Some disturbing stats reviewed by the New York Post reveal an ugly truth about school cafeterias: one in five are crawling with bugs and/or rodents.
Over the past three years, health inspectors discovered roaches, mice, rats, and flies in nearly 400 public school cafeterias. The figures also reveal that 1,380 of the city’s 1,859 public schools (or three in four) have been cited by the State Department of Health since 2020.
The specific violations include 1,072 deemed critical enough to cause illness in at least 620 different public schools. They include spotting filth flies (in more than 100 schools), mice (in more than 300 schools), and cockroaches (in more than 80 schools). That is on top of at least 46 instances of cold food being kept so warm that e coli and salmonella could grow.
The worst offender was the cafeteria in PS/IS 208 in Glen Oaks, Queens. It had 16 citations for issues including mice, flies, and not having a hand washing station. After 208, the public school cafeterias with the most violations were all in Brooklyn: PSC 138, PS K315, and PS 131.
Separately from the DOH, the state comptroller’s office found 90% of the schools had “unsatisfactory conditions.”
Some have blamed poor staffing for these issues at least in part, while defenders say that violations in the kitchen versus the cafeteria mean different groups are at fault.
At any case, the verdict is clear: NYC public school cafeterias are disgusting.
