PORT ST JOE, FL. Back in March 2026, a state inspector walked into Store #293, a convenience store on the Gulf County coast that also handles significant food service and packaged ice, and found raw chicken sitting directly on the walk-in cooler floor.
That was one of 12 violations documented during the March 23 inspection, including two classified as priority-level, the most serious category under Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services standards. None of the violations were repeats from prior inspections, but several pointed to gaps in basic food safety practice that went beyond a bad day.
What Inspectors Found
At the serve counter, the inspector observed an employee step away from the cash register and move directly toward a customer to help with food, without washing hands first. According to the inspection record, the person in charge was notified, coached the employee, and hands were washed before any food contact occurred.
In the kitchen, a bucket of sanitizer was sitting on a prep table above single-service items, a placement that creates a direct contamination risk if the bucket spills or drips. The inspector noted it was moved.
The fried chicken tenders at the serve counter had no time mark. Under time-without-temperature controls, hot-held food that is not kept at proper temperature must be tracked and discarded within four hours. The inspector noted a time was marked and the tenders were set for discard.
Also in the kitchen, tongs stored on a shelf had visible debris buildup on the food-contact surface. A wet towel near the handwash sink turned out to be what an employee used to dry their hands after cleaning grease equipment, a practice that cross-contaminates the towel and anything it subsequently touches.
The inspector also noted that the establishment could not verify employee reporting responsibilities when asked, meaning staff illness policies were not documented or accessible. Test strips for measuring sanitizer concentration were not available either.
Raw chicken was stored directly on the walk-in cooler floor. Single-service items were stored on the floor in dry storage. A thermometer was wiped off with a cloth after being dipped in sanitizer solution rather than allowed to air-dry. The three-compartment sink had a slight drip while not in use. The employee restroom had no covered trash receptacle.
What These Violations Mean
The hand-washing failure is the most direct public health concern in this inspection. An employee moving from a cash register to food handling without washing hands can transfer bacteria, viruses, and contaminants from currency, surfaces, and other customers directly onto food. At a convenience store where customers buy ready-to-eat items at the counter, that transfer has no further cooking step to interrupt it.
The sanitizer bucket stored above single-service items is a chemical contamination risk. Sanitizer is not food-safe at full concentration. If a bucket tips or drips onto cups, wrappers, or trays stored below, those items carry the chemical to a customer's mouth.
The missing time mark on fried chicken tenders matters because temperature is not always the control in play at a serve counter. When food is held under heat lamps rather than in temperature-controlled equipment, time becomes the safety measure. Without a mark, there is no way to know whether the tenders had already been sitting for two hours or four, and no trigger for when to discard them.
The inability to produce test strips may sound administrative, but without them, employees have no reliable way to verify that their sanitizer solution is strong enough to kill pathogens. A solution that is too weak leaves contaminated surfaces appearing clean.
The Longer Record
Store #293 has five prior FDACS inspections on record going back to August 2023. Three of those, in August 2023, August 2024, and October 2025, were focused inspections that found zero violations. A fourth focused inspection in January 2026, just two months before this inspection, also found zero violations.
The one exception in the prior record was a February 2025 inspection that logged five violations, including one repeat, during a visit categorized as an operating-without-a-valid-food-permit inspection. That citation carried its own weight, but the violations from that visit did not carry forward as repeats into the March 2026 inspection.
The pattern here is not one of chronic, escalating failure. Three consecutive clean focused inspections, then a full sanitation inspection that turned up 12 violations, suggests the focused inspections, which are narrower in scope, were not catching the same range of issues that a full sanitation review surfaces.
What Remained Unresolved
Seven of the 12 violations were corrected on site during the March inspection. The raw chicken stored on the walk-in cooler floor, the single-service items on the dry storage floor, the dripping three-compartment sink, the missing covered restroom receptacle, the thermometer not air-dried after sanitizing, and the missing employee illness reporting documentation were not noted as corrected before the inspector left.
The establishment met sanitation inspection requirements overall and was not closed. But the raw chicken on the cooler floor, one of the most fundamental cross-contamination risks in any food service setting, had no correction noted in the record.