurant windows.

An effort to enact a similar system in Ventura County fell flat in 1998 when supervisors rejected a rating plan 4 to 1.

“I think it’s something we need,” Supervisor Frank Schillo, the lone dissenter in the 1998 vote, said Wednesday.

Schillo said he once spoke to a group of local mayors and asked how many knew that a popular Thousand Oaks restaurant had been cited by health officials for rat infestation.

“None did,” he said. “The public has a right to know this.”

Schillo said pressure from restaurants helped kill the county’s 1998 ratings plan effort.

Dan Del Campo, mayor pro tem of Thousand Oaks, is a longtime supporter of a ratings system. His belief in ratings began after he got phone calls from residents who became ill after eating out.

“I did some investigation and got the number of restaurant closings from the health department,” he said. “It had names you wouldn’t expect, popular places in Thousand Oaks.”

But Terry Gilday, acting director of the Ventura County Department of Environmental Health, has concerns about a rating system, saying it doesn’t actually tell much about the restaurant.

People know A, B and C from school, but the way they are used to rate restaurants may differ in each case, Gilday said. In Riverside and San Diego counties, A does not mean excellent, B does not mean good and C does not mean average, he noted.

“A is adequate, B has problems and C ought to be closed,” he said. “It’s too simplistic to convey what the public needs to know.”

In Los Angeles County, the A grade means the facility got between 90 and 100 points, with 100 being the best. A rating of B is for 80 to 89, and a C is 70 to 79 points.

Grand jury foreman Marvin Reeber said the panel was looking at a rating system like the one used in Los Angeles.

Currently, the Environmental Health Department lists restaurant closures on its Web site and is working on a system that would allow it to list the details on why an establishment was closed.

Gilday said a grading system would necessitate hiring more staff as restaurants with low grades ask for repeated inspections to improve their ratings.

“It’s expensive and doesn’t do much for food safety,” he said.

Among the grand jury’s other recommendations Wednesday were for the county to hire more psychiatrists for its mental health programs and to increase housing for the mentally ill.

Over the past several weeks, the grand jury has released interim reports on issues ranging from mental health to water rates.

The grand jury reviews county government operations and issues reports, as well as handing down criminal indictments. The reports generally serve as recommendations to supervisors, who seldom make policy changes based on the findings.