Walla Walla officials debate workaround after food vendor misses L&I inspection for county fair

Walla Walla County commissioners and local public health officials debated on Aug. 26, 2025, whether to allow a food vendor to operate at the county fair without a current Washington Labor & Industries (L&I) inspection, exploring a workaround that would require cooking outside the vendor’s trailer while allowing use of built-in refrigeration.

The discussion mattered because the county must follow state rules (the Revised Code of Washington and Washington Administrative Code) on mobile food-unit inspections while also trying to keep fair vendors in place. Commissioners emphasized they did not want to put county health staff in a difficult position by asking them to approve a permit that might not be legally valid.

Public health director Nancy Wenzel described the situation: the vendor had not received an L&I inspection and scheduled an inspection for Sept. 11; environmental health staff had worked with one vendor to allow cooking outside the trailer as a temporary fix, but a second vendor had not completed the county application until recently. Cody, environmental health staff, said, “The application doesn't include the workaround because the application is set, for all of our temporary food vendors. There's a section that says temporary food booth, a mobile cart, L and I approved mobile food unit. Those are the temporary food, permit options.”

Commissioner Kimball, serving as interim fair manager, said she had previously recommended permitting a particular trailer but acknowledged new information about state deadlines and compliance: “I did send an e mail saying that I, as a fairgrounds manager, recommended that we not do a workaround but permit this 1. We permitted it in the last 2 years, the exact same trailer.” Chair Fulmer stressed caution about exposing health staff to an instruction that might force them to issue an invalid permit: “But I but I don't want you to put in a bad spot. I don't want Nancy put in a bad spot, and I certainly don't want doctor Krager put in a bad spot.”

Local health officer Dr. Krager said he was sympathetic but saw limited legal room to waive the L&I requirement: “I don't see a way around the requirement,” and added that the applicable state rules are “pretty clear that that L&I permit needs to be there before we are able to do it. So I think even if we permitted it, I don't think it'd be a valid permit.”

Commissioners and staff discussed the practical workaround that would treat the vendor as a temporary booth — cooking outside and using the trailer only for refrigeration — and noted the vendor had the option but was unwilling to adopt it. Commissioners said they prefer to keep vendors at the fair when possible but only if the public-health staff judges the workaround safe and legally defensible. No formal waiver or permit change was approved at the meeting; the board directed staff to continue pursuing the workaround option and to defer to the county health officers on whether a temporary setup would be an acceptable and valid permit.

The county noted history of rolling L&I extension dates (several changes of effective dates were discussed) and that some vendors required months to complete the permitting process in prior years. The transcript records one staff member saying an application was submitted in July and that the vendor has an L&I inspection scheduled for Sept. 11. Commissioners also reported that at least one other county had denied the vendor for the same reason at a recent fair, indicating the issue is not unique to Walla Walla County.

County officials said next steps will be for environmental health and the county public health officer to follow up with the vendor on the temporary-booth option, confirm whether the workaround satisfies state and county requirements, and report back to the commissioners. No formal board action was taken at the meeting.