Schumer Urges FDA Action Against Filthy Food Suppliers
ALBANY, N.Y. (CBSNewYork/AP) -- Sen. Charles Schumer is urging the Food and Drug Administration to implement a plan to address recent reports of rat-infested warehouses that supply food to restaurants.
The New York Democrat said during a midtown news conference Sunday that the FDA sent warning letters to 90 food facilities across the country in 2014, including one in Brooklyn. The conditions found by the FDA, Schumer said, include "dead rodents and bird droppings, rat carcases, bird nests, excrement."
He's calling on the FDA to increase the regularity of inspections, increase fines for violations, and create an easily searchable database for restaurants and consumers to see which food processing and storage facilities have poor sanitation records.
Currently, the FDA only releases info on violations to the public at the end of the year, Schumer told reporters, including WCBS 880's Jim Smith and 1010 WINS' Kevin Rincon.
"The process takes too long and is much too private," he said.
"There's no easy way for the purchasing restaurants and the public to find out which warehouses have violations."
Schumer said retail food vendors should have a clear way of knowing if the products they are buying are from a facility with known violations cited by the FDA.
WCBS 880 reached out to the FDA for comment but had not heard back as of Sunday afternoon.
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