JACKSONVILLE, FL. An inspector visiting Arepa Please on Riverside Avenue on September 10 found toxic chemicals improperly stored and labeled near food, employees not reporting illness symptoms, and a sewage or wastewater disposal problem, then left the restaurant open.
The inspection turned up 8 high-severity violations and 1 intermediate violation at the 474 Riverside Ave. location. Despite that tally, the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation did not issue an emergency closure order.
What Inspectors Found
Two of the eight high-severity citations involved toxic chemicals. Inspectors found chemicals both improperly stored or labeled near food and improperly identified, stored, or used in a separate but related citation. Those two violations together document a kitchen where hazardous substances were not segregated from food preparation areas and were not clearly marked.
The inspector also cited an employee for failing to report illness symptoms, and the facility for improper handwashing technique among staff. Food contact surfaces were not properly cleaned or sanitized.
The shellfish citation is notable at a restaurant whose menu centers on Venezuelan-style arepas. Inspectors found inadequate shell stock identification or records, meaning the facility could not demonstrate where its shellfish came from or provide the documentation required to trace it. There was also no consumer advisory posted for raw or undercooked foods.
No person in charge was present or performing duties at the time of the inspection. The intermediate violation involved improper sewage or wastewater disposal.
What These Violations Mean
The two chemical storage citations carry the most immediate risk. When toxic substances are stored near food without proper labeling or separation, a spill, a mislabeled container, or a simple mistake by a kitchen worker can put those chemicals directly into food or onto surfaces that touch food. The result is acute poisoning, not a gradual illness that develops over days.
The illness-reporting failure is a different kind of danger. When employees are not required or reminded to report symptoms like vomiting or diarrhea before a shift, a worker carrying norovirus or another pathogen can transmit it to dozens of customers through food handling before anyone realizes what happened. Norovirus is the leading cause of foodborne illness outbreaks in the United States, and food workers are the primary transmission route. Arepa Please's inspectors found this violation alongside improperly sanitized food contact surfaces, which compounds the risk: a sick employee using a contaminated cutting board or prep surface creates multiple exposure points simultaneously.
The sewage and wastewater disposal violation adds a third vector. Improper sewage handling introduces fecal contamination into the facility environment. Combined with inadequate handwashing technique documented in the same inspection, the conditions inspectors described on September 10 represent a cascade of overlapping failure points, not a handful of isolated paperwork issues.
The shellfish traceability gap matters most if someone gets sick. Without shell stock identification records, health investigators cannot determine where contaminated shellfish originated, cannot issue a recall, and cannot identify other customers at risk from the same source.
The Longer Record
The September 10 inspection was not an anomaly. State records show 25 inspections on file for Arepa Please, with 232 total violations accumulated across that history.
High-severity violations have appeared in nearly every inspection cycle. The February 2026 visit turned up 5 high-severity and 2 intermediate violations. The September 2025 inspection found 3 high and 3 intermediate. April 2025 produced 5 high and 2 intermediate. Going back further, August 2024 yielded 6 high and 1 intermediate, and the August 2023 inspection matched this week's count exactly: 8 high-severity violations and 2 intermediate citations.
The single clean inspection on record, a February 2023 visit with zero high or intermediate violations, came one day after a February 8, 2023 inspection that found 13 high-severity and 3 intermediate violations. That is the facility's worst single inspection on record and the only time it has approached a clean bill of health in the period documented here.
Despite 232 violations across 25 inspections and a record that includes 13 high-severity citations in a single visit, Arepa Please has never been issued an emergency closure order.
Still Open
The categories that appeared on September 10 are not new to this restaurant. Chemical storage failures, illness-reporting gaps, management absence, and food contact surface contamination have cycled through the inspection record repeatedly across three years.
Arepa Please remained open following the September 10 inspection.
