How an Academic Partnership and Community Engagement Helped Design a Food Safety Rating System in Seattle & King County

Introduction

Public Health – Seattle & King County (Public Health) is one of the largest metropolitan health departments in the United States (U.S.). Serving a resident population of 2.1 million people speaking over 100 languages, Public Health’s mission is to protect and improve the health and wellbeing of all people in King County. Between 2000 and 2016 the county’s population grew by 21%, with most of this growth coming from immigrants from all parts of Asia, Latin America, Eastern Europe, and Africa.

Each year, millions of Americans get sick, hundreds of thousands are hospitalized, and thousands die as a result of foodborne diseases. To help with this issue, local governments support access to healthy food by ensuring adequate systems are in place to monitor the safety of the food within their jurisdictions. This is primarily done through the inspection of retail food establishments by local, county, or state public health departments. Increasingly, municipalities are also passing restaurant- grading ordinances that include the requirement that retail food establishments post food safety rating or sanitation grading information in a highly visible place, such as in restaurant windows.

These schemes are meant to provide consumers with simplified food safety information at the time of decision- making or purchase, and many large U.S. cities, including New York and Los Angeles, are already using restaurant grading systems. While these ordinances are gaining in popularity, researchers have called into question the efficacy of restaurant food safety grading in decreasing outbreaks of foodborne illness.

In addition, the equity impacts of restaurant grading on smaller food establishments, especially those serving culturally diverse populations, can be cause for concern.

King County’s Equity and Social Justice (ESJ) Initiative, launched in 2008 and codified in 2010, calls on local government to use an equity lens in policy and decision-making, organizational practices, and engagement with the community. To create a more prosperous and inclusive region for all, ESJ created an opportunity for Public Health to understand how those “who have been most disenfranchised—low-income residents, communities of color, and immigrants and refugees— could be prioritized in decisions and practices.”

Acknowledgements

This resource was developed for the Healthy Food Policy Project (HFPP) at the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems. This case study relies heavily on information provided during interviews and subsequent communications with Mike Zelek, Health Promotion and Policy Division Director, Chatham County Public Health Dep’t (July 19, 2017) and Jack Meadows, Director of Planning and Community Development, Siler City (July 25, 2017).

The HFPP collaborators thank these individuals for their contributions. We have not included citations to the information they have contributed throughout the body of this case study, but have relied upon it unless another source is indicated. Siler City maps and photos are included, courtesy of the Town of Siler City, and are all found in the Siler City, NC, Pedestrian Master Plan (2013).

The HFPP also thanks its Advisory Committee members for their guidance and feedback throughout the project. Advisory Committee members are: Dr. David Procter with the Rural Grocery Initiative at Kansas State University, Dr. Samina Raja with Growing Food Connections at the University of Buffalo, and Kathryn Lynch Underwood with the Detroit City Planning Commission. Previous advisory committee members include Pakou Hang with the Hmong American Farmers Association and Emily Broad Leib with the Harvard Food Law and Policy Clinic. Renee Gross, JD, served as a project consultant from 2015-2018.