Preventing Sewer Overflows by Conducting Onsite Fats, Oils, & Grease Inspections

In order to prevent sewer overflows, it is imperative to ensure waste water containing fats, oils, & grease discharged by commercial restaurants do not reach the sewer system. This presentation will provide a complete overview of how municipal inspectors can manage and conduct onsite fats, oils and grease inspections within commercial food service establishments. Every aspect of inspections will be addressed from managing an inspection program to conducting the actual onsite inspections. Videos of inspections being conducted and actual case studies from inspections will be referenced. The presentation is broken down into five parts listed below. Part 1: Why Conduct FOG Inspections? We will first show the value and reasoning behind conducting inspections. Ensuring facilities within the jurisdiction are adhering to local regulations is a crucial aspect of managing a FOG program. By conducting onsite inspections, regulators can verify that the grease separation device(s) are adequately operating, educate the facility's staff of the importance to keep FOG out of the sewers, and issue needed warnings/fines. Part 2: Scheduling & Resource Allocation A municipal inspector is challenged with ensuring that all facilities are within the compliance guidelines of the local jurisdiction. Often times these professionals are faced with a lack of staffing in comparison to the number of facilities and need to allocate available resources accordingly. We will explore scheduling methods used by inspectors for both inspections being conducted on a regular frequency and emergency inspections. Part 3: Step by Step Onsite Inspection Process This portion of the presentation will focus on a clear step by step process of conducting an onsite FOG inspection. We will explore how to communicate with onsite facility staff and inform them of the inspection process. We will go into detail in terms of what items an inspector should be looking for during a walkthrough. There will be particular focus on examining a grease removal device in terms of physical condition, capacity, and operating efficiency. Part 4: Issuing Warnings & Notices of Violations We will explore different methods used throughout the USA in terms of issuing warnings, notices of violations, and fines. There is a high variability in this area depending on how much enforcement leverage the department conducting the inspection has. Actual case study examples of what has worked and what has not worked for different municipalities will be used to demonstrate the effectiveness of various approaches. Part 5: Follow up & Enforcement Depending on the outcome of an inspection, some kind of follow up may be required. Different methods of follow up procedure examples will be shown and we will discuss the effectiveness of each. Verifying that violations were corrected and providing facilities the resources and education to ensure compliance going forward will be reviewed. . Attendee Outcomes or Learning Objectives. 1.The attendees will learn the relationship of FOG and sewer overflows 2.The attendees will be able to put together an inspection scheduling program 3.The attendees will be able to troubleshoot a grease separating device 4.The attendees will know how to execute thorough onsite FOG inspections