RI Health Orders 14-Year-Old to Pour Bleach on Festival Food - Claims of Cultural Insensitivity
GoLocalProv News Team
RI Health Orders 14-Year-Old to Pour Bleach on Festival Food - Claims of Cultural Insensitivity
And, on the other side was the Rhode Island Department of Health inspectors.
Now, there are charges that Health Department inspectors don’t have enough knowledge and understanding of ethnic food. Pastel is a Cape Verdean pastry with filling.
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST"They've been doing this for a long time," said Pawtucket resident Khrystyne Bento, of the Department of Health, of what she said happened to Aquila Santos at the 44th Annual Cape Verdean Festival held on July 7 at India Point Park in Providence.
Bento, however, took issue with what she said was their lack of cultural knowledge of the food.
"It was pastel -- not empanadas," said Bento of what Santos had with her and was subsequently destroyed. "Pastel is made with tuna. Americans eat tuna with mayo -- cold. But [the Department of Health] put down empanadas, with beef and potatoes, as the food in question."
"I said to one of the inspectors, you're treating it like it an empanada?? She said how am I supposed to know? She said they're all the same," said Bento.
RI Department of Health Charge
“Our aim is always to ensure that the food being provided in public settings like this is healthy and safe. But we also try to be sensitive to the different ways that people prepare and store food,” said Joseph Wendelken, spokesperson of the RI Department of Health.
“Two people who were at the Cape Verdean festival last weekend reached out to us about an interaction they saw between a food inspector from the Rhode Island Department of Health (RIDOH) and a food vendor. Department leadership met with them today to better understand their concerns. We’re also in the process of meeting with staff from RIDOH’s Center for Food Protection to better understand how they handled food code violations that day,” said Wendelken.
"It's so against our culture to throw food out," said Bento, of the hundreds of pastel Santos was made not just to throw out, but have her 14-year-old son pour bleach over the food his mother had prepared.
"And I saw that [Santos] signed the form saying she 'voluntarily' had her son pour bleach on the food," said Bento. "I asked her why she would have done that? She said she was afraid she was going to get in trouble, that they were going to call the police."
"I want those health inspectors reprimanded," said Bento. "This wasn't right. The didn't need to be bullies."
“We asked if the vendor can take the food home and they told us they were speaking to their supervisor to see what they could do. About 30 minutes later they care to us and told us it was the decision of their supervisor to throw the food. According to Aquila and a witness, they asked them to pour bleach on it,” said Taveras.
Taveras added, "This has been the practice of the Health Department for years and it is hard for us to not comply because they have to approve all vendors in order for us to have the event. We as an organization have spoken to Aquila and reimbursed her for the fee she paid to be a vendor hoping it will at least cover some of her cost."
Department of Health confirmed the incident.
“…There was an instance at the festival of food for sale being stored out of safe temperature range. When that happens, food inspectors make sure that the food is discarded and not sold, because food that is not stored at proper temperature can make people very sick. Many health departments, including RIDOH, sometimes use products like bleach to ensure that unsafe food is not sold,” said Wendelken.