food waste

After years in this food industry, it's not hard to become de-sensitizied to the sight of massive amounts of food being thrown away.  Well, you do not become totally dis-heartened, but maybe you just get used to it.  The basic argument is always that restaurants and other food service establishments will not donate their left-over food product because of liability issues.  Think about that when you go out to your Easter buffet and load your plate up with more than you can eat.

This fact was brought to our attention again lately by a member of our staff, Ms. Bertha Corbin.  Aside from being a great Mississippi southern-style cook, she took a few days off this week to lobby for change in the Florida State Legislature.  She and about 8 other members of a Miami Homeless charity group went knocking on the doors of most of the state's representatives to push for the passing of a good Samaritan bill brought about by an 11 year old boy named Jack Davis.  The story goes that Jack was eating at a buffet with his family and was told to take as much food as he wanted before the buffet shut down... and that afterwards, most of this food was just going into the garbage.  They explained to him further that this food could not be given away or donated because the restaurant could get sued for food poisoning if someone got sick.  Seeing the obvious lack of sense in this situation, he started pushing to get the law changed.

We feel very proud that Ms. Bertha took the initiative to go out and change this wasteful legal situation.  After speaking to every politician on the list, her group also was present at the voting and the Jack Davis bill was signed into law!  The bill basically redefines restaurant food product in such a manner that it protects the donating establishments from any liability under law.  While we have just watched this happen and scraped out many a pot and pan into the trash for so many years, an 11 year old boy and a small group representing the interests of the homeless went out and made a difference.  Thank you and all who did something other than accept the current situation by donating your time and energy to something that will make a huge difference in so many lives.

Comments

[rageahol]

i havent lived in florida for several years now (thankfully) but i seem to recall that good samaritan laws like this already exist. these are the auspices under which groups like Food Not Bombs operate under. the organization http://www.wastenotflorida.com/ also seems to support my half-remembered idea.

the greater problem imho is that in the restaurant industry , people have been selling this line of BS for so long that it simply becomes conventional wisdom. it's not like restaurant managers bother to ask a lawyer about the legality of this practice unless they actually really want to donate food. many of them go out of their way to make it difficult for dumpster divers to recover uneaten, perfectly good food.

at base, it's mostly a class issue.

[chadzilla]

I understand your points and frustrations on this issue, rageahol.
Honestly, I am not a lawyer but from what I have read on the Jack Davis Bill (which is an actual bill and not a ficticious story), it involves re-writing the definition of perishable food in the pre-existing law to include more 'waste' from restaurants.
And although I have read stories about people bleaching out dumpsters to prevent the hungry homeless from eating left-overs, I can say that this definitely does not represent the majority of situations. Most chefs and kitchens would gladly donate foods if organizations arranged consistent and frequent pick-up times for items. It's just to easy to give that food away to those who need it instead of throwing it away... and we are not all de-sensitized to the point where we don't still cringe at the waste of 'good' food. And even if 25% of restaurants and hotels donated their left-overs, it would be a huge amount to stop hunger.