§ 22-20-5 — Regulations for Establishments Handling Food and Providing Public Accommodations

(a) The State Committee on Public Health shall, as conditions demand, adopt and promulgate regulations for the construction, maintenance and operation of all establishments, and their immediate surroundings, in which foods or beverages intended for sale for human consumption are made, prepared, processed, displayed for sale in an unpackaged state or served and for the construction, maintenance and operation of hotels, inns, taverns, motels, tourist courts, tourist homes, trailer courts or any place where sleeping accommodations for transients, tourists or vacationists are advertised for sale, as well as regulations for the construction, maintenance and operation of exhibition-ground food concessions, poultry slaughterhouses and animal slaughterhouses, and their surroundings; except, that the authority hereby vested shall not include the authority to conduct meat and poultry slaughter and processing inspections and other inspections conducted by the Department of Agriculture and Industries pursuant to Sections 2-17-1 through 2-17-38. Copies of the said regulations shall be furnished to county health officers, who, as authorized representatives of the State Health Officer, shall enforce such regulations within their respective jurisdictions.
(b) This section shall not restrict the power of county boards of health nor of municipal corporations to adopt more stringent, emergency regulations or ordinances, respectively.
(c) Whenever the State Health Officer officially notifies the judge of probate of a county or the officials of a municipal corporation that he is in position to secure the enforcement of any, or all, of the aforesaid regulations authorized in this section in any county or municipality, such notice shall constitute official declaration of the fact that said regulations are in effect in said county and said municipality, and it shall be unlawful thereafter for the judge of probate of said county or for the city clerk of said municipality to accept payment for, or to issue, a privilege license for the operation of any establishment governed by said regulations unless the applicant for said license is in possession of a valid permit issued by the health officer for the operation of said establishment. It shall, therefore, be unlawful to operate, within any county or any incorporated municipality within the State of Alabama, wherein the aforesaid regulations have been declared to be in effect, any establishment which is governed by said regulations unless the operator of such establishment possesses a valid permit from the health officer for its operation; and further, the health officer is hereby authorized and empowered to suspend or revoke, after the expiration of reasonable time specifically named in an official written notice to the operator, the permit for the operation of an establishment governed by the aforesaid regulations, for the flagrant or continuous violation of any provisions of said regulations.
(d) The health officer is hereby authorized and empowered to institute proceedings in the circuit court to enjoin the operation of any establishment governed by the aforesaid regulations when no more reasonable course of action will serve to protect the public health. When the operation of an establishment is ordered enjoined by the court, such order shall be enforced by the same authorities and in the same manner as are other similar court orders.
(e) The health officer is hereby authorized to enter any establishment governed by this section, at any time, for the purpose of inspection and is further authorized to score or grade such establishment and to post or publicly announce such score or grade. It shall be unlawful for anyone except the health officer to remove a posted score or grade, or for anyone to deface or falsely advertise a posted score or grade or to hinder a health officer or his representative in the performance of his duty.
(f) In case a county is without the services of a county health officer, or in event the county health officer requests assistance in the enforcement of the aforesaid regulations or, if in the discretion of the State Health Officer, special circumstances make it advisable to take the enforcement of the regulations authorized in this section out of the hands of the county health officer, the State Health Officer is hereby authorized to enforce the said regulations.

Legislative History

(Code 1907, §723; Acts 1919, No. 658, p. 909; Code 1923, §1146; Acts 1927, No. 640, p. 774; Acts 1935, No. 443, p. 918; Code 1940, T. 22, §85; Acts 1947, No. 52, p. 22; Acts 1947, No. 491, p. 337; Acts 1953, No. 723, p. 977.)