DORAL, FL. A Doral restaurant that has already been emergency-closed once for roaches and has accumulated 312 violations across 25 inspections was cited for 10 high-severity violations in August 2026 — including no written employee illness policy, no traceability records for shellfish, and documented failures in parasite destruction procedures — and was allowed to remain open.
State inspectors visited Las Columnas Restaurant at 1657 NW 79 Ave on August 24. The inspection produced 10 high-severity citations and 3 intermediate ones. Not one of the 10 high-severity violations was resolved before inspectors cleared the building.
What Inspectors Found
The illness policy violations are the most operationally alarming. Inspectors cited the restaurant for having no written employee health policy and for employees not reporting illness symptoms. Those two violations together mean there was no formal mechanism to keep a sick worker away from food.
The shellfish finding adds a separate layer of risk. Inspectors cited inadequate shell stock identification records, meaning the restaurant could not document where its shellfish came from. Oysters, clams, and mussels are frequently consumed raw or lightly cooked. If a customer became ill after eating shellfish at Las Columnas, there would be no paper trail to trace the source.
Parasite destruction procedures were also flagged as not followed. When fish or pork is served undercooked or raw, specific freezing protocols are required to kill parasites including Anisakis and Trichinella. The record shows those protocols were not in place.
Food contact surfaces were cited as not properly cleaned or sanitized. Inspectors also noted improper handwashing technique and inadequate handwashing facilities, a combination that means employees attempting to wash their hands may not have been able to do so effectively even if they tried.
The restaurant also had no consumer advisory posted for raw or undercooked foods. Without that notice, diners who are pregnant, elderly, or immunocompromised have no warning before ordering dishes that carry elevated risk.
What These Violations Mean
The combination of no illness policy and employees not reporting symptoms is the condition most directly linked to multi-victim outbreaks. Norovirus, which causes roughly 20 million illnesses annually in the United States, spreads most efficiently when an infected food worker handles food without being removed from service. A written illness policy is the basic administrative control that prevents that. Las Columnas did not have one on August 24.
The shellfish traceability failure matters because it removes the ability to respond if someone gets sick. Shellfish carry a specific risk for Vibrio and hepatitis A. If an illness cluster emerged among diners who ate shellfish at Las Columnas, investigators would have no harvest records to work from.
The parasite destruction citation is distinct from temperature violations. This is a procedural failure, meaning the restaurant was not following required protocols for fish or pork served in undercooked form, protocols that exist specifically because cooking alone does not always destroy parasites. That violation, combined with no consumer advisory on the menu, means customers had no way to know they were eating food that had not been treated to meet safety standards.
The absent person in charge compounds all of it. CDC research shows that establishments without active managerial control log three times more critical violations than those with a supervisor actively overseeing operations. On August 24, that supervision was not present.
The Longer Record
The August 2026 inspection is not an outlier. Las Columnas has been inspected 25 times and has accumulated 312 total violations on record.
The February 2026 inspection produced 9 high-severity and 3 intermediate violations. The September 2025 inspections, conducted on consecutive days, produced 12 high and 4 intermediate on September 23, followed by 3 high and 2 intermediate on September 24. The January 2025 inspection found 8 high and 5 intermediate violations. The October 2024 inspection found 8 high and 1 intermediate.
The restaurant was emergency-closed on January 18, 2024 for roach activity. It was allowed to reopen the following day.
The pattern across eight documented prior inspections shows high-severity violation counts ranging from 3 to 12. The August 2026 total of 10 sits near the top of that range. There is no inspection in the recent record where the restaurant posted zero high-severity violations.
The illness policy violations, the handwashing failures, and the food contact surface citations are not new categories for this restaurant's record. They represent the same operational breakdowns appearing across multiple inspection cycles.
On August 24, 2026, after documenting 10 high-severity violations at Las Columnas, state inspectors did not close the restaurant. It remained open for business.
