Under Phase 5 of WA’s COVID requirements, Category 2 events (over 2,500 patrons) have a mandatory requirement for one COVID Safety Marshal per 500 patrons and for Marshals not to perform dual roles. However, a local government Authorised Officer is authorised to use their discretion and approve an alternative COVID Safety Marshal ratio or simultaneous roles, as part of an event approval. If you would like assistance in this process, please contact the Public Events team. This authorisation is supported by the COVID Safe (Phase 5) Directions and COVID Event Plans webpage. 

Local governments are reminded to submit reports on the performance of functions under the Food Act and Public Health Act for 2020/21 by 31 August 2021. The questions should be completed and submitted online. Further information is available on the Department of Health website. Please note optional reports requested under the Public Health Act will not be required for this financial year, however, will be requested as part of the 2022-23 reporting. A review of the optional report questions will be undertaken in collaboration with local government.  

In partnership with the Great Southern Environmental Health Regional Group and the City of Albany, the EHD will be hosting the Evaluation of Site and Soil Assessment Reports workshop on Friday 22 October 2021, 9am to 2:30pm. Members of the Great Southern group do not need to register. Twenty five places are available for any planners, EHOs, wastewater industry representatives or consultants to attend. Register here. 
Local governments in the Great Southern region are encouraged to promote the workshop to interested parties. Details are also available on the site and soil evaluation webpage. 

The HealthyWA website provides a range of information for the general public on a range of health and safety matters. To improve how people find information on environmental health topics, a number of new categories have been added under the "Safety and First Aid" section of the site, including:

Further improvements will be made to the look and navigation of the website over the coming year. 

The fire damaged asbestos webinar is now available to listen to on YouTube. The slides are also available below:  

The webinar feedback has been positive. It is pleasing to hear that the webinars provide the opportunity for entire teams to participate, and allow local governments in regional areas access to more learning opportunities.

A range of resources are available to assist EH professionals with managing fire damaged asbestos including:

All asbestos information is accessed on the Environmental Hazards webpage. All queries can be directed to the Chemical Hazards team on 9222 2000 or email Chemical Hazards.

A range of fees and charges related to environmental health regulations have increased and were gazetted on the 29 June 2021. Fee increases include a $79 application fee that must be paid when lodging an application to construct or install an apparatus for the treatment of sewage to the Cheif Health Officer (Department of Health). Details of this fee increase has been added to the application to install a wastewater system webpage. 

Since the release of the egg safety quiz in our last e-news 54 people have completed the quiz. The average score was 77%, with 6 people with 100% correct answers. So where do we need to improve:

Learn more about safe handling of raw egg products. 

Food Allergy Aware - all about allergen (external site) is a free online training course developed for local government authorised officers to improve food allergy management in the food service and food manufacturing sectors. The website provides an overview of the legislative context for food allergens, and other tools to assist authorised officers to help to improve practises around food allergen management and to educate the food service and food manufacturing sectors about food allergen management. 

FSANZ has developed a 3-minute video designed to introduce the basic concepts of food safety culture to food businesses. The Building a Mature Food Safety Culture Guideline (alchemysystems.com) is a practical guide that covers the five dimensions of food safety culture put forward by the Global Food Safety Initiative (vision and mission, people, consistency, adaptability, hazard and risk awareness). It provides clear steps to advance and strengthen an organisation’s maturity level in each area. It explains the new requirements of international food safety standards and how to comply with them. A range of practical examples of best practice in food safety culture are also available on the FSANZ website. 

The mobile food business centralised register is now live and can be accessed by local governments who have signed and submitted the Memorandum of Understanding. So far 43 local governments have signed up, 12 from metropolitan Perth and 31 from regional WA. Log in details are provided to participating local governments only. The site is not accessible to the general public. Read more about the register here. All queries can be directed to Food Vendor Administrator. 

Nominations are open for a metropolitan member to join LHAAC. Nominees are asked to complete the Nomination Form and email by 5pm Friday 6 August 2021 to nominations@walga.asn.au. Read more here. 

The Shire of Dardanup is gathering experts for an industry-leading, live-streamed state emergency management conference in October and are looking for dynamic presenters who can contribute under the theme ‘Building Capacity to adapt in an Era of Unprecedented Disasters’. Wednesday 13 October to be held at the Bunbury Regional Entertainment Centre. Read more and register here. 

The City of Mandurah's Health Services team was awarded best in the state for its outstanding service in environment health. This is the second time the team have been named 'Environmental Health Local Government Team of the Year' previously winning the award in 2019. The City won by delivering a range of important public health programs to the community including mosquito management, food safety, water safety, event management and community education. Read more here and view team photo here. If you think your local government is doing better, you can consider competing in next years team award. Learn more here.

In June 2016, the City released its first Public Health Plan 2016-2020. Since then, key state and local actions have occurred which have an important influence on the Plan and prompted the need for an interim review. Check out the City of Albany's updated 2018-2022 Public Health Plan. Since 2016 some key initiatives have included the development of: