PALATKA, FL. Back in March 2026, a state inspector walked into Safeway Discount on the convenience store strip in Palatka and found kratom products on the shelves with a concentration of 7-Hydroxymitragynine above the legal limit, hemp products exceeding the legal delta-9 THC threshold, and a store drawing its drinking water from a well that had never been approved by regulators.
None of the seven violations documented that day were corrected on site.
What Inspectors Found
The inspector's notes on the kratom products were direct: "Kratom products offered for retail sale observed to have 7-Hydroxymitragynine concentration at level above the legal limit." That compound, commonly abbreviated 7-OH, is the primary active metabolite in kratom and the focus of state and federal regulatory scrutiny over its potency and potential for dependence.
The hemp products drew a parallel citation. The inspector noted that products on the shelf had "delta-9 THC concentration at level above the legal limit per product label," meaning the store was selling items that exceeded the legal threshold on their own packaging.
The labeling problems compounded the concentration findings. The inspector noted that kratom products on the shelves did not include "name and location of manufacturer packer or distributor, nutrition and/or supplement facts panel," and separately that the packages lacked "net quantity of package contents." Both are required under Chapter 500 of Florida Statutes and the Code of Federal Regulations.
The two priority violations involved the store's basic infrastructure. The inspector noted that the establishment was "operating with an unapproved well water source" and separately that it was "operating with an unapproved septic system, sewage not conveyed through approved system." Both citations are classified as priority violations under FDACS standards.
The store was also operating without a valid food permit, a finding that had been documented before.
What These Violations Mean
The two priority violations involving water and sewage are not paperwork problems. An unapproved well means the water supply has not been tested or certified to meet public health standards, and there is no regulatory chain of oversight ensuring it is safe for drinking, hand-washing, or food contact. An unapproved septic system means waste is not being conveyed through a system that has been inspected and approved, which creates contamination risk that can affect both the facility and surrounding groundwater.
The kratom concentration finding carries a different kind of risk. 7-Hydroxymitragynine is the compound that gives kratom much of its opioid-like effect, and Florida law sets a ceiling on how much of it a product can contain. A product above that limit is not a mislabeled item, it is an illegal product. A shopper buying it has no way to know from the label that the concentration exceeds what the law permits.
The hemp THC finding works the same way. When a product's own label reflects a THC concentration above the legal limit, the store selling it is offering a product that should not be on the shelf. The labeling failures on top of that, missing manufacturer information and no net quantity disclosure, mean a customer cannot trace the product back to a source or know how much of the active compound is in what they are buying.
Operating without a valid food permit means the store is selling food products outside the regulatory system that requires inspections, record-keeping, and accountability. If a product sold there makes someone sick, there is no current permit record to anchor a public health investigation.
The Longer Record
The March 12 inspection was not the first time state inspectors had flagged these problems at Safeway Discount, and it was not the last.
Records show that on February 2, 2026, inspectors documented 34 violations at the same location, including 3 repeat violations, under the same inspection type: Operating Without a Valid Food Permit, Re-Inspection Required. That visit, with more than four times the violation count of the March inspection, came just over five weeks before the March 12 findings.
A February 26 inspection found 3 violations. The March 4 inspection, eight days before the visit at the center of this report, found 7 violations including 2 repeats, an identical profile to the March 12 visit.
Then on March 31, nearly three weeks after the March 12 inspection, inspectors returned and found 7 violations again, with 2 repeats, under the same operating-without-a-permit designation.
That is five inspections in less than two months, all under a re-inspection-required flag, with the permit violation appearing as a repeat finding across multiple visits. The unapproved well and septic system, both classified as priority violations on March 12, were not corrected on site that day.
As of the March 12 inspection, zero of the seven violations had been resolved before the inspector left the building.
