FLORIDA. A Subway franchise on Clyde Morris Boulevard in Port Orange had no manager present, employees who were not reporting illness symptoms, food from an unapproved source, inadequate handwashing, and unsanitized food contact surfaces, all in a single inspection window, making it one of the worst-performing Subway locations in Florida over the past 90 days.
That location, Subway 43772 at 3751 Clyde Morris Blvd, was one of four Subway franchises statewide to accumulate five high-severity violations during the January 25 to April 24, 2026 inspection period. The chain operates 876 locations across Florida, and the state's records show an average of 3.44 violations per inspection and an overall pass rate of 93.26 percent, meaning roughly 1 in 14 inspections turns up a failure. One location has been emergency-closed this year.
What Inspectors Found
The Port Orange location on Clyde Morris drew five high-severity citations in a single inspection. Among them: food sourced from an unapproved or unknown supplier, a violation that cuts off any traceability if a customer gets sick, and food contact surfaces that were not properly cleaned or sanitized.
A second Port Orange location, Subway 2621 at 3781 S Nova Rd, drew one high-severity citation for food in poor condition, mislabeled, or adulterated. That is a separate franchise from the Clyde Morris location, meaning two Subway stores within a few miles of each other in the same city surfaced in the state's worst-performing list during the same 90-day window.
In Oldsmar, Subway 28977 at 3775 Tampa Rd accumulated five high-severity violations, including no person in charge present, no written employee health policy, employees not reporting illness symptoms, unsanitized food contact surfaces, and inadequate shell stock identification records. A Subway location selling shellfish without proper tag records cannot trace where that product came from if it causes illness.
The Subway Sandwiches and Salads at 236 S Temple Ave in Starke also logged five high-severity violations, including improper handwashing technique, inadequate shell stock records, unsanitized food contact surfaces, no consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods, and toxic substances improperly identified or stored. Four intermediate violations accompanied those, covering multi-use utensils not properly cleaned, improper sanitizing procedures, and single-use items being reused.
A second Starke location, Subway Sandwiches and Salads at 14500 Hwy 301 S, drew one high-severity citation for employees not reporting illness symptoms, the same category flagged at the Temple Avenue store.
In Clermont, Subway 34365 at 2575 E Hwy 50 was cited for four high-severity violations: unsanitized food contact surfaces, no consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods, and two separate chemical storage violations, toxic chemicals improperly stored or labeled and toxic substances improperly identified, stored, or used. That combination means inspectors found chemical hazards in two distinct categories at the same location during the same visit.
In Jacksonville, Subway 60865 at 1325 San Marco Blvd drew four high-severity violations, including improper handwashing technique, food in poor condition or mislabeled, unsanitized food contact surfaces, and no consumer advisory. Three intermediate violations rounded out the inspection, including multi-use utensils not properly cleaned and inadequate toilet facilities.
At Nonno Subway Inc at 3690 N Atlantic Ave in Cocoa Beach, inspectors cited four high-severity violations: employees not reporting illness symptoms, improper handwashing technique, food in poor condition or mislabeled, and toxic chemicals improperly stored or labeled. Two intermediate violations were also noted.
The Subway at 1530 Ohio Avenue S in Live Oak logged five high-severity violations, including no person in charge, employees not reporting illness symptoms, improper handwashing technique, unsanitized food contact surfaces, and no consumer advisory for raw or undercooked foods.
On Miami Beach, Subway 28842 Inc at 980 McArthur Causeway drew one high-severity violation for improper hand and arm washing technique, alongside an intermediate citation for inadequate ventilation and lighting.
What These Violations Mean
The single most common high-severity violation across these ten locations is inadequate or improper handwashing, appearing in some form at the Clyde Morris Port Orange location, Live Oak, Starke's Temple Avenue store, Oldsmar, Jacksonville, Cocoa Beach, and Miami Beach. Inspectors distinguish between employees who skip handwashing entirely and those who go through the motion incorrectly. Both carry the same risk: pathogens including Norovirus, Salmonella, and E. coli transfer directly from hands to food. At a sandwich counter where employees handle ingredients with their hands for every order, that pathway is direct and continuous.
Food from unapproved or unknown sources, cited at the Clyde Morris Boulevard location in Port Orange, is a different category of risk. When food enters a restaurant through a channel outside the USDA and FDA inspection system, there is no paper trail. If a customer reports illness and investigators need to trace the ingredient, that trail does not exist. The violation does not necessarily mean the food is contaminated. It means no one can verify that it isn't.
The chemical storage violations at the Clermont and Cocoa Beach locations, and the toxic substance violations at both Starke locations, represent an acute hazard distinct from microbial risk. Chemicals stored near or above food preparation surfaces can contaminate food through spills, mislabeling, or spray drift. The Clermont location drew citations in two separate chemical violation categories during the same inspection, which inspectors treat as distinct failures.
Employee illness reporting violations, documented at the Oldsmar, Live Oak, Starke Highway 301, Clyde Morris Port Orange, and Cocoa Beach locations, are the violation type most directly linked to multi-victim outbreaks. Norovirus, the leading cause of foodborne illness in the United States, spreads aggressively through food prepared by an infected worker. A written health policy and active reporting requirements exist specifically to interrupt that chain before it reaches customers.
The Longer Record
Florida's inspection database shows 13,898 total inspections on record for Subway locations statewide across 876 locations. That is an average of roughly 15.9 inspections per location over the chain's documented history in the state, a substantial cumulative record that gives context to which locations are persistent underperformers and which are newer problem spots.
The two Starke locations appearing on this list are particularly notable in combination. Two franchises in the same small city, both flagged in the same 90-day window, with overlapping violation categories including employee illness reporting and toxic substance handling, suggests the issue is not isolated to a single operator or a single inspection day.
The Oldsmar location's five high-severity violations include the absence of a written employee health policy, which is a foundational document, not a technical procedural lapse. Its presence on the list alongside the no-person-in-charge violation points to a management infrastructure gap rather than a one-time oversight.
The two Port Orange locations are operated as separate franchises under different store numbers, 43772 and 2621, but both appeared in the worst-performing list for the same quarter. The Clyde Morris location's citation for food from an unapproved source has no parallel at the Nova Road store, but both drew high-severity findings within the same inspection period in the same city.
The Pattern Across the Chain
Across the ten locations flagged in this period, food contact surface sanitation was the single most frequently cited high-severity violation category, appearing at the Clyde Morris Port Orange, Live Oak, Oldsmar, Starke Temple Avenue, Clermont, and Jacksonville locations. That is six of ten worst-performing stores sharing the same critical failure at the surface where food is prepared and assembled.
The chain's statewide pass rate of 93.26 percent means the overwhelming majority of Florida Subway inspections close without a failure designation. But the ten locations above account for 39 high-severity violations and 12 intermediate violations in a single 90-day window, and three of them, the Clyde Morris Port Orange store, the Live Oak store, and the Oldsmar store, each drew five high-severity citations without a single intermediate violation recorded alongside them, meaning inspectors were not finding minor issues. They were finding the most serious categories the inspection form tracks.
The Clyde Morris Boulevard location in Port Orange had food from an unapproved source with no manager present to account for it.