When you eat at local restaurants and food establishments this year, you may want to look for a Jefferson County Health Department sticker with a QR code you can scan with your smartphone to learn how the business scored on its last three health inspections.
The Health Department is in the process of putting up the QR codes in establishments throughout Jefferson County.
“They’re being put up by each of the inspectors,” said Dan Kane, environmental supervisor for the Health Department. “We have nine inspectors and they’re going up as they inspect.”
He said the department averages 50 to 65 inspections a week, and there are more than 950 permitted food establishments in the county. Most are restaurants, but they also include grocery stores, hotels, convenience stores, schools, nursing homes and day care centers.
“I think sometime by spring (the QR codes) should all be up in every facility,” Kane said. “From our website, anybody from the public has the ability to access the same site that the QR code takes you to.”
QR codes will be displayed in restaurants, grocery stores and other facilities serving and storing food. These codes will allow users to search for health inspection information.
To see a specific food establishment’s three most recent inspection reports, scan a QR code or visit jeffcohealth.org/environmental and click on “View Food Establishment Health Inspection Scores.” From there, you may either enter the business’ license number from the QR code or the business name. Having the license number is helpful if the restaurant has several locations.
“The QR code is kind of a reminder or an easy way for folks to get (to the website) because it has the license number. Once they get to that portal, they know which facility to search for,” Health Department spokeswoman Brianne Zwiener said.
Grading system
In 2021, the department began looking into a scoring system for food establishments, Kane said.
While looking at what other counties were doing, Health Department staff came across a study that said scoring systems are worthwhile, he said.
“Research from the University of Minnesota from 2022 showed that jurisdictions where a scoring system or a grading system is used, they have fewer reinspections, fewer restaurant complaints, fewer foodborne illness outbreaks,” he said. “This practice can lead to a greater focus on food safety practices and fewer violations. Inspectors also reported that the scoring system has been a valuable education tool with retail food operators.”
Kane said the department’s goal for the new system is to increase compliance among the food establishments and decrease the risk of foodborne illnesses among the public, as well as to educate the public.
“Jefferson County had never had a grading system for their food inspections, so we were looking at how can we implement those without disrupting the relationships that we’ve had with all of the food establishments and restaurant owners,” he said. “We didn’t want to go straight into it and just post a grade on their door with no warning.”
Zwiener said the department held meetings to see whether food establishments preferred a letter or a number score on the door or a QR code that wouldn’t have to be replaced every few months.
She said everyone seemed to be on board with making a score available to the public.
In early 2023, Health Department inspectors began providing restaurants with a score without posting it publicly or online, Kane said.
“It was just this is what your score would have been for this inspection,” he said. “And then (in 2024) we moved into where those scores were available but it was only on our website. Now we’re rolling out the QR code so it’s available to the public.”
Since the program started, the Health Department has seen an increase in facilities scoring at least a 95 out of 100 and a reduction in scores under 75, Kane said, adding that the reinspection rate has slowly decreased and is now down to one in 10 inspections requiring a reinspection.
“(Reinspection is not really based on the score you get; it’s really the type of violation,” he said. “There’s priority violations, priority foundation violations and then core violations.
“If you only had just core violations, but you had 30 of them, it wouldn’t necessarily mean that there would be a reinspection at that point. It would be more up to the inspectors if they deemed that was necessary, especially if they’re having the same violations from one time to another. They can have a reinspection because they’re just not correcting violations.
“But the priority and priority foundation violations, they have to be corrected within a certain amount of time. Priority violations typically are corrected the same day before the inspector leaves. There’s a few that can’t be corrected. Let’s say if a cooler is (not at the right temperature) and it’s not able to hold food, we’ll have to move the food and may even have to discard the food, but we will do a reinspection to check that that cooler was maintained or somebody came to fix it.”
Kane said it’s rare for the Health Department to call for a food establishment to be closed.
“It’s quite a process to go through to close a facility,” he said. “Our process is an inspector would have to feel there’s an imminent health hazard, and then they call a team leader who is a more experienced inspector and then if that inspector also feels (the business) should be closed down, they would call me and I would have them explain the situation, and I would ask my boss, (community services manager) Jeana Vidacak, and usually we have a meeting between me, her and (Executive Director) Steve Sikes just to talk it over.”
Most temporary closures involve a power outage, fire or sewage backup.
Zwiener said the QR code gives food establishments a way to show off how well they are doing.
“(Customers) can pull up that whole report so they don’t just see the score,” she said. “They see the issues or things that were talked about and corrected.”
For example, if a restaurant scores 97 out of 100 points, you can see all the things they are complying with and all the things they are keeping up with on a regular basis,” she said.
Kane said each establishment must post something to let the public know how they’re doing on their inspection, and they are given the following options: post the most recent inspection report for public viewing at the establishment, post the QR code or come up with another method, such as posting a placard with a score from the most recent inspection.
Inspections
On social media, the Health Department has begun explaining the food inspection process.
The Jefferson County Food Code requires food safety training for every food establishment.
During inspections, the inspectors check temperatures for hot and cold surfaces and use testing strips on dishwater, Kane said.
“We’re a second set of eyes or a fresh pair of eyes to (help managers) see things where they can do better,” he said.
Kane said most facilities have pest control services that visit on a monthly basis so pests are not a common problem.
“I would say probably our biggest concern is just proper hand washing,” Kane said. “The other one would be just like cross contamination, when they’re working with raw meats and then ready-to-eat foods like vegetables or lettuce or something like that, contaminating one from another. As far as the most common violations, those are our biggest concerns. But I think the most common would probably be contaminated equipment … not cleaning up to standard.”
Kane said the job is to reinspect restaurants until they are good, adding that all inspections are unannounced.
He said overall, food establishments in the county are doing a good job.
“There’s nowhere in the county I wouldn’t eat,” he said.
Kane said the Health Department will continue its effort to educate the public about the work it does to make sure food establishments comply with safety standards.
“We plan to hit a bit harder in 2025 on what an environmental public health specialist is and what they do, what those inspections look like, what they’re doing while they’re back there and why it’s important,” Zwiener said. “We’re hoping to kind of give a behind-the-scenes look to the community to provide a little bit more education because they are the unsung public health heroes. If they do their job, no one knows they’re there. That’s really kind of how it is because if they’re doing their job and they’re working with the food establishments, they are preventing any problems before it even happens.”