Public Health Seattle & King County outlines pilots to simplify food business permitting, cut fees and shorten turnaround times

Public Health '1 Seattle & King County briefed the Board of Health April 11 on a package of initiatives intended to lower barriers to food business permitting and improve food safety oversight for both permanent and mobile vendors.

Iyab Manzi Gah, assistant division director of the Food and Facilities program, told the board the program inspects roughly 12,500 permitted permanent food businesses and 800 mobile food units, issues about 3,500 temporary permits annually, conducts 18,000 to 20,000 inspections per year and responds to about 1,000 complaints. The program also reported an increase in unpermitted vending: public-health staff closed 109 unpermitted vendors in 2022-23 and closed 44 in the first quarter of 2024.

To address financial and operational barriers, Public Health officials outlined five main initiatives: a searchable countywide database of…