California Considers White-Glove Test For Restaurant Playgrounds

Remember the mom who journeyed around the country’s quick-service restaurant playgrounds, testing them for cleanliness? Fortnightly reported the story a year ago. A California assemblyman was so concerned about the discoveries of high levels of bacteria that he wrote a bill requiring these play spaces meet strict cleaning standards. California’s restaurant playgrounds are currently unregulated.

AB1513 would require restaurants to devise policies for keeping those brightly colored plastic jungle gyms as germ-free as eating areas and keeping parents informed about a regular cleaning schedule. The bill has passed the Senate 25-12 and moved to the Assembly for concurrence. If the bill becomes law, fast-food restaurants will have to inform parents on how regularly they clean their playground structures.