Boston Restaurants to Be Letter-Graded on Cleanliness

Restaurants in Boston will soon have a different assessment standard for food safety. The city has plans to start assigning restaurants letter grades based on inspection results, according to The Boston Globe.

This new program, which will kick off early next year, is based off similar ones in place in New York City and Los Angeles. Officials will assign either A, B, or C letter grades to restaurants based on their level of cleanliness. Initially, the grades will be posted online, according to Boston Magazine, but there are plans to have restaurants display grades in their storefronts.

Restaurants with the lowest grade (C) will have the opportunity to improve their standards or fix any violations in advance of a re-inspection within 30 days, the Globe reported, at which point their grade will either get bumped up or will stand until the next regularly scheduled inspection.

Food trucks, cafeterias, and other vendors will also be subject to this new standard of review.

William Christopher, the head of Boston's Inspectional Services Department, which will oversee this new program, told the Globe: "We want to make it as simple as we can for people to understand the health conditions at our restaurants."

Meanwhile, Bob Luz, who is the president and chief executive of the Massachusetts Restaurant Association, told the Globe he had reservations about the initiative, saying such programs can oversimplify inspection results.