Report: Nearly Half Of Boston Restaurants Had Serious Health Violations In 2014
BOSTON (CBS) - There's a new report out that's enough to scare you right out of your restaurant seat. The Boston Globe crunched the numbers and found that nearly half of Boston's restaurants had health and sanitary violations last year, serious enough to possibly make you sick.
The Globe found the restaurants with the most serious violations in 2014 were the Best BBQ Kitchen in Chinatown, Cosi cafe and Master Wok, both inside South Station.
There are about 3,000 restaurants, food trucks and other food service locations in Boston. The report says inspectors found the most serious type of violations in more than 1,300 of them. The range of violations across the city include not keeping food at proper temperatures, sanitary problems like employees not washing their hands, and even evidence of insects or rodents near food.
"These are violations that have been caught and been fixed," says Commissioner William Christopher, the head of Boston's Inspectional Services. People from that agency inspect every restaurant at least once a year.
Christopher is working on a system where restaurants are required to post a letter grade based on their violations, like they do in New York City. "You and I have stores across the street from each other and you're at an 'A' and I'm at a 'C', obviously I'm going to try and improve my situation so I can be more competitive with you," says Christopher.
Until then, you're not helpless. You can check out the website The Mayor's Food Court. You can search any restaurant in Boston and see if there are health violations and whether they've been fixed.
No one from the three restaurants mentioned in this report would talk to us on camera, but a representative from Cosi points out that the restaurant passed its last inspection. The other two also passed, but with "minor" violations remaining.
