The city’s health department conducted fewer restaurant and rodent inspections due to staffing shortages last fiscal year, affecting its ability to reduce the threat of foodborne illness and animal-related risks to human health, according to the annual Mayor’s Management Report published this week.
According to the “report card,” which compiles metrics to track trends across city agencies throughout each fiscal year, the health department conducted inspections at 66% of city restaurants in the 2023-2024 fiscal year, down 17% from the previous year, when the department inspected 83% of restaurants.
The agency’s goal is to conduct inspections at every restaurant in the city — a standard it has consistently met, including in 2019, when it inspected 99.5% of them. But according to the report, staffing shortages have hindered the department’s ability to execute all the inspections.
Health department spokesperson Shari Logan said the department is working to get back on track this year.
“The health department’s food safety program is actively recruiting to bring on staff and is currently training a class of new restaurant inspectors. Over July and August of this year … the health department inspected 37% more restaurants compared to July and August of 2023,” Logan said in an email.
The department said in the report that it’s struggled to be consistent since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. And that lack of consistency, it said, is also part of the reason why the percentage of restaurants getting “A” grades went down by 3% to 87% — though the report said the full explanation is “likely multifaceted and complex.” A spokesperson has not yet replied to another message seeking more information on those causes.
Andrew Rigie, executive director of the New York City Hospitality Alliance, said inspection frequency is especially important for restaurants waiting for the chance to improve their letter grades.
“We do hope the health department is prioritizing restaurants that need to increase their letter grade from a ‘grade pending,’ a ‘B’ letter grade, or ‘C’ letter grade, and they’re not unnecessarily punished with a lower letter grade for an unnecessarily long period of time,” he said. “I certainly do think the health department will rehire, get more aggressive, probably as a result of this data coming out. And I know they’re also trying to work more collaboratively with local restaurants to focus on education, training, and compliance first, instead of just going out and being punitive.”
He noted that restaurants with “B” and “C” grades are still deemed safe to eat at. He said though inspections are down, restauranteurs know they need to “stay on their toes,” because an inspector can come at any time.
Rat inspections were also similarly down in the last fiscal year, according to the management report. The agency conducted approximately 150,000 initial rodent inspections in 2023-2024, a decrease of nearly 17% from 2022-2023. The report said that decline was also due to “staffing challenges.”
Of the inspections that were conducted in 2023-2024, 24% failed due to signs of rat activity, which is the most serious rodent violation, according to the report. That is up almost 10% from fiscal year 2020, when that number was 15%.
The city has ramped up its “war on rats” over the last year by moving toward containerization of trash and creating a citizen “Rat Pack” program to engage with and educate residents on the issue. This week, the city will host its first National Urban Rat Summit, where leaders from across the country will gather to discuss strategies for dealing with rat populations.