By Tony Biasotti, Ventura County Star
March 2, 2010
County officials Tuesday defended their recent order to a Camarillo hardware store to stop giving away coffee and doughnuts, saying they were more concerned about the store’s practice of cooking and serving barbecued meat.
County Supervisor Kathy Long, whose district includes the Camarillo location of the B&B Do It Center, asked Environmental Health Director Bob Gallagher to discuss the issue at Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting.
Both Gallagher and supervisors said they thought the matter was blown out of proportion in a Ventura County Star story last week that mentioned the coffee and doughnuts but not the unpermitted barbecue.
“In this specific instance, we got a complaint that a hardware store was barbecuing meat,” Gallagher said. “That’s something we would normally respond to, and we did. The business was cooperative — we asked them to stop that and they did.”
The store was also selling some food items and giving out coffee and doughnuts without a proper permit, and the owners agreed to stop doing that as well, Gallagher said.
“When we visited, we found that they also put out coffee and doughnuts as something for their customers,” he said. “Normally we wouldn’t be involved in a business if that’s all they were doing, but because we were in there dealing with the other food operation, they came under our oversight.”
Gallagher said county food-safety inspectors are told to concentrate on people and businesses that handle “high-risk food.”
“Normally, a hardware store or other business that’s putting out comparatively low-risk items like coffee, or lollipops for kids, we’re not regulating that,” he said.
Long said environmental health workers have been unfairly criticized since the matter came to light, as bloggers and news organizations across the country have picked up the story.
“The inspection was in response to a legitimate complaint, and the hardware store was very complimentary in response to the inspector on how it was handled,” Long said. “That should have been the end of the story, and it really spun out of control.”
John Moore, metro editor of The Star, said an Environmental Health Division official was interviewed for more than 15 minutes by a reporter for last week’s story and never mentioned the violation was for unpermitted barbecue. “Had she said that, we certainly would have included the information in our original story,” Moore said.
The family-run hardware store has been serving customers free coffee for 20 years and doughnuts for the past six or seven years, owner Randy Collins said Tuesday.
Collins said employees were only promoting the store’s new barbecue smoker by cooking the meat in front for a few hours on Saturdays.
“We were only doing it a month or two,” Collins said. “Customers would ask for samples, and frankly the employees just did not realize they were doing anything wrong. That caused the complaint, and we stopped it as soon as the Health Department came in.”
When Collins was told the doughnuts and coffee also had to go unless he made various changes to his store — including putting in a new three-compartment sink, a refrigerator and approved flooring — he decided to stop the free caffeine and sweet treats, he said.
Collins said he also was told to stop selling candy.
“This is so common in so many small businesses, like salons, car dealerships, barber shops, even the dentist,” Collins said. “It’s so common in the small business world, but do these businesses know it is illegal? I’m not angry ... I’m just disappointed. It’s still nice to serve your customers something.”
— Staff writer Marjorie Hernandez contributed to this report.
Ping to #5.
From personal experience, I can tell you that Board of “Health” Nazis are among the most power-drunk individuals on the face of the earth. I’ve never met a single one of them who was worth knowing in any way.
If I had my druthers, there would BE no Boards of “Health”, but since that ain’t gunna happen...they should be leashed and muzzled until SOMETHING ACTUALLY HAPPENS.
For example, they should have NO SAY in this hardware store’s business at all, unless the guys down at the store are dragging their customers over to the coffee pot and donuts and shoving a gun in their ribs until they eat.
Never in my life have I met such a bunch of sniveling busybodies. Bleech! Just the thought of them makes me sick. And this sort of thing is EVERYWHERE today! What’s wrong with people? Do they really want some bureaucratic nincompoop making decisions on donut consumption for them?
Personally, I’d rather take my chances on my own than have them sticking their noses under every tent.
/rant
Regards,