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Food safety legislation to be proposed in California tomorrow

The Bakersfield Californian reports that California State Senator Dean Florez will introduce controversial food safety legislation in the California legislature tomorrow. The legislation, which is being proposed in three separate bills, would:

  1. Allow the Department of Health Services to assess fees on all growers of leafy green vegetables.
  2. Require the Department of Health Services to set standards for members of the produce supply chain, such as growers, shippers, and processors, to minimize the danger of contamination with E. coli and other foodborne pathogens, and would outlaw the use of unprocessed manure as fertilizer on food crops.
  3. Require the food industry to implement a trace-back system so that individual packages of fresh produce can be traced back to the fields they were grown in.

"This will start a real conversation about the food safety rules that we have to have in California," said the senator.

Senator Florez will hold a press conference tomorrow, where Marler Clark clients Ken and Pauline Costello will add their remarks on the new legislation. Pauline Costello’s mother, Ruby Trautz, passed away after eating contaminated spinach in September.

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