‘Golden A’ Awards
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Danny Thornton, Environmental Health Director at the Golden A Awards Ceremony. Thornton said The Golden A awards recognize the important hard work these food service workers are doing. He encouraged everyone to learn something new about their operation and move forward for our residents and visitors.
On March 24 I had the opportunity to attend the county’s Golden A Awards
ceremony. This event is hosted by the Environmental Health Division of the Brunswick County Health Services. This event was held at Odell Williamson Event Center at Brunswick Community College. This is the 26th year that the Golden A Awards have been given.
Environmental Health is responsible for inspecting the food service operations in Brunswick County. The reason for the Golden A Ceremony is to celebrate and recognize those restaurants and other food service operations that have gotten a 95% or above on each of their required health inspections during 2024.
In his opening remarks, Health Director David Howard said that he was impressed and proud to be able to recognize this hard work. He congratulated and thanked the
award winners for the important work they do every day to keep the community
safe. Hubert Reaves a former Environmental Health Specialist and special guest
at the ceremony said it was an honor to stand before these award winners. He
said this ceremony also honors the health department for the good job they do.
There are 550 food service operations (this includes restaurants, food stands,
meat markets, senior sites, institutional food services—nursing home dietary, pushcarts, mobile food units and school lunchrooms) that are inspected here in
Brunswick County. Out of them, 372 got the Golden A this year. That’s 67% of all the food service establishments in the county receiving these impressive scores. Wow! Among these winners were all 18 of the county’s schools and all three of the senior center sites.
Even more impressive are those that got a Platinum A award. This award is
given to operations that have received a Golden A Award for five years in a row.
There were 176 Platinum A’s awarded.
You can check out the listing of past Golden A and Platinum A award winners on
Environmental Health’s webpage. This year’s awardees will be posted soon. Those recognized were given framed certificates that you can see posted in their locations—be sure to look for them and feel confident that these folks set a high standard for food safety!
I was invited to participate in this event because I have trained many of the folks
getting these awards in food safety. N.C. Cooperative Extension in in Brunswick
County offers a Food Safety Manager Certification class called Safe Plates. This
is an evidence-based program designed at NC State that provides training on
food safety standards for managing food safety in a food service operation.
I had the opportunity to recognize some of these Safe Plates participants. After
taking the Safe Plates class, participants take an American National Standards
Institute (ANSI) test from the National Registry of Food Safety Professionals.
Upon successfully passing this test they receive their Food Safety Manager
Certification. There were three Safe Plates students that received 95% or above
on this test in 2024. These were: Felicia Deans from Carolina National Golf,
Daniel Harper from Surfer’s Café (they also got a Golden A) and Lori Tucker from
The Cheese Shoppe in Southport (they got a Platinum A. too).
The Cheese Shop in Southport received a Platinum A Award. l-r Nichole Harding, owner of the Cheese Shoppe; Cheryle Syracuse, Safe Plates Instructor, N.C. Cooperative Extension; Alli Gray, Environmental Health Specialist and Lori Tucker also from The Cheese Shoppe received special recognition for her score on the Safe Plates Food Safety Manager Certification test.
Safe Plates classes incorporate the best available science in food safety and is based on the Food and Drug Administration’s 2022 Food Code. I teach these classes several times a year with the assistance of staff members from Environmental Health. Check our website for future classes!
I’m so proud that many of my students have achieved Golden A, Platinum A and our Safe Plates awards. Congratulations to all. This is great news for all of us who live and eat here in Brunswick County.
Syracuse is a Family and Consumer Science team member and can be reached at N.C. Cooperative Extension, Brunswick County Center 910-253-2610 or clsyracu@ncsu.edu