Public Health assists and supports the food service establishment in fulfilling its responsibilities through education, training, monitoring and regulation. Red critical violations indicate the most serious risks of food borne illness and the higher the value the higher the risk. The violation points for each item range from 5 to 30. However, a red critical violation worth 30 points may create more risk than a combination of smaller violations that add up to 30. This point system is used statewide and was developed by a panel of food safety experts from several health departments.
Black items are generally cleanliness issues, like clean floors, walls, and ceilings.
They are not likely to directly contribute to food borne illness and are therefore given less priority. Typically, if the violation is a one time occurrence, education or technical assistance during that routine inspection is all that is necessary to correct the problem. Civil penalties were designed for situations where the penalty is assessed against the owner of the real property. In most cases, that would mean that the penalty would be assessed against the landlord, not the food establishment operator. After an inspection occurs in a food service establishment, the inspection report is signed by the Food Safety Inspector and the person in charge of the food business.