I will apologize profusely if this was reported locally earlier, but I couldn’t find any mention of it online,and I just became aware of it today.
Urbana’s Tiny Greens was issued a Warning Letter by the FDA on May 5, documenting insanitary conditions observed at the sprouting facility during an FDA inspection between December 20, 2010 and January 28, 2011.
The inspection was instigated because of a salmonella outbreak at Jimmy John’s restaurants in December 2010, and the FDA states that their investigation “linked a Salmonella enterica serotype outbreak to [alfalfa] sprouts grown in your facility.” The Warning Letter states that a sample of runoff from a compost pile at Tiny Greens “yielded a strain of Salmonella that was indistinguishable from the outbreak strain, as determined through Pulse Field Gel Electrophoresis (PFGE).”
The outbreak sickened 94 people in 16 states and the District of Columbia. Jimmy John’s has since switched to clover sprouts.
The below text is from the Warning Letter:
The following insanitary conditions were observed:
• Run-off water from the compost pile was pooling into a drain along the walkway 11 feet from the entrance to the greenhouse. The subsample that yielded the Salmonella outbreak strain was taken from this site. An employee entered the compost area to dump production waste. After walking through the compost pile and water that had pooled along the walkway, the employee returned to the production area wearing the same clothing and boots that he had worn outside. In addition, two employees pushed a cart containing trays of alfalfa sprouts from the sprouting area, (b)(4), out through the greenhouse exit. After walking and wheeling the cart through the compost pile, the employees returned to the production area with the cart, wearing the same clothing and boots that they had worn outside. The employees did not clean or disinfect their boots or the cart at any time between these two activities.
• The sink employees use to wash their hands in the lunch room before entering the production area had a hose with a valve on its end that was leaking water onto the floor where there was a substantial amount of foot traffic. Organic matter, in conjunction with wet conditions, such as those observed in your facility, foster the growth of Salmonella and other pathogens.
• An employee placed a screen from a shaker table on the floor and rinsed it with a hose. This operation was performed within 2 inches of open trays of germinated sprouts. Aerosol water droplets from the water stream onto the floor were splashing into the trays of germinated sprouts.
• Germination drum plexi-glass doors were stored on the drum frames less than 12 inches from the floor. The drum closest to the greenhouse door had all four doors stored in this manner. Water and debris from the floor was observed splashed onto the doors. The doors were not cleaned prior to installation on the germination drum.
• Sprouts were unloaded from the germination drums into white perforated pails on dollies. When the dollies were rolled to the table for placing the sprouts in trays, water from the rotating wheels on the floor was observed splashing up on the perforated pails with access to the sprouts.
Food Safety News reported on this June 1.