News from City Hall

City Communications Office

City of Kansas City, Mo.

http://www.kcmo.org

CONTACT: Mary Charles, city communications officer, (816) 513-1356

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Jan. 12, 2010

Health Department announces Food Excellence Award recipients

The City of Kansas City, Mo., Health Department has announced the recipients of its sixth annual Grade A Food Excellence Award for 2009. This year, 95 food service establishments qualified for the award, including full-scale restaurants, fast-food establishments, school cafeterias, bakeries, convenience stores, grocery stores and others.

The award recognizes food establishments that have continuously demonstrated excellence in compliance with the City’s Food Code and other public health standards established by the Health Department. The award is valid for one year. The 2010 award recipients will be announced in January 2011.

“We are proud of the quality and safety of food establishments in Kansas City,” said Councilwoman Cindy Circo, 5th District at large. “We appreciate the effort that the majority of establishments put into cooperating with the Health Department and providing a safe eating experience, but I would especially like to extend my congratulations to the award recipients.”

The Health Department recognizes that excellence is best achieved when food service management fully endorses employee education and training. Therefore, the 2009 Grade A Food Excellence Award is being awarded to establishments that have exhibited excellence in sanitation and food safety, as well as evidence of successful employee education.

All food establishments in Kansas City, Mo., are inspected regularly by the Health Department. To remain open, food establishments must pass these inspections. The establishments recognized with this award have substantially exceeded the Food Code standards.

The full list of recipients and further information on the award is available on the City’s Web site at http://www.kcmo.org/health.

Media inquiries on this topic should be directed to Jeff Hershberger, public information officer for the Health Department, (816) 840-2548 (pager).

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