Alaska Food Protection Task Force Meeting Minutes

Minutes

• July 12, 2022

• Roll call: Dena Cologgi, Kathryn Helfrich, Kimberly Stryker, Carol Brady, Susan Sery, Claudia Coles, Lorinda Lhotka, Jeremy Ayers, Steven Crupi, Kathleen Easley, Brehan Corveau, Joe Logan, Katie Hubbard, Daniel Tew, Josephine Dawson, Ytamar Rodriguez, Samantha Lewis, Emily Garrett, Bobbie McDonald, Julie Cascio, Virginia Ng, Robert Gerlach

• Opening remarks and introductions
• Food Safety and Sanitation program update
  • Resignations have left the Food Safety and Sanitation program short-staffed, working on recruiting for vacancies
  • Busy with FDA contractual work, increase from past few years
  • Contract with USDC is in progress, this will allow Alaska to do contractual services to facilitate the process for firms that want to export their products
• Member updates
  • Section of Epidemiology
    • Lucky Charms - Nothing really resulted from this
    • Jif peanut butter - Some complaints, no epi links in Alaska
    • Some general GI complaints, possible outbreaks
    • Struggling to contact complainants for follow-up to get additional information, uncertain if this is different than baseline, but seems more difficult than in the past to get the whole group of ill folks to provide information
      • May need to watch this in case it is ongoing or becomes a pattern
      • Online surveys have been useful, some folks may prefer an anonymous online survey as opposed to providing their personal contact information
    • Section of Epi, Public Health Nursing are still not back to normal with pre-pandemic duties
    • Outbreak response training for public health nurses was held at the beginning of June 4
  • Chugach Chocolates
    • Video crew from an online payment system was visiting to do a success story video
  • Seafood Products Association
    • Sensory evaluation work in progress for canned salmon from Alaska
    • Looking for summer seasonal help
    • Reviewing retort operations in Alaska
    • Small companies starting up again and looking for help with processes
    • Planning a BRCGS course
    • Finalizing a seafood course and presentations for seafood processors, requested by Washington University
  • State Veterinarian
    • Produce safety inspection is being done today
    • Alaska Range Dairy obtained interstate dairy shipping certification, others renewed
    • Will be hiring for a dairy sanitarian position
    • Excited to see movement on grant project to evaluate different species of Alaskan seafood, which will hopefully eventually include finfish, shellfish, and mariculture products - looking for nutrients and Fukushima contaminants
  • Environmental Health Lab
    • Open position for Microbiologist 1/2/3
    • Received notice of award for Y3 of LFFM grant
    • Waiting to see what commodity pair assignments will be
  • Department of Education
    • Planning to hold training on inventory management next month, noted that this has been an issue here locally - will be offered to schools and community programs
  • Trident
    • No updates
    • Salmon run in Bristol Bay is the largest on record! Fish are smaller, but returning in higher numbers (primarily reds)
  • Extension
    • Classes on food preservation
    • No classes on food safety planned right now, likely to be held in October
    • Access to online courses is limited by internet quality and availability in rural areas
    • ServSafe has food protection study materials and testing in Spanish, Korean, and Chinese
  • Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium
    • No updates for the group today
    • Still progressing on traditional foods project, nothing new since last meeting
  • MEP
  • Yum!
    • Updating food safety for restaurants globally using FDA Model Food Code - comprehensive update
    • Restaurants in the US follow local regulations, also bring model food code standard to global restaurants
  • Alaska Food Policy Council
    • Alaska Farmer's Market toolkit
    • Local Catchment workshop in Girdwood for local fisherman, direct market
• Action Items/To-Do List
  • Next meeting: Tuesday, October 18 at 1000-1130 Alaska time

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