Grocery stores provide a particularly compelling example of the proliferation of state regulation. While Texas has regulated some aspects of grocery store operations for more than half a century, the 1991 Legislature established the state's general licensing program for food retailers. All food retailers must be licensed by either TDH or a local health department and meet state food-safety inspection standards. This license, however, represents only a small part of the total regulatory burden on many grocery stores. Modern food retailers offer a dizzying array of products and services, from pharmaceuticals and alcoholic beverages to lottery tickets and video arcades, and consequently are regulated by an equally bewildering maze of state programs.
Permits expire on different dates, require different forms, and involve different fees.
Inspections are not coordinated, and standards and enforcement procedures vary from agency to agency. The Legislature has attempted to streamline state business regulation. For instance, some license renewal dates that inadvertently hampered efficient agency administration have been eliminated. Statutory renewal dates are particularly troublesome to streamlining efforts, since new legislation is needed to harmonize them for any integration of license processes. Yet such streamlining is eminently practical, since the present system often requires a food retailer to fill out more than a dozen different license renewal forms with essentially the same information.