2006 Crumbine Award: Criteria and Nomination/Application Due Date

The Foodservice & Packaging Institute, Inc. (FPI) sponsors the 2006 Samuel J. Crumbine Award for Excellence in Food Protection at the Local Level, which annually recognizes excellence in food protection services by local environmental health jurisdictions in the United States and Canada. The application deadline for the award this year is March 15, 2006.

Named for one of America’s most renowned health officers and health educators, Samuel J. Crumbine, MD (1862-1954), the Award has elevated the importance of food protection programs within government departments and agencies and has inspired excellence in the planning and delivery of services. Entries for the Crumbine Award competition are limited to U.S. and Canadian local environmental health jurisdictions (county, district, city, town, or township) that provide food protection services to their communities under authority of a statute or ordinance. Past winners may apply five years after receiving the award.

Criteria used as the basis for all applications for the Crumbine Award, which must be followed strictly to be considered for the award, include:

-- Sustained improvements and excellence, as documented by specific outcomes and achievements, over the preceding four to six years, as evidenced by continual improvements in the basic components of a comprehensive program;
-- Innovative and effective use of program methods and problem solving to identify and reduce risk factors that are known to cause food borne illness;
-- Demonstrated improvements in planning, managing, and evaluating a comprehensive program; and
-- Providing targeted outreach; forming partnerships; and participating in forums that foster communication and information exchange among the regulators, industry and consumer representatives.

The winner is selected by an independent panel of food protection practitioners who are qualified by education and experience to discern excellence in a program of food and beverage sanitation. They represent various interests, including leading public health and environmental health associations, past Crumbine Award winners, consumer advocates and the food industry.