Environmental Health - Mobile Restaurant Ratings Tool

About the Program

Category: Information Technology (Best in Category)

Year: 2016

The Maricopa County Environmental Services Department (ESD) maintains inspection results from food establishments such as restaurants, retail stores, school cafeterias, and mobile food trucks. In August 2015, these inspection results were made available to the public through a new Mobile Restaurant Ratings tool (figure 2). In addition to being mobile-friendly, this tool provides users with the ability to search geospatial enriched data, file a citizen complaint, and learn more about the ESD’s Cutting Edge Food Safety Partnership program. Since launching the Mobile Restaurant Ratings tool, there has been a 17% increase in the number of hits related to inspection results and the enrollment rate for the Cutting Edge program has doubled. The entire process took nine months to launch and was accomplished in-house, using minimal monetary resources. Facilitating access to inspection results has increased the public’s ability to make informed choices, and encouraged businesses to work towards reducing the risk of foodborne illness.